Pros And Cons Of Mass Incarceration

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.

Overall, the United States prison system and society’s view of African Americans needs to change. People need to make sure that the mistakes society has made in the past do not repeat themselves. In order to fix many of the existing problems it is important to focus on reforming the prison system. Doing so would prevent many future cases of injustice and racial

In, “The Caging of America”, by Adam Gopnik explains the problems in the in the American criminal justice system focusing more on the prison system. Some of the struggles that Gopnik states in his article are mass incarceration, crime rate, and judges giving long inappropriate sentencings to those with minor crimes. He demonstrates that inmates are getting treated poorly than helping them learn from their actions. Using facts and statistics, Gopnik makes his audience realize that there is an urgent need of change in the American prison system. The main idea of Gopnik’s article is that the prison system needs to improve its sentencing laws because prisons are getting over crowed. Gopnik’s argument is valid because there is a problem in the sentencing laws that has caused a malfunction in the prison system as a whole.

Although we would like to believe the world is not as racially charged in 2013 as it was in the 1960s, a look in our penal system would show that minorities are still arrested and incarcerated at a higher rate than whites. The United States has experienced a rise in its prison population over the last 40 years and our incarceration rate is nearly 5 times higher than any other country. Even though 13% of the US population are African American males, they make up 38% of the prison population. Contributing factors to these numbers are mandatory minimum sentences, high crime and poverty areas, and lack of rehabilitative resources within our system (p.77-78).

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.

Every civilization in history has had rules, and citizens who break them. To this day governments struggle to figure out the best way to deal with their criminals in ways that help both society and those that commit the crimes. Imprisonment has historically been the popular solution. However, there are many instances in which people are sent to prison that would be better served for community service, rehab, or some other form of punishment. Prison affects more than just the prisoner; the families, friends, employers, and communities of the incarcerated also pay a price. Prison as a punishment has its pros and cons; although it may be necessary for some, it can be harmful for those who would be better suited for alternative means

At the beginning of the semester our Professor gave a speech on her personal accomplishment and to start she asked us how many of us knew someone who either was or had been incarcerated. Most of us in the class raised our hands in the affirmative, including myself. This may not seem like much in a classroom with roughly 25 students, but it does have some merit. The United States of America accounts for “5% of the world’s population, but 25% of the world’s prison population” (DuVernay, 13th). Within the last year California legislators have introduced Senate Bill 10 or the Bail: pretrial release bill, which seeks to eliminate pretrial detention and bail requirements for accused individuals who meet public safety criteria ("SB-10 Bail: pretrial release", 2017-2018). I argue that SB 10 doesn’t go far enough and should include that low level non-violent first offenders be offered alternative methods to incarceration. A policy such as SB 10 would allow California to serve as a model, reducing the effects of mass incarceration, creating a fairer system and eliminating coerced plea deals.

Mass Incarceration is a growing dilemma in the United States that populates our prisons at an alarming rate. Michelle Alexander is a professor at Ohio State University and a graduate of Stanford law school. She states in her award winning book, The new Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness “In less than thirty years, the U.S. penal population exploded from around 300,000 to more than 2 million” (Alexander, 6). These young men and women are unable to afford a decent lawyer because they come from such a poverty-stricken background. Men and women are at a financial disadvantage in our justice system. Lawyers and attorneys cost a fortune and most people can just simply not afford them. Others plead to their charges because

Mass incarceration brought a bigger issue than people being locked up in jail. After people were released from jail they would have to go to court and figure out their situation was, figure out what would happen to then when they go back home. For those that lived in public housing and their name was the one that was on the contract they were forced to leave the house, If the individual was a parent and they were the only parent that the kids had; the parents would lose their kids and be homeless. Because the individual has been to jail and now is homeless they are no longer eligible for a job because of their criminal records. Not only are these individuals no longer eligible for housing or jobs they also can’t have custody of their kids and

Within this paper, you will find a comprehensive review of the United States prison system, and why it needs to analyzed to better support and reform the people of this country. I plan to persuade the other side (politicians and society) into seeing that the way the prison system is now, is not ethical nor economical and it must change. We have one of the world’s largest prison population, but also a very high rate of recidivism. Recidivism is when the prisoners continuously return to prison without being reformed. They return for the same things that they were doing before. So, this leads us to ask what exactly are we doing wrong? When this happens, we as a nation must continuously pay to house and feed these inmates. The purpose of a prison needs to be examined so we can decide if we really are reforming our inmates, or just continuing a vicious cycle. What is the true purpose of prison besides just holding them in a cell? There must be more we can do for these hopeless members of society.

American Prisons poorly represent our criminal justice system; due to not have clearly outlined goals associated for its offenders. Also, look at the cost to lock up and house this country’s offenders, it has increased significantly over the past few decades. With the two above stated issues, we have a huge problem in America. Other countries look at our justice system as though we have got it figured out and, we may have a better idea of Justice than most countries, because, well we are no longer chopping off hands for stealing anymore. While there are some prisons that are too harsh, there are some that make life way too easy. Therefore, we must create a baseline for all prisons in this country. In order to decrease the percentages of repeat offenders and expedite the out-processing of small time criminals, American prisons are in dire need of help, especially

The United States is home to five percent of the world population, but 25 percent of the world’s prisoner. There must be a change to the current prison system which is doing more harm than good in American society and must be reformed. Reasons for this claim are that American prisons are too overcrowded with inmates, which creates a dangerous and unhuman environment. The cost to run a prison has gotten too expensive for tax payer pockets, and lastly the prison system is more as a punishment instead of rehabilitation with about sixteen percent of inmates most serious offence being drug charges. Prisons fall short of reforming criminals and the government is obligated to completely reform the prison systems in the United States.

Incarceration affects everyone. The US is known to have one of the highest incarceration rates. It's to a point where every single American has a family member in jail or prison. And based on the way our jail system works, the impacts it leaves on prisoners, loved ones, and society aren't positive. Jail is used as a punishment, rather than a way to help inmates better and prevent future crimes. They leave psychological impacts, social impacts, and economic impacts on all of us. Incarceration in the United States has various controversies, but it is discernable that it is unjust and unethical because of the negative impacts it leaves and must be addressed by more effective reform systems.

America loves to be number one, but sometimes being number one isn’t good thing. The most problematic chart that America tops is that of incarceration rate. According to the Prison Policy Initiative, 693 out of every 100,000 people in the United States are incarcerated. For perspective, out of all the founding members of NATO, the United Kingdom is in second place behind the US with an incarceration rate of 145 per 100,000 people. The US doesn’t just hold the lead, she’s lapping her peers in Western society. This startling statistic is the result of decades of bad policy throughout all levels of government.

The basis for crime deterrence in the United States is based on the exacting words of Beccaria, “… a punishment… should be public, immediate, and necessary, the least possible in the case given, proportioned to the crime, and determined by the laws. While this philosophy fulfills its intended goals, it also comes with far reaching consequences for criminal offenders and completely ignores the true goal of incarceration, to rehabilitate the offender for reintroduction into society. Mass incarceration as a means of criminal rehabilitation in the United States is extremely flawed. There are many far-reaching consequences of this practice that not only affects the incarcerated but larger society on a whole.