Philosophy in Prison

Abstract

This chapter is centred around the elective course “Philosophy in Prison” offered to last-year law students of ESADE Business and Law School in Barcelona, Spain. It is taught inside a Catalan prison, and the participants are, in equal numbers, law students from the university and imprisoned people from a penitentiary centre. During 10 weekly sessions the group engages in a dialogical exploration around topics essential to human existence such as identity, happiness, justice, or forgiveness. The mainstream law education provides young students a purely theoretical and partial understanding of the law, which reinforces the harmful prejudices about incarcerated people and other minorities embedded in the judicial system they will represent. This chapter dives into why Socratic Dialogue is an extremely efficient method to instil in the future lawyers a commitment to social justice and inclusion, essential components for healthy, just, and thriving democracies.