SOME ASPECTS OF NEGOTIATED ORDER IN MAXIMUM SECURITY PRISONS Jim Thomas Department of Sociology Northern Illinois University DeKalb, IL 60115 (18 July, 1983) A revised version appeared as: "Some Aspects of Negotiated Order, Mesos-tructure and Loose Coupling in Maximum Security Prisons." Symbolic Interaction (1984), 7(Fall): 213-231. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Midwest Sociological Society 1981 annual Meetings, Minneapolis. I am indebted to John Johnson, Malcolm Spector and Joe Harry for their suggestions, and to three anonymous reviewers of Symbolic Interaction for their useful comments. This project was aided by the assistance, participation and encouragement of Edmond Clemons, David Stribling, Doug Gates, Reggie Smith, and especially Alex Neal, Ra Rabb Chaka, and Mike Clark. Support was provided in part by NIU faculty research stipends (1980 and 1982) and LEAA grant #79-NI-AX-0013. ABSTRACT Even in total institutions, control is far from total. Max- imum security prison residents, for example, resist extreme con- trol and use that resistance as the basis for negotiating a sys- tem more to their liking. Organizational ambiguity creates "gaps" betwen formal institutional structure and institutional behaviors which partially decouple formal rules from behaviors intended to carry out those rules, allowing for negotiatons to occur. In prisons, the residents employ a variety of strategies to negotiate at least limited autonomy, and are thus able to transform rigid prison settings into more-fluid processes of do- ing time which require continual maintenance and renegotiation. This study examines prisons as loosely coupled organizations in which participants transform their environment through a continu- ous series of negotiations which neutralize the power, authority, and control of what is usually perceived as a total institution. - ii - SOME ASPECTS OF NEGOTIATED ORDER IN MAXIMUM SECURITY PRISONS Even in total institutions, control is far from total. Residents resist extreme control and use that resistance as the basis for negotiating a system more to their liking. This means that social orders are to some extent negotiated even in situ- ations that would appear unamenable to negotiation. When this occurs, the formal organizational structure and ostensibly rigid systems of control are loosened, thus becoming decoupled from and replaced by discretionary behaviors guided by an emergent set of informal rules, tacit policies, and interaction techniques. These disconnect the behaviors of organizational participants from the goals and rules which these behaviors are intended to implement. This in turn creates dramatic possibilities for medi- ating formal organizational structure through a divers repertoire of social behaviors intended to resolve the contradictions be- tween what the organization says should be done and how function- aries propose to do it. It is hardly surprising that prison residents and guards are "discovered" to negotiate informal arrangements, obligations and relationships. Nor has there been a lack of studies describing - 1 - the social order of prisons.ý Few of these, however, examine the relationship of prison social order to the broader organization- al, structural, and social factors to which these behaviors are connected, or display the actual processes of negotiation by which social order emerges. This study supplements previous re- search by detailing more fully how order is negotiated in total institutions, and describes how prison negotiations reflect, at least in part, an accomodation by both inmates and staff to modi- fying formal organizational policy. The Negotiated Order Perspective The concept of negotiated order helps display how at least some aspects of formal social organization are worked out in dis- cretionary grey areas, and how apparently rigid, inflexible rules can themselves be neutralized. Analysis of negotiations also provide a means of examining the process by which informal rela- tions occur, rather than simply identifying their existence. Ex- amining negotiation processes also provides a means of distin- guishing differences and similarities between types of prisons, since negotiation may not occur equally in prisons of different security statuses or with high ethnic ratios between staff and inmates. Finally, analysis of negotiation processes also helps illustrate how unstable aspects of prisons can be made--through interaction-- more stable, and how instability can be transformed into stability. ý - 2 - Although friendly critics of the persepctive have argued that it has not been adequately attentive to issues of power, history or politics (Day and Day, 1977, 1978), or social struc- ture (Benson, 1977, 1978), advocates of the position (e.g., Scheff, 1968; Strauss, et. al., 1963; Strauss, 1978, 1982; Klein- man, 1982; Hall and Hall, 1982; Busch, 1982; Maines, 1977, 1978, 1982a; Sugrue, 1982; Levy, 1982; Horowitz, 1982; Luckenbill, 1979; O'Toole and O'Toole, 1981) have illustrated that the per- spective is not inappropriate for clarifying, if not fully ad- dressing, such issues. For example, the concept facilitates un- derstanding of the interrelationship between formal and informal social