In the preceding chapter, I presented evidence that incarceration can create communities of inmates that are best described not as relations of “mutual aid, loyalty, affection, and respect” or as a “war of all against all,” but instead as a precarious combination of the two. As Gresham Sykes pointed out, describing the social dynamics of inmate life: “In actuality, the patterns of social interaction among inmates are to be found scattered between these two theoretical extremes. The population of prisoners does not exhibit a perfect solidarity yet neither is the population of prisoners a warring aggregate. Rather, it is a mixture of both and the society of captives lies balanced in an uneasy compromise.” The social effects of higher-security prisons, in particular, are marked by both solidarity and strife; inmates form strong social ties, but these groups serve as the basis for development of contentious and sometimes even violent inter-group norms. Thus, life for inmates within the prison setting may be experienced simultaneously as “predominantly cohesive” and as “a jungle-like existence.”