The Value of Social Positioning Inside a Forensic Psychiatry Service. An Ethnographic Account from a Residence for the Execution of Security Measures

In 2015, following the closure of Judicial Psychiatric Hospitals, the Italian NHS launched new forensic facilities: the Residences for the Execution of Security Measures (REMS). Inside REMSs, healthcare professionals work to rehabilitate individuals who have committed crimes and who have been judged both socially dangerous and mentally ill. Based on an ethnographic project within a REMS in Northern Italy, this contribution explores how healthcare workers balance their care role with the demands for social control imposed by the institution. The findings reveal that staff members often navigate conflicting roles, sometimes employing informal resistance strategies against institutional demands that conflict with their professional ethics: in this way they are able to negotiate their identity and agency in a highly controlled environment, particularly when managing sensitive issues like patients’ sexuality.