order, and allows interactionist researchers to display social process without ignoring social structure. That is, nego- tiated order provides an accessible analytic window into what Maines (1982b) has termed the mesostructure of social order: Mesostructures are realms of human conduct through which social structures are processed and social pro- cesses become structured. The negotiated order thus requires a mesostructural analysis in which structure and process are tightly and complexly joined. It is not just that new processes lead to new structural ar- rangements, or that structural change leads to associ- ated processual change. . . but that structural ar- rangements exist in and through processes that render those structures operative (Maines, 1982b: 277-78). Mesostructures are those intermediate realms or intertices in which the latency of negotiation arises in response to inter- actional and structural conditions. Because mesostructures are always in flux, negotiated order allows organizational research to examine how the interrelationship between structure and behav- - 3 - ior creates a loosely coupled system· of interactional exchanges, out of which this mesostructure emerges. Through negotiation, residents decouple staff behaviors and required inmate responses from formal rules. This serves to create a habitable social or- der through developing tacit understandings by committing inten- tional rule violations as direct or symbolic resistance, or by participating in ad hoc manipulation or reconstitution of exist- ing material and symbolic resources. This study will develop and apply the concept of negotiated order and also fill an empirical gap in our understanding of how prison social order emerges our of symbolic reconstruction of os- tensibly tightly-controlled environments. The focus here is es- pecially on how those who are tightly controlled, prison inmates, are able to secure advantage and benefits through various negoti- ation strategies. It will conclude by suggesting several re- search directions by which negotiations might be integrated into broader organizational analysis. Method The data here have been collected between January, 1980 and July, 1983 from a large midwest maximum security prison of ap- proximately 2,200 residents. Open-ended, unstructured, recorded and unrecorded interviews and conversations were conducted with a large (perhaps ten percent) cross-section of residents. Addi- tional data was obtained through inmate correspondence, telephone conversations, student papers, and interviews with former inmates · - 4 - of this institution. Interviews were also conducted with guards and available prison documents were also used. Some use was also made of the television documentary "Hard Time," filmed in the in- stitution of this study. Participation in a variety of resident activities in cell blocks, cells, and work, living, and recrea- tion areas provided additional data. Some prison residents also conducted recorded interviews or provided written accounts and documents of prison existence. Residents who openly and willing- ly provided information, assisted in obtaining data, and provided access to many activities normally closed to outsiders undoubted- ly had their own hidden motives. But most participated most- likely on the basis of previous prison and other experiences with the author, and in a sense became in this paper something more than "field resources," but something less than co-authors. One reviewer of this paper was concerned that the methodology might include excessive "second hand" stories or "third-person" ac- counts. Gathering data in prisons often involves what Marx (1981) has called dirty data, in that sometimes information is revealed that is embarassing or damaging. This may on occasion require that discussion be tailored to protect informants or re- searchers. At the risk of occasionally stilted discourse, few of the illustrations here are "indirect" or second hand. Negotiated Order and Prison Existence The welfare of maximum security prison residents depends largely upon an ability to maneuver in the interstices of insti- tutional control and the freedom allowed by rule ambiguity, oper- ational necessity, and staff discretion. That is, resident wel- - 5 - fare depends upon the degree to which one is able to engage in the type of social labor that accomplishes a tolerable social ex- istence. Negotiation becomes one form of social labor which serves a variety of functions, including survival, coping, con- structing a social niche, and modifying administrative policies. These functions generate a variety of negotiation techniques. This discussion will focus on four of the most salient: compro- mise, power/influence, hassling, and favors. 