The analysis reveals that the ideas on risk and governmentality expressed in the research literature provide a framework for the governance of everyday prison life. The prison admission handbooks clearly place the responsibility of inmate management squarely on the shoulders of those being governed: the inmates themselves. In an effort to motivate inmates to govern themselves, the handbooks rely on a managerial language that renders inmates as “just another client group or customer base.” By approaching inmates as another client group, the rhetoric of prison management denies the particularity of penal institutions and places all the responsibility for self-improvement and order on the inmates. Other findings indicated that women’s behavior and sexuality was more heavily regulated than men’s behavior and sexuality, suggesting that although women generally pose the minimal security threat, they are approached as if they are in need of greater control. Indeed, in all the time periods under analysis, women’s behavior and dress is subjected to more detailed rules and regulations than those of their male counterparts. Prison admission handbooks from the 1960s and 1970s contain language promising individualized care to prepare inmates for release while the more recent prison admission handbooks contain more mission statements and stress the inmates’ role in maintaining order and realizing their potential. The author argues that this type of language disguises the true workings of power within correctional institutions and implies the existence of some type of social contract between customers and service providers. In so doing, the penal industry is seeking to gain legitimacy in the face of the official rejection of the rehabilitative ideal. Notes, references