Indigenous imprisonment. State imposition of prison and the duty to respect indigenous justice in Colombia

Abstract

This essay argues that the serious situation of overcrowding, uprooting, loss of identity and cultural integrity of indigenous people in prison requires emphasizing intercultural measures that guarantee the application of ethnic and cultural diversity principle. To develop this idea, the first section shows the neglect of indigenous people in prison and the problems of multicultural jurisprudence that claims to protect them (I). The second section argues that an intercultural perspective has more advantages than a multicultural perspective to overcome the serious situation of indigenous people in prison and to implement at least two indigenous proposals: intercultural prison indigenous treatment and harmonization centers or their equivalents according to the worldview of each people (II). The third section draws attention to the advantages of intercultural dialogue and presents, based on the participant observation of the authors, a balance of the prior consultation process of the legal instrument that seeks to regulate the conditions of indigenous people deprived of liberty in prison (III).