This article explores how self-isolation in Danish prisons engages the prohibition of torture, inhuman and degrading treatment. Despite international criticism and established harms associated with solitary confinement more broadly, under Danish law, self-isolation is considered a prisoner’s right and is understood to reflect the state’s respect for prisoners’ autonomy. By combining qualitative interviews with self-isolated prisoners and an extensive legal analysis, we question this assumed autonomy – the core principle underpinning the practice – and how it is used to shield its harms from the scrutiny of torture’s prohibition. Our findings suggest that not only does self-isolation implicate the state in protecting its prisoners, the full recognition of its inflicted suffering presents distinct challenges for prevailing interpretations of the prohibition. We conclude that the current practice of rights-based isolation is not a prisoner’s right to escape violence but effectively a right to choose between sources of violence.
ArmstrongS (2020) At risk of rights: Rehabilitation, sentence management and the structural violence of prison. Critical Criminology28(1): 85–105.
2.
BaşoğluM (ed.) (2017) Torture and Its Definition in International Law: An Interdisciplinary Approach. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
3.
BrasholtMSveaassNSalesPP, et al. (2023) Protocol on medico-legal documentation of solitary confinement. Torture33(1): 92–118.
4.
BrownE (2023) Prison Segregation: The Limits of Law. London: Routledge.
5.
CakalE (2022) Assessing (and making sense of) severity: Conceptualising and contextualising torture’s core. Nordic Journal of International Law91(2): 284–309.
6.
CakalE (2025a) An ‘aptitude for isolation’: Using resilience in dismissing the suffering of solitary confinement. Nordic Journal of Human Rights43: 202–215.
7.
CakalE (2025b) Recognising psychological suffering in adjudicating torture’s prohibition: Between precedent and practice at the European court of human rights, the inter-American court of human rights and the UN committee against torture. PhD Thesis, The University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen.
8.
CakalE (forthcoming) Law and Torture. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
9.
CanningV (2023) Torture and Torturous Violence: Transcending Definitions of Torture. Bristol: Bristol University Press.
10.
CAT (2016) Concluding observations on the combined sixth and seventh periodic reports of Denmark. CAT/C/DNK/CO/6-7. UN Committee against Torture.
11.
CAT (2024) Information received from Denmark on follow-up to the concluding observations on its eighth periodic report. CAT/C/DNK/FCO/8. UN Committee against Torture.
12.
ChristieN (1986) The ideal victim. In: FattahEA (ed.) From Crime Policy to Victim Policy. Basingstoke: Macmillan, pp. 17–30.
13.
CPT (2002) Report to the Government of Denmark on the visit to Denmark. CPT/Inf(2002)18. European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
14.
CreweBGoldsmithAHalseyM (eds) (2022) Power and Pain in the Modern Prison: The Society of Captives Revisited. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
15.
CreweBHulleySWrightS (2020) Life Imprisonment from Young Adulthood. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
16.
ECmHR (1978) Ensslin, Baader and Raspe v. Germany.
17.
ECtHR (2005) Öcalan v. Turkey (no 1).
18.
ECtHR (2006) Ramirez Sánchez v. France.
19.
ECtHR (2009) Pishchalnikov v. Russia.
20.
ECtHR (2011) Premininy v. Russia.
21.
ECtHR (2015) Bouyid v. Belgium.
22.
ECtHR (2016a) Buzadji v. the Republic of Moldova.
23.
ECtHR (2016b) Muršić v. Croatia.
24.
ECtHR (2017) Rezmiveș and others v. Romania.
25.
ECtHR (2018) A.T. v. Estonia (no 2).
26.
ECtHR (2020) Pranjic-M-Lukic v. Bosnia and Herzegovina.
27.
ECtHR (2023) Semenya v. Switzerland.
28.
EngboHJ (2019) Normalisering og isolation. In: RuaMSmithPS (eds) Isolasjon – Et Fengsel i Fengselet. Oslo: Cappelen Damm Akademisk, pp. 211–250.
29.
FeeleyMMSimonJ (1992) The new penology: Notes on the emerging strategy of Corrections and its implications. Criminology30(4): 449–474.
30.
FoucaultM (1977) Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books.
31.
FransenPSmithPS (2022) Shaping Nordic punishment. In: ChristensenMJLohneKHörnqvistM (eds) Nordic Criminal Justice in a Global Context. London: Routledge, pp. 39–58.
32.
Hannah-MoffatK (2001) Punishment in Disguise: Penal Governance and Canadian Women’s Imprisonment. Toronto, ON, Canada: University of Toronto Press.