1. Compromise. Compromise refers to resolution of con- flicting positions (in this case, behaviors versus formal rules) through tacit or explicit settlements which allow parties to at least partially gain preferred ends. Both residents and guards can cooperate in limited but specific ways in attempts to recon- struct social existence in order to reduce the mutual costs of doing time. As one resident described with deceptive simplicity: I have a happy medium with most of the officers because I'm straight up. I'm not causin' no problems, they don't cause me none. It's understood that I can make any job hard, and it's understood with me that they can make my time hard. So we compromise ("Hard Times, a Documentary.") How compromise operates may be illustrated by the following civilian account of a "give-and-take" activity in which discre- tion and reciprocation were traded for the "privilege" to engage in illicit behavior: I was talking to two prisoners in their cell, and one said "Do you want to try some "stuff?" I said sure, and he brought out something [alcoholic] from half-gal- lon jars, and he said the first bottle was "ready." It was quite nice . . . and we finished it. He brought out another half-gallon jug, and we drank that, and got even drunker. A guard walked in and gave [X] a small can of orange juice while I was there, and [X] joked - 6 - that it was a "payoff" [the alcohol was made from or- ange juice]. I asked what I should do when guards walked by. He said "Do whatever you want, just act natural. If they see you in here, they will probably just keep walking, and tell me later, 'aha, you're trying to get [Y] drunk." If [the guards] walk by, put the glass down. Natural. Everybody knows I make it, the guards know I make it. It's like a trade-off. I violate the formal rules, but the informal rules I get by on, and they know if they bust me when they come by, they won't get a little something when they want it. Guards may come by, and I'll give them some. If I get busted, they know they won't get any more. Just don't make it look like you're challenging them, their authority. [It won't be] a problem for you, probably not even for me. No- body's going to fuck with me as long as I don't fuck with them." [He] kept filling up [my pint glass] when I wasn't looking. We drank, and [the second inmate] was supposed to be keeping "lookout," so when a guard walked by we could put the drinks down. As we drank more, [the second inmate] became increas- ingly less alert on the door. He was propped up against the cell door, half in, half out. As we became increasingly drunk . . . guards kept walking by, and finally [the second inmate] simply did not see them, and didn't report them com- ing. We were no longer subtle, and were obviously drinking in front of the guards, so they finally came and broke up the "party" by saying they had to shut the cell doors. Drinking was an outcome of a set of behavioral give-and-takes in which all participants, including the civilian, became players in a game in which organizational rules were bent as an outcome of a long, complex process of negotiations with prison staff. When excesive breeches of the negotiated rules occured, that is, when the "party" became too obvious to ignore, staff ended the compromise with subtle, yet direct, termination (for which there were no subsequent repercus- sions). The rules, the inmate said, are guidelines that can be vio- lated if you know how. In this case, the compromise involved guards' relaxation of formal rules and a corresponding cooperation by the in- mates in following pre-established "rules" guiding how violations could occur. - 7 - Compromise refers here not so much to resident-guard alliances or to enlightened humanitarianism by guards. It requires discretionary waiving of administrative control by the guards as part of usually unspoken, tacitly established give-and-take behavioral sequences in which each participant learns (often by trial and error) which behav- iors will evoke counter-behaviors. The outcomes include lightened du- ties or ease of control for guards, and easier time (e.g., more show- ers, accessible contraband, freedom of movement) for the resident. 2. PowerInfluence. In addition to compromise, a second form of negotiation includes bargaining with power and influence by individu- als or groups such as street gangs (e.g., Jacobs, 1977; Irwin, 1970, 1980). Power/influence refers to the sources of overt or covert coer- cion from which inmates are able to draw which function to neutralize the formal power and influence of the administration. Sometimes power resources derive from violence or overt threats, or at other times from the prestige or position of specific individuals or groups. Prison gangs, which comprise an estimated 75 percent of this institu- tion's population (Thomas, et. al., 1981), are especially useful as a negotiating mechanism. There is substantial agreement among "inside residents" in this institution that it is the gangs themselves, not administrative policies, that are "keeping the lid on" dramatic vio- lence. It is believed to be the "vast amounts of money to be made" by resdients (through contraband, for example) that provides the motiva- tion for preventing large-scale disruption. As a consequence, gangs and administration share an interest in maintaining a stable popula- tion. Although gangs are not "officially" acknowledged by the admin- istration, leaders can on occasion be used. For example, when certain - 8 - types of information are required, gang leaders may be "requested" to cooperate, as occured in the rape of a civilian woman, when a resident gang leader claimed "chiefs" (ie, gang leaders) were summoned to pro- vide