Six years after its launch, the Diploma in Building Citizen Security —a university extension program of the National University of Mar del Plata coordinated from inside Batán Penitentiary Unit No. 15— is now in its fifth cohort. Diana Márquez, secretary of Cooperativa Liberté, director of the Víctimas por la Paz association, and president of the Argentine Society of Restorative Justice (SAJuR), and Ricardo Augman, treasurer of the cooperative and coordinator of the Mental Health Program, share the general coordination. In this conversation, they explain how the program sustains itself from the inside.
Six years, a revolution we did not expect
The diploma program was born in 2021 with a feature unprecedented in the Spanish-speaking world: it was coordinated entirely from inside a penitentiary unit and moderated 100% by people in prison. Six years later —there was no cohort in 2024 due to lack of technological equipment— it has completed four cohorts with thousands of students and graduates from 25 countries. Márquez revisits that beginning with mixed feelings.
It is a bit dual. On one hand, it was a revolution, a milestone for Liberté and for the entire network that sustains it, each from their own space: a unique place in thought, creativity, and voice. We knew that. But we did not imagine the impact it would have on the outside, on people. That also left us in a place of surprise.
The recognition that came from outside, she says, brought both an enormous joy and a new responsibility: that of knowing they were being watched. Over the years, that response never let up.
We are in the fifth cohort and we increasingly feel that the diploma is a central and necessary place, because it is our voice: the voice of people in prison. And it is also a way to think about the future. When those who think, imagine, and dream are the same people who live these experiences firsthand —without being mediated, without others thinking for them— there is a unique significance and emancipatory force in that.
Augman, who shares the general coordination and runs the Mental Health Program, also recalls those first years as a turning point.
Indeed, I think it was a revolution: a way of creating a space for dialogue, discussion, exchange of knowledge, and community, with unprecedented characteristics. Bringing together on equal terms people in prison, penitentiary service officers, family members, human rights organizations, judicial experts, judges, and lawyers. And seeing the growing number of people year after year is, in some way, confirmation that we chose a correct and necessary path toward making the concrete walls surrounding prisons more permeable.
A class inside and outside of prison
Much of what makes the diploma distinctive comes down to its classroom. Augman thinks through content together with those inside Batán Penitentiary Unit No. 15, and from that vantage point describes what changes, and what does not, when preparing a class inside the prison.
In principle there are no major differences, beyond accounting for the obstacles that can arise inside a penitentiary setting, some unexpected situation or security issue. But our way of thinking about education, conversation, and engaging with topics has similar characteristics. When you think of people in terms of equality —regardless of their social condition, political opinions, religious or spiritual orientation, or the legal situation they are going through, which is always temporary— and you set aside differences to look for what is common, a class is a class whether it is inside prison or outside. That is what makes Liberté's space different.
That baseline equality translates into concrete rules of coexistence in the classroom.
We have established very serious and very deep agreements, ones that sometimes do not exist in university classrooms. We have a basic rule, which is respect for diverse opinions, and it is followed strictly: we do not get into narcissistic disputes, and every time that kind of tension appears it is resolved quickly, without entering a game that never ends well. In our house, so to speak, all opinions are welcome: those that feel friendlier and more familiar to us and those that feel rougher or more distant. That is also a major difference from academic spaces.
For Augman, what has been built over these years goes beyond each cohort.
This diploma also made possible the meeting of professionals and experts in various fields, with an unusual level of equality for what adult learning spaces usually look like. Very deep encounters were achieved, full of reflection, that over time will become objects of study: not only because of what we learn and exchange in each edition, but because the space itself is a phenomenon that would deserve in-depth study.
Between crime victims and prison
Márquez holds an uncommon position: she is secretary of Cooperativa Liberté —an organization of people in prison and formerly incarcerated people— and at the same time director of Víctimas por la Paz, an association of crime victims. That dual membership, she says, is the foundation of her perspective.
