Insurgent citizens in the U.S. detention regime: a case study of mobilization and rights claims from within an Ohio immigration prison

ABSTRACT

Foundational literature on ‘insurgent citizenship’ highlights how spaces of both exclusion and encounter among marginalized groups lead them to reimagine traditional practices of citizenship through mobilization, occupation, and claims related to place and legal rights. Recent scholarship, especially work written by undocumented activists themselves, illustrates the power of this approach in contemporary movements for justice in North America, especially in the construction of spaces of abolitionist sanctuary, and the valuable role of critical participatory methods in illuminating such forms of social action. Building on this praxis-based body of scholarship, our case study centers on a mobilization by detained activists against abuses and violations of rights during the Covid-19 pandemic at Butler County Jail in Hamilton, Ohio, and the role of strategic alliances between external allies and people within the jail. Through a mixed-methods approach (interviews, discourse analysis, and participant observation) and drawing on critical methodologies of accompaniment and witnessing, we examine how this mobilization constituted a form of ‘insurgent citizenship’.

KEYWORDS:

• Insurgent citizenship
• political mobilization
• rights claims
• solidarity
• detention regime

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Miranda Cady Hallett

Miranda Cady Hallett (PhD Cornell University 2009) is a legal anthropologist and associate professor at the University of Dayton, and currently directs the Human Rights Studies program.

Yulianna Otero-Asmar

Yulianna Otero-Asmar is a graduate of the University of Dayton with degrees in Women's and Gender Studies and Human Rights Studies with a minor in Anthropology, and is working in the nonprofit sector in Puerto Rico.