information on the crime. This suggests that not only do such groups provide a basis for some power, but they also provide a means for engaging in conventional negotiations and bargaining. Such nego- tiation can be direct, as when prison gang leaders cooperate with prison administrators to mediate potentially explosive disputes, gen- erate compliance to rules by other residents, or serve as liason be- tween residents and administration in return for favors which benefit either the general population, or more often, specific individuals or groups. Some gangs are believed to indirectly maintain prison stabil- ity by suppressing those challenges to administrative policies which would coincidentally threaten a particular gang's power as well. This is acknowledged to have occured when one gang quickly moved to "ag- gressively discourage" some activities of newly-incarcerated political militants lest they unbalance established social arrangements between and among both residents and prison staff. This, as does the change of cellblock staff discussed below, indicates the potential fragility of negotiations and the vulnerability of negotiated arrangements, es- pecially when threatened by newcomers who may not understand or who choose to disregard the rules. Sometimes negotiations involve civilians, as occured between gangs and a respected prison chaplain which ended a potentially bloody feud (which were common during the late 1970s): We stopped at least three gang wars, because we was conven- ing the chiefs, and we come in one morning, and one of the [gang name] had been stabbed by three of the [gang name], so we pulled together the leaders of the two groups, and sat - 9 - down and talked, and it took about three hours, but when it was over with, it was over, rather than when it first came down, one of the [gang name] chiefs wanted five from the [gang name], another wanted to kill every one of the [gang name], and the [gang name] had the power to do it. They're the most powerful numerical force in there, and also the most vicious, because they're the least politicized of all the [ethnic] gangs. . .in this particular situation where this cat has been killed [the gang leaders were saying] "we want an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, we want com- pensation." The [gang name leader] wanted it in the form of blood, and I argued "We're all brothers racially and cultur- ally," and I used that as the argument, and talked about white society, and "this is exactly what they want to see happen, is for you to kill each other." The significance of inmate organizations as a force in negotiat- ing order, however, extends also to informal groups which can mediate institutional operations by using their power to define and enforce situations and redefine and enforce acceptable forms of behavior among residents: There are a number of ways we have, that we solve problems among ourselves. A few of us, that has some influence, that has some control, that has some understanding, you know-- they deal with the administration and the residents. That we deal with things ourselves, we keep somebody from going in the hole [i.e., disciplinary segregation], from loosin' some good time--but it don't happen again. It's a thing that, without the administration's approval, we take them down in the basement, down in the shower, you know, and, uh...chastize them. This type of informal discipline not only helps control at least some de-stabilizing inmate behaviors, but also saves the guards the risk of "keeping the lid on" volatile individuals. In return, staff at least tacitly reaffirm and preserve the power and influence of the inmate groups. 3. Hassling. Hassling refers to minor provocative behaviors de- signed to goad, needle, or even anger another. Hassling can be ex- pressive (or cathartic), as occurs when it reflects an immediate re- - 10 - sponse to a situation (i.e., "jumping off"), with no broader purpose. It can also be instrumental when it becomes the means to another goal. Instrumental hassling occurs when residents hassle guards in ways that are not likely to conclude with a disciplinary violation, but which can nonetheless make the costs of a guard's continued behavior unac- ceptably high. Webb and Morris (1980) have suggested that guards' fear of prison residents stems not only from a perceived threat to their physical well-being, but also includes a fear of being duped or of being made to "look poorly" in front of residents, other guards or the administration. One resident demonstrated how an opportunity to exploit guards' preservation of face can occur, and how a civilian can be used as a prop in a game to challenge face. I had managed to re- lease a resident from his cell, and he was giving me a tour through his cellblock. As we walked down a high tier of cells, we passed an- other resident returning from exercise who was awaiting a shower. My guide said softly, "watch this, I'll show you how to con a shower," and we slowed and waited near the cell of the returned exerciser. A guard approached and said to the returnee, "get ready for your show- er." My guide walked over and said, "what about me?" The guard looked at him, then at me, then back at him, and although