That dual membership is almost unique; in my reading of Restorative Justice, I would say it is one hundred percent symbolic. It is very uncommon. And sustaining it comes from a fundamentally non-binary view of the human: I try to be consistent with that and with the importance I place on people, on the spaces they inhabit, and on communities and their transformations.
That non-binary view —one that does not lock anyone into the category of victim or perpetrator— runs through her daily work between two worlds that society tends to think of as opposites.
«The concept of victim is enormously broad»
One singular feature of the virtual classroom is its composition: in a single class, people in prison and formerly incarcerated people sit alongside victims of serious crimes, judges, lawyers, social workers, criminologists, and family members. For Márquez, it is precisely that crossing that enriches the dialogue.
Working in an articulated way between crime victims and people in prison shows you that the boundaries are very blurry: between the victim as we socially imagine them and the person in prison, who is also a victim of other situations. Being on each side taught me that the concept of victim is enormously broad, that it is not exclusive to anyone. And that you have to approach these phenomena without judging, without preconceptions, with humility —without believing you own any revealed truth—: understand, help others build, and let others help you build as well.
That dialogue between crime victims and people who caused harm has years of practice behind it. Márquez describes it as something you go through personally, before any method.
This dialogue, in the same virtual or in-person space, is something we have shared for many years. Perhaps what is most interesting is thinking about how one gets there: how a victim of an atrocious crime ends up in a prison. There I allow myself to speak of a process, of going through many personal stages to arrive at this setting, to be all of us together.
What sustains that dialogue, she says, is a commitment to humanity. And she clarifies: a virtuous humanity.
The dialogue is sustained by proposing humanity, and that humanity is returned to me with interest. I speak of a virtuous humanity, because humanity can also cause harm, wars, and disasters, like the ones we see every day inside and outside of prison. A humanity that thinks about peacemaking, integration, the most difficult dialogue, and that sustains itself by listening and by also questioning myself. Prison makes you acquainted with the most extreme and most basic experiences in life.
For Márquez, what brings them together is more elemental than any label.
People in prison and crime victims —if they can even be placed on separate shelves— need a future. A brighter future, a way out of these places: out of the place of victim, out of the place without freedom. That is what unites us. And from there, thinking and working together for education and work. Coordinating everything that Liberté does, as secretary of the cooperative and as director of an association of victims, for me is an honor.
«For me, this diploma is light»
Near the end, Márquez sums everything up in a single sentence.
For me, this diploma is light. That is my sentence. And long live Liberté, as Mario Juliano wrote.
Augman, for his part, chooses an image.
For me it represents Harry Potter's invisibility cloak, because what we have achieved through the diploma is making the walls invisible: allowing people from different backgrounds, from different countries and provinces, to enter into dialogue and share knowledge, experiences, ideas, and projects, without the wall being a barrier. Through the diploma we have achieved that: making the prison walls invisible.
«Sign up»
To those reading this article who are hesitant to join, Márquez speaks plainly.
I hope no one hesitates to sign up. Sign up, because it is not just the learning: it is the community that this diploma has been bringing together for so many years. A community that accompanies us, listens to us, understands us. And I have no doubt that it also benefits the rest of society, even if society does not know it exists: spaces like Liberté and its activities translate into improvement for everyone.
A paradigm, permeated by dignity
Toward the end, Márquez brings together the pillars that the diploma proposes as a different paradigm of citizen security: not the paradigm of punishment, but of care.
Integration, transformation, and security understood from our point of view —working toward zero recidivism, supporting mental health— make up a new paradigm for society, all permeated by the dignity of people in prison.
More information and registration
Full details on the course schedule, curriculum, and teaching staff are available on the diploma program page.
Registration is now open and can be completed through the registration form. Questions can be sent by email to formacion@universidadliberte.org and by WhatsApp at +54 9 223 678-9264.
Participants who complete 75% of the sessions and submit the practical assignments will receive a University Extension Diploma issued by the National University of Mar del Plata, through the Extension Secretariat of the Faculty of Social Work and Health Sciences.
