When Punishment Begins at Home: Understanding the Drivers of Penal Experience Within Norway’s Electronic Monitoring Program

Norway’s correctional geography has shifted dramatically, with 40% of “unconditional prison sentences” now being served exclusively via front-door electronic monitoring (EM). This turn to EM aims to reduce negative consequences of imprisonment, but how is EM experienced by those punished this way? Through interviews with EM-clients, this study analyzes penal experiences along Sexton’s framework of penal consciousness and Todd-Kvam’s framework of pain vs. suffering. Clients experienced pains from EM’s restrictions on their movements, but when weighed against imprisonment, the salience and severity of EM was often ameliorated. Some clients, however, experienced suffering, thus contrasting EM’s punitive contours, even as a penal alternative, against its proposed benefits.