it seemed relatively obvious that my guide had not been exercising, the guard asked, "were you playing softball too?" "Yeh, I just got back," my guide replied. The guard hesitated after a long (perhaps 15 second) pause, and said, "OK, get ready." Residents in this cellblock, unless they are engaged in athletic activity or have a medical permit, are authorized but one shower a week, and additional showers are obtained through favors, "cons," and a variety of other strategems. Whether - 11 - this guard knew of my guide's ploy and that he had just been "conned," or just needed any reasonable justification to permit a shower and thus intentionally allowed himself to be "duped" is impossible to de- termine. The point here is simply that in the resident's perception, he saw an opportunity to use me as a prop and exploit what he saw as an opportunity to negotiate a shower by challenging the guard's un- willingness to "risk" a hassle in the presence of a civilian: Now he's looking at me, and I know what's going on in his mind right now, it's "should I go back and say something, or should I keep walking," because he doesn't know if I'm sup- posed to be up here with you or locked up or what. My guide explained that he felt confident in acting as he did because he was certain that the guard would not choose to "loose face" in front of someone who "looked official." The guide therefore felt suf- ficiently confident that the guard would use discretion and ignore the established rules to announce to me his intention in advance, then successfully carry through his ploy by drawing on his knowledge of in- teractional rules and repertoire of "conning behaviors" to "win" the shower. It does not matter here what the guard actually thought. What is important is that the resident was guided by the metaphor of "face saving" that structured his actions in a way that successfully gained his ends. At stake in hassling is the "cost" of enforcing rules for which "face" becomes an exchange commodity in negotiation. In this sense, hassling reflects a "costs-benefits" model in which the price of en- forcement or compliance is situationally defined and usually "one- shot." Another form of hassling occurs through concerted "needling" of guards when undesireable behaviors occur. An example of this oc- - 12 - cured during a weekly class period in which students, mostly women, from a large university participated in a class composed of both cam- pus and inmate students. One high-ranking officer, usually stationed near the front of the institution, appeared in the school area near the end of a period. Employing highly vocal and brash bravado to "bully" the resident students into a line to return to their cells (and focusing his attention especially on those residents talking with women), the officer then attempted to engage in discussions with wo- men. The residents began making sotto voce comments audible especial- ly to the women and the officer, but not sufficiently loud to identify the source. The comments included a variation of the "dozens" (a "one-up" game alluding in unflattering terms to one's geneology, sexu- al habits, or personal flaws) and were, judging from the laughter, amusing especially to the women, and one would assume quite uncomfor- table for the officer. The object, as one resident later explained, was not so much to anger the guard (which was one immediate conse- quence), but to make him "loose face" in front of the women who seemed to be the ultimate object of his attention. In the following weeks, the guard kept a lower profile, did not disrupt, and unlike the first encounter, usually avoided the campus students, and instead hassled the resident students whenever he had an opportunity to isolate one or two from the larger group. In this way, despite the deferred cost of subsequent minor counter-hassling by the guard, the inmates altered not only strict enforcement of policies guiding class-end procedures, but shaped as well the manner in which the guard(s) enforced the poli- cies. - 13 - Hassling of guards by residents is also a means of creating the conditions for negotiation by structuring a context in which the guards cannot easily ignore or redefine existing rules. An example of this is a resident law clerk who, according to his disciplinary re- port, followed existing administrative procedures by refusing to allow another resident to use his office typewriter even though ordered to do so by a "fish" (i.e., new) guard. The resident explained to the guard the administrative procedures, but the guard interpreted this as a challenge to his authority. He cited the resident with "mutinous be- havior" and "inciting to riot" by refusing a "direct order" (which contradicted the previous direct order of the resident's supervisor). In violation of existing administrative procedures the resident was placed in disciplinary segregation. Upon release, the resident filed a law suit against the officer and others as a means of challenging the discretionary power of guards, especially when such power violates established formal rules. The intent of such lawsuits is not solely to win a favorable judicial decision, because: We can't get their money, we can't get their jobs, and we can't always even change the policies, because the policies they're violating are the same policies they've been violat- ing for years. Hassling is a means of raising "costs," partially reversing staff/resident roles (by making staff legal defendants), and in gener- al challenging "face." It takes a variety of forms, and can occur through direct or indirect confrontation between a guard and one or more residents, or can take the form even of legal challenges against guards, the administration, or state officials. Hassling functions to create situations in which administrative rules may be challenged, - 14 - circumvented, or ignored by creating confusion, uncertainty, and in- creased personal costs to staff. 