Non Incarceration

The policy options that will be discussed are establishing efficient and beneficial rehabilitation systems in prisons, establishing educational systems in prisons, eliminating private prisons, and reducing mandatory sentencing laws. These are a few of the many ideas and solutions that the United States can take in order to reduce its high incarceration rate.

Ever since the first prison opened in the United States in 1790, incarceration has been the center of the nations criminal justice system. Over this 200 year period many creative alternatives to incarceration have been tried, and many at a much lower cost than imprisonment. It wasn’t until the late 1980’s when our criminal justice systems across the country began experiencing a problem with overcrowding of facilities. This problem forced lawmakers to develop new options for sentencing criminal offenders.

Our group chose the topic of mass incarceration because it is extremely relevant in this day and age. There are hundreds of thousands of American citizens that have been incarcerated for a variety of crimes. When mass incarceration was first introduced it was unknowingly supporting the “War on Drugs”, which we will go into more detail in the paper. The war on drugs inevitably became a war on people. The penalties of carrying different types of drugs became more severe, and those who were caught by the police were minority groups especially young African American men. The consequences of mass incarceration occur in more than just a jail cell. Once prisoners are released, it is extremely difficult to become employed once there is a conviction following your name. Even as supporters of The Black Lives Matter Movement protested against the unfair treatment of African Americans, those who resisted against authorities were imprisoned. Throughout this paper we will see the sociological perspective of mass incarceration on todays society.

In his chapter on “Assessing the Prison Experiment,” he explained that the increase of crime rate is not the sole reason that mass incarceration occurs, and it was also because the courts and the legislature did indeed became “tougher” on offenders (Currie 14). Currie discussed the circumstances of the war on drugs, which was launched by President Richard Nixon. He indicates that the incarceration rate and sentence longevity were increased dramatically since the beginning of the war on drugs. Some of these offenders were given a sentence for more than ten years without the possibility of parole, which is taking away any chance of the prisoner being released before the completion of his or her sentence. Locking people up is a failed attempt to descend the crime rate, and the adoption of mandatory minimum sentencing law is the root of mass incarceration. The government should reconsider the current sentencing laws and reform the correctional system in order to solve the current mass incarceration problem. Furthermore, establishing more community-based programs for youth offenders and initiating early release programs are excellent alternatives to resolve the issue of mass incarceration from both long-term and short-term perspectives, respectively.

The United States prison population has grown seven-fold over the past forty years, and many Americans today tend to believe that the high levels of incarceration in our country stem from factors such as racism, socioeconomic differences, and drugs. While these factors have contributed to the incarceration rate present in our country today, I argue that the most important reason our country has such a high incarceration rate is the policy changes that have occurred since the 1970s. During this time, the United States has enacted policy changes that have produced an astounding rise in the use of imprisonment for social control. These policy changes were enacted in order to achieve greater consistency, certainty, and severity and include sentencing laws such as determinate sentencing, truth-in-sentencing, mandatory minimum sentencing, and three strikes laws (National Research Council 2014). Furthermore, I argue that mandatory sentencing has had the most significant effect on the incarceration rate.

Mass incarceration has been an issue in the United States since the start of the War on Drugs, because of the political agenda attached to the “tough on crime” regimen thousands of people have suffered as a consequence. The solution to this is one that can only be possibly solved by approaching through several angles. The ten steps presented by Michael Tonry, are an innovative and have merit to some extent. However, mass incarceration results from more than unjust sentencing laws, which is his main focus. If ever we are to resolve the issue, society and the criminal justice system must come together to completely reevaluate what we consider to be “tough on crime” and redefine the purpose of prisons, strictly punishment or rehabilitation. The focus has to shift from harsh sentencing, stigma, racial discrimination to a basic form of rehabilitation and reduction of the prison system in general. The criminal justice system has to do what they are actually meant to do and focus on rehabilitation measures, and when possible completely stop interaction with the prison system all together.

Mass Incarceration is a predicament in the U.S. because in the land of the free, there are more than two million people in prison. Prisons are homes to the majority of twenty-two percent of the U.S. population. The U.S. has a massive incarceration rate, seven hundred and sixteen per every one hundred thousand. The U.S. makes five percent of the world’s population and the third country in which most people live in but number one incarcerating humans.

In the United States incarceration is inevitable for most americans, this dilemma has created mass incarceration throughout the country. "Almost 30 years ago there were over

The author, Peter Enns, of “The Public’s Increasing Punitiveness and Its Influence on Mass Incarceration in the United States” is investigating whether the publics rising amounts punitiveness explains the significant rise in incarceration rates in the United States. Also, the author explores the importance of public influence and congressional hearing in relation to mass incarceration of individuals in the United States.

Mass incarceration has had a huge impact in the United States on a multitude of levels. The costs of many people in jail has had a huge impact on the U.S. economy. Using taxpayers money for funding mass incarceration has left less money for other programs much needed in our society, such as higher education and health care. Mass incarceration has broken up families and led to the decay of communities. Without a doubt, mass incarceration has impacted the lives of African Americans. This group of people has been the most affected by this phenomenon. (Human Rights Watch & Golvin, 2008).

The main argument within this article was that America has a poor approach to incarceration and is ultimately an expensive failure. However, the article provided many points on how our justice system could be improved upon. For example, they could change the harsh sentencing rules, crimes that are currently felonies (drugs), and the rehabilitation programs. All of these things would help to lower the incarceration rate which would ultimately lower overcrowding within our jails and prisons. Though these tools may take time to be put in place they would have highly beneficial outcomes.

2 million people fill the prisons and jails in the U.S. The U.S. locks up more people than any other nation and 2.3 million people are confined in a correctional facility. This is what mass incarceration is. After slavery ended the system began to support the guilty and rich rather than the innocent and poor. African Americans were also arrested for minor crimes as simple as looking at white men or women in the eyes could led them to getting arrested. Plea bargains created a frightening sigma in regard to fighting for their innocence. The lasting effect of mass incarceration begins with the idea with war on drugs. A rise in recreational drug use in the 1960s led to President Nixon’s focus on targeting substance abuse. After he declared the

There have been varied considerations during the incarceration of suspected offenders over the past decennary with respect to duration of imprisonment, severity of punishment, and the regularity or rate of recurrence of imprisonment. Furthermore, critics of incarceration have also been debating about the motives for incarceration, its usefulness, and ability to transform criminals. Fierce debates have also risen about fairness during incarceration

Britian is now known to have record numbers in jails, which is also accurate for many other countries, such as USA, which has over two million people in prison, one and a half million serve in China and nearly one million in the Russian Federation (Newburn 2013: 706). Despite the fact that jails and conviction work differently when it comes to other countries, we can all agree on the fact that they exist namely in order to prevent crime and set justice for those who have been a victim of one as well as to avoid even more damage to the society (UK Essays 2013). Yet, there is a huge controversy whether jail is actually able to make a positive impact on the offenders in relation to their comprehension that the law must be abidden. The following essay will focus on both effectiveness and ineffectiveness of incarceration.

In America’s tough economic society, over population has become an exceedingly hot topic issue. However, overcrowding in America’s prison system has been a severe problem since the 1970's. The majority of the changes have come from different policies on what demographic to imprison and for what reason. The perspective of locking up criminals because they are "evil" is what spawned this (Allen, 2008). Because of this perspective the prison system in America is in need of serious reorganization. Since 1980, most states have one or more of their prisons or the entire system under orders from the federal courts to maintain minimum constitutional standards (Stewart, 2006).