33.
LawsB (2021) Segregation seekers: An alternative perspective on the solitary confinement debate. The British Journal of Criminology61(6): 1452–1468.
34.
LieblingA (2011) Moral performance, inhuman and degrading treatment and prison pain. Punishment & Society13(5): 530–550.
35.
LobelJSmithPS (eds) (2019) Solitary Confinement: Effects, Practices, and Pathways Toward Reform. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
36.
LönnqvistESmithPS (2025) Innocent in theory, punished in practice: Assessing the punitiveness of Swedish and Danish pre-trial practice. Incarceration6: 1–19.
37.
MavronicolaN (2021) Torture, Inhumanity and Degradation under Article 3 of the ECHR: Absolute Rights and Absolute Wrongs. London: Hart Publishing.
38.
MiersD (1978) Responses to Victimisation. London: Professional Books.
39.
Ministry of Justice (2010) Begrænsning af udelukkelse fra fællesskab og enerumsanbringelse af indsatte. Copenhagen: Ministry of Justice.
40.
NowakM (2017) Powerlessness as a defining characteristic of torture: Comments on Metin Başoğlu’s ‘Definition of Torture in US Law’. In: BaşoğluM (ed.) Torture and Its Definition in International Law: An Interdisciplinary Approach. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
41.
O’DonnellI (2014) Prisoners, Solitude and Time. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
42.
O’RourkeM (2024) Human Rights and the Care of Older People: Dignity, Vulnerability, and the Anti-Torture Norm. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
43.
PintoM (2022) Human Rights as Sources of Penality. PhD Thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science, London.
44.
ReiterKSextonLSumnerJ (2018) Theoretical and empirical limits of Scandinavian exceptionalism: Isolation and normalization in Danish prisons. Punishment & Society20(1): 92–112.
45.
RowlandADeCaroJReiterK (2025) The securitization of research ethics: Navigating the ethics of engaging criminalized voices. Theoretical Criminology. Epub ahead of print 13 April 2025. DOI: 10.1177/13624806251325538.
46.
RudesDSMagnusonSIngelS (2025) Purposive placement: Autonomy through self-lock-up in restrictive housing units. The British Journal of Criminology65(5): 1016–1034.
47.
ShahlaeiF (2025) The anatomy of a valid waiver of human rights. Human Rights Law Review25(2): 1–22.
48.
ShalevSEdgarK (2015) Deep Custody: Segregation Units and Close Supervision Centres in England and Wales. London: Prison Reform Trust.
49.
SimonJ (2007) Governing Through Crime: How the War on Crime Transformed American Democracy and Created a Culture of Fear. New York: Oxford University Press.
50.
SmithPS (2008) Solitary confinement. An introduction to the Istanbul statement on the use and effects of solitary confinement. Torture18(1): 56–62.
51.
SmithPS (2011) A critical look at Scandinavian exceptionalism: Welfare state theories, penal populism and prison conditions in Denmark and Scandinavia. In: UgelvikTDullumJ (eds) Penal Exceptionalism? Nordic Prison Policy and Practice. London: Routledge, pp. 38–57.
52.
StoyanovaV (2023) Positive Obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights: Within and Beyond Boundaries. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
53.
SykesGM (1958) The Society of Captives: A Study of a Maximum-Security Prison. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
54.
TaxhjelmFR (2025) In the veil of rights: Voluntary isolation in Danish prisons. Incarceration6: 1–19.
55.
TaxhjelmFR (under review) The self in self-isolation: Making sense of the emptiness of prison segregation.
56.
TaxhjelmFRCreweB (2025) The depth of imprisonment and the dilution of self. Punishment & Society. Epub ahead of print 6 August 2025. DOI: 10.1177/14624745251363610.
57.
TaxhjelmFRKessingPV (2025) Frivillig udelukkelse fra fællesskab i danske fængsler og arresthuse. Copenhagen: The Danish Institute for Human Rights.
58.
The Danish Parliamentary Ombudsman (2019) Exclusion from association. Copenhagen: The Danish Parliamentary Ombudsman.
59.
UgelvikT (2014) Power and Resistance in Prison. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
60.
UNGA (1984) Convention against torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. Treaty Series 1465. UN General Assembly.
61.
UNSRT (2017) Report of the special rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. UN. A/72/178. UN General Assembly.
62.
WildemanCAndersenLH (2020) Long-term consequences of being placed in disciplinary segregation. Criminology58(3): 423–453.