4. Favors. A fourth and common from of negotiation is exchange in which favors are traded on a reasonably quid pro quo basis. Favors granted by guards include special privileges (e.g., showers, telephone calls, extra commissary, permissible rule violations), "safe" cell- mates, or protection. In return, residents provide cooperation, do favors, or perform personal tasks. One resident, a college graduate teaching in the prison general education program, explained that some guards were attending nearby colleges, and "would come by and say, 'hey, I don't have time to study.'" He would either do the administra- tive paperwork or similar tasks, or do their school assignments while the guards studied. He identified two types of reward for this activ- ity. First, there would be certan direct favors exchanged, but he felt that a more important benefit was "the chance to see what goes on, how administration gets done." This knowledge could itself become an instrument to be used, sold, or manipulated for other advantage. He also felt that this type of activity helped to neutralize some of the power or authority of the guards by creating a minimal dependency relationship which in turn weakened guards' control not just over res- idents involved, but subtly compromised guards' authority over other residents as well. He, however, like many residents, cautioned against over-generalizing the degree to which such "neutralizing" be- came a form of "corruption of authority" since guards themselves have ways of neutralizing such apparent relinquishing of control. - 15 - A more explicit form of negotiated favors occurs when residents and guards engage informal tradeoffs for mutual benefit. One resident active in prison agitation explained how a trade-off situation occured to ease tensions in a cellhouse: The system of control used by the guard staff was a human cooperative management system with flexible enforcement of rules. The social atmosphere was calm and relaxed and coop- erative. Agreements were made by the top level guard staff with the inmates, that if they cooperated with the guard staff, the guard staff would cooperate with the inmates. The guards wanted the stabbings and beatings stopped, the cellhouse cleaned and maintained. After the agreement was made, the inmates got showers every day--before they were getting showers once a week--school and recreation lines were taken to their destination on time and regularly, there were even attempts to get inmates more recreation, easy ac- cess to telephone calls--some inmates were making on an av- erage three phone calls a month before. Rules became more flexible, inmates did less cell time. Movement restrictions were at a minimum, and tickets, violation reports, were used more sparingly and prudently. There seems to be as if a cease-fire had been called and all the warring parties had curtailed their aggressing. Since ticketing was curtailed, there were fewer incidents of inmates being walked to the segregation unit, and subsequently there were less privileg- es being denied. Because of the less repressive measures used by guards, there were fewer formal grievances filed against guards by residents. There were fewer suits filed, and fewer incidents of threats and use of force by inmates. This illustrates how discretion and tacit, yet consequential, rules arise which can mediate both formal procedures and the problems of maximum security control as experienced both by guards and resi- dents alike. Such negotiated exchange modified the social organiza- tion, thus allowing for other forms of peaceful negotiation. But ne- gotiations and the order they produce are often ephemeral and require continual maintenance. This fragile order, created over time through experimentation, can be shattered when newcomers--in this case guards- -are unfamiliar with the negotiated order and respond to resident be- - 16 - havior either from within the framework of formal rules or their own discretionary expectations. The relaxed, calm, cooperative environment gave way to frus- tration, tension, and an increase in resistance. Captain "D" and Lieutenant "E" immediately upon taking charge start- ed enforcing inflexible and staunch adherence to rules, and regulation of lighting in cells at night. They modified the old cooperative management system to a strict authoritarian sytem. These overcontrol methods led, according to residents willing to dis- cuss changes, to fewer privileges and to an inability of guards to meet institutional goals (in