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KeithEdelmanFirstPaper 5 - 19 Aug 2009 - Main.EbenMoglen
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| META TOPICPARENT | name="FirstPaper" |
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| | | While many might agree that rehabilitation should be the ultimate goal of our criminal justice system, the reality is that mass incarceration is unlikely to subside anytime soon. The first step in achieving such massive change is to understand why this phenomenon has developed. The recent devotion to free market ideology provides numerous answers. Stigmatized by the corollaries of this paradigm, inmates are incarcerated to provide mental and purported practical benefits for society. In light of the recent economic meltdown, this analysis will hopefully facilitate a reexamination of our criminal justice system and produce much needed social change. | |
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- I don't understand the analysis here. For some reason, anti-regulatory pro-business laissez-faire ideology is supposed to be connected in so direct a way to the American enthusiasm for incarceration, that it can be seriously proposed that a downturn in the economy will result in changes in the theory of criminal punishment, not because we can't afford to imprison as extensively as we do now, but for some less immediate cultural reason, which after two readings I'm not sure I can specify. (My puzzlement is made worse by the fact that free market ideology is used to explain both why people defend prisons as good for economic development and attack prisons on NIMBY grounds.)
- It is true, of course, that recession is bringing about a crisis in prison funding, as can be seen most clearly at this stage in California. I do not see any sign, however, that the change is in attitudes about whether we should imprison large numbers of people, but only in our ability to fulfill our appetite for incarceration given the cost. If you had public opinion data, or indeed any species of evidence to present in support of your conclusions, it would have been welcome.
- This draft is definitely an attempt to address the problems with the first draft, and it constitutes progress. What it needs next is some factual support, and some analytic clarification.
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| META FILEATTACHMENT | attachment="LCP63DWinterSpring2000P257.pdf" attr="" comment="Rethinking Welfare Rights, Journal of Law and Contemporary Problems, Duke University" date="1240164582" name="LCP63DWinterSpring2000P257.pdf" path="LCP63DWinterSpring2000P257.pdf" size="317368" stream="LCP63DWinterSpring2000P257.pdf" user="Main.KeithEdelman" version="1" |
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