Att fånga känslor : Om kriminalvårdares emotionella arbete inom häkten

Sammanfattning: Abstract The purpose of this study is to explore how prison officers in Sweden manage their feelings in remand prisons versus inmates and colleagues. Due to changes in the prison officers occupational role and work environment we found it profoundly interesting to study how prison officers perceive and reflect on their emotion management, that relates to the work they perform. The prison officers occupational role includes tasks that corresponds with security work and rehabilitative labor towards inmates, this tend to create a complexity as the occupational role consists of contradictive tasks. They need to uphold safety by physical means simultaneously as they need to become more intimate with inmates to accomplish the rehabilitative tasks. The study proceeds with a qualitative inquiry with six interviews from three different remand prisons around Sweden. The interviews are divided into two informants from each remand prison. The results proclaims that prison officers need to manage emotions that are generated from the institutional environment, as well as from their colleagues and the inmates. The emotional work is marked as a multifaceted emotional work that changes due to different circumstances and work tasks.  The results doesn’t give a general approach to the matter, but it contributes to knowledge and a deeper understanding of the prison officers occupational sphere.