that there were late lines for assign- ments and meals, a reduction in daily services). This led in turn to an increase in resistance through resumption of former illicit and un- desirable behaviors by both residents and guards, which led to an in- crease in discipliary tickets, an increase in staff-resident conflict, and a decrease in morale for all participants. In sum, negotiated favors have the capacity both to reduce guard authority (when done for guard self-interest) or to enhance guards' ability to do their job while improving the immediate and long-term conditions of prison existence for the residents. When the delicate web of negotiated order is disturbed, it can create confusion and am- biguity, and the consequences often include increased tension and hos- tility because of mutual misunderstanding of the rules which had pre- viously guided participants' behavior. - 17 - Conclusion Negotiated order does not, nor is it intended to, account for all social organization. One use of the metaphor for organizational anal- ysis is the degree to which it is able to display the loosely coupled nature of "tightly coupled" systems, and illustrate the tensions be- tween organizational rules and specified behaviors with actual behav- iors of organizational participants. Whenever organizational rules are rigid, they may be dramatically transformed in ways that neutral- ize the totalizing nature which the rules are intended to impose. As Bennis et. al. (1958) have suggested, power does not always reside in the established positions of an organization. As a consequence, power and social organization in prisons may be at least partially embedded in the highly variable and contingent nature of negotiations, and on the frequency, intensity and availability of resources to which par- ticipants have access. Negotiations relocate power in ways that tac- itly decouple the authority of total institutions from the ends such power is (at least ostensibly) intended to serve. It is, of course, presumptuous to assume that the ostensible goals of prison administra- tion are in fact the ends which policies are intended to serve. Pris- ons, as Jacobs (1977, 1982) has observed, have become highly politi- cized, experiencing intrusion from numerous sectors of society (government, media, reform groups, or social pressure). This suggests that prison administrators may have multiple agendas by which they op- erate, and that formal policy may be the symbolic ediface by which sub rosa goals are articulated. The negotiated order metaphor helps illu- minate these symbolic processes of implementing hidden agendas and - 18 - other subtle dynamics by which substantive rationality replaces formal rules in a way that creates considerable slippage between the inters- tices of control and autonomy (Thomas, 1981). Contrary to the view that negotiated interaction and manipulation may reflect a corruption of authority (e.g, McCorkle, 1978; Crouch and Marquart, 1980; Miller, et. al., 1978), negotiated order may reflect rational behavioral strategies which ultimately achieve what formal organizational poli- cies cannot. Rather than perceive "breakdown of authority" as dys- functional and corrupting, negotiations might in fact represent acco- modating behaviors by which doing time becomes possible for all participants. Although focusing on prisons, this study has implications for all interactionist research in formal organizations. The concept of nego- tiated order provides a new way of looking at often-familiar behav- iors. It suggests that behaviors that are often defined as "typical" of persons labelled "a-typical." are not necessarily a reflection of abnormal personal behaviors, but reflect rather a more-or-less normal coping response to a situation that may be otherwise overwhelming. This does not necessarily lend credence to the "imprisonization" the- sis in which prisoner social organization is seen as a consquence of the peculiar social order of prisons (Clemmer, 1958). The implica- tions are rather broader. It suggests that negotiations occur in all settings, of which prisons are but one dramatic example of the ten- sions between freedom and control. The negotiated order perspective would be useful to address a va- riety of organizational issues. First, both the forms and intensity of negotiations change over time, and the research task is to analyze - 19 - the structural and other factors that shape the form, content, and level of negotiation, as well as dissimilar negotiating skills and differential access/opportunity to the game of negotiation. Second, as the form and content of negotiation changes, so may the outcomes. For example, control strategies may change as forms of negotiation or the context of their occurance change, which may decrease the stabili- ty of the prison and occasionally lead to violence. As Skolnick (1975: 12) has suggested, whenever rules of organizational constraint are ambiguous, these rules may create or strengthen the conduct they are intended to restrain. Dramatic examples occured in the 1982 Jack- son (Michigan) Prison riot when guards attempted to enforce rules that the administration opposed (Trojanowicz, 1982), and in the 1980 New Mexico Prison riot. There, initial governor-appointed commissions at- tributed the causes of the riot to the fact that "things had gotten too slack and undisciplined" in the prison. Subsequent and more ob- jective (and less political) analyses revealed, however, that there had been a progressive elimination of discretion and personalized ap- plication of rules thus decreasing inmate incentive to participate and contribute to social control (Johnson, 1983; Television Documentary "Hard Times;" Stone, 1982). Third, negotiations may change as the power structure of prisons change. Stastny and Tyrnauer (1982: 19), for example, have identified several types of power corresponding to the ideology and function of prison. Since power transformations do not occur by fiat but involve a long process of conflict, tension and redefinition of coercion-com- pliance-resistance strategies, the research task becomes one of dis- - 20 - playing how negotiations inhibit, facilitate, or otherwise change as a prelude to or outcome of power shifts. Finally, negotiated order al- lows for placing the context of organizational change in a historical perspective by tracing how specific historical configurations have shaped or altered interaction processes. An example for prisons would be how the changing nature of racism over the past 30 years has led to administrative, legal, ideological, and similar changes that shape in- teraction. Social order emerges through divers and complex processes, of which negotiation is one generating factor. In this study I have at- tempted to suggest that the concept of negotiated order provides a useful way of displaying how social orders become processed in the me- sostructure of organizational life. Because organizational outcomes, even in the most-total of organizations, rely on interaction and the labor of symbolically enacted formal rules and mandate, the concept of negotiations provides one means of displaying the emergence and main- tenance of social order. If successful, this essay should encourage further debate over and application and refinement of the concept as a useful technique of refining our understanding of the structuring of social order. - 21 - Footnotes 1. Goffman (1961) has defined total institutions as those organi- zations which break down the barriers ordinarily separating the spheres of work, sleep, and play: First, all aspects of life are conducted in the same place and under the same single authority. Second, each phase of the member's daily activity is carried on in the immediate company of a large batch of oth- ers, all of whom are treated alike and required to do the same thing together. Third, all phases of the day's activities are tightly scheduled, with one ac- tivity leading at a prearranged time into the next, the whole sequence of activities being imposed from above by a system of explicit formal rulings and a body of officials. Finally, the various enforced ac- tivities are brought together into a single rational plan purportedly designed to fulfill the official aims of the institutions (Goffman, 1961: 6). In maximum security prisons, this analytic definition reflects the symbolic mandate which organizes operations and which pro- vides a unifying set of symbols through which organizational work is done. 2. The literature on prisoner social organization, too numerous to cite, tends to involve a-theoretical and a-conceptual descrip- tions of prison life. For an excellent extended bibliographic essay on this literature, see Bowker, 1977. 3. Although not explicitly discussed, this study is informed by the metaphor of loose coupling, which sensitizes us to the out- come of negotiations. Loose coupling provides a a cognitive mapping device that sensitizes researchers to tensions between social structure and interaction (e.g., Weick, 1969, 1976, 1980; Manning, 1979b; Thomas, 1980, 1981, 1983a; Rubin, 1979). The metaphor implies a lack of connection or a loose "fit" be- - 22 - tween, for example, prison organizational apparatus of security or administration on one hand, and the means by which these are to be carried out and the intended results on the other. There appears to occur in maximum security prisons a variety of means which partially neutralize the total character of such institu- tions. This in turn creates a form of social and organization- al slippage which reflects the loosely coupled social structure of even rigidly controlled and tightly monitored institutions. By selecting from a repertoire of available behaviors, prison residents may, with varying degrees of success, alter, oppose, refuse, ignore, transform, or simply adjust to organizational social arrangements. - 23 - BIBLIOGRAPHY BIBLIOGRAPHY Bennis, W.C., N. Berkowitz, M. Affinito and M. Malone. 1958. "Authority, Power, and the Ability to Influence." Human Relations, 11:143-155. Benson, J. Kenneth. 1978. "Reply to Maines." Sociological Quarterly, 19(Summer): 497-498. Analysis." Sociological Quarterly. 18(Winter): 3-16. Bowker, Lee H. 1977. Prisoner Subcultures. Lexington (Mass): Lexington. Busche, Lawrence. 1982. "History, Negotiation, and Structure in Agriculture Business." Urban Life, 11(October): 368-384. Carroll, Leo. 1977. 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