Mass Incarceration Redefined

Mass incarceration is a crisis in the United States.  Thanks to an expansion of awareness around the issue, partially due to Michelle Alexander’s “The New Jim Crow” and the loud voices of advocates, the general public is becoming more aware of this horrific social problem.  However, how people define the issue is another battle.  Many individuals who are personally unaffected by mass incarceration or do not study it, may not fully understand the issue.  Some believe that individuals end up in jail because they made mistakes and that is it.  However, mass incarceration represents a larger societal issue.  With the prison population rising so astronomically over the last 30 years, it must be clear to society that there is a greater force at play and a defect in society allowing this to occur.

The war on drugs launched in the 1980s fueled the growth of the prison populations.  For starters, legal penalties surrounding drug play a huge role in the expanding prison population since a majority of inmates are incarcerated for non-violent drug offenses.  Additionally, the systematic political and social barriers that inhibit returning citizens contribute to ”employment and financial difficulties, poor marriage outcomes, disruption and instability in children’s lives, and increased rates of communicable diseases such as HIV-AIDS have all been documented among the communities so disproportionately affected by incarceration policies” (Raphael, 2007-2008). As a result, citizens who are returning to such communities reenter the cyclical patterns they started in and change becomes difficult and upward mobility almost impossible.

Mass incarceration is not an individual issue, a county issue, or even a state issue.  Mass incarceration is an American problem that strongly affects politics, society, and the economy.  If changes are not made soon, the issue will only continue to grow.  It was our hope that this blog would bring about awareness of the issue to begin to educate the problem not only about the problem, but the various facets embedded in the problem.  Finally, we hope that this blog will continue with your help, your comments, and your support in spreading awareness about mass incarceration and encouraging research and education.

 

Mass Incarceration and Poverty Theory

How can we understand poverty to affect change for incarcerated

 individuals and returning citizens?

        As a social worker, it is pertinent to understand poverty theory, its different components, and how it affects not only individuals in society, but also social policies.  According to Ted K. Bradshaw’s article “Theories of Poverty and Anti-Poverty Programs in Community Development”, there are five major theories as to why poverty exists:

      1.      Individual

      2.      Cultural

      3.      Political-economic Structure

      4.      Geographic

      5.      Cumulative and Cyclical

While all five theories of poverty represent reasons why poverty exists, not are all widely accepted.  For example, theory number one blames an individual’s character and choices for their poverty (Bradshaw, 2007).  While this and the other aspects of the theories hold some valid points, they must be carefully analyzed before fully embracing them.  Each individual’s situation is different and individuals living in poverty are affected by an array of outside influences.  No one theory can apply to an entire community or group of people.  However, I believe there is one exception when studying returning citizens living in poverty.

            According to Bradshaw, progressive social theory embraces the idea that poverty is caused by economic, political, and social distortions or discriminations (Bradshaw, 2007).  One such instance this can be applied to is mass incarceration.  Individuals, who have been incarcerated, also known as returning citizens, are often held back in society due to social and political barriers that inhibit their mobility.  According to Steven Raphael’s work at the University of California, Berkley, “employment and financial difficulties, poor marriage outcomes, disruption and instability in children’s lives, and increased rates of communicable diseases such as HIV-AIDS have all been documented among the communities so disproportionately affected by incarceration policies” (Raphael, 2007-2008).  Because of policies that inhibit returning citizens from obtaining certain jobs and the social stigma surrounding former inmates, it becomes difficult to escape poverty, especially when entire families are involved.

            Poverty theory number three regarding political and economic structures is applicable to mass incarceration because political and social policies deliberately discriminate against former inmates.  These restrictions highlight systematic barriers that prevent such individuals from accessing education, employment, housing, benefits and other resources necessary to escape the cycle of poverty.

 

Raphael, Steven. "The Employment Prospects of Ex-Of- Fenders." Social Policy

Approaches That Promote Self-Sufficiency and Financial Independence Among

the Poor 25.2 (Fall/Winter 2007-2008).

Bradshaw, Ted K. "Theories of Poverty and Anti-Poverty Program in Community

Development." Community Development: Journal of the Community Development


 Society". 38.1 (2007): 7-25 

Looking at Mass Incarceration Through Labeling Theory

When most people think about crime and mass incarceration, they view it as an individual problem, not a social problem. They think that only those incarcerated and their families are affected. They also most likely see it through the lens of rational choice theory. Meaning they think people commit crimes because they weighed the pros and cons and made the rational decision to commit a crime, not taking societal factors into account. When looking at mass incarceration through the lens of labeling theory, it is seen as a societal problem because it is societies fault for labeling someone as a criminal.  If people would see mass incarceration as society's fault, maybe more people would see it as a social crisis as opposed to a social problem that doesn’t affect most people. This is why I think labeling theory is the best theory to define mass incarceration.

How Labels Affect Crime and Mass Incarceration

Labeling theory could very easily be applied to the issue of mass incarceration. First, let’s define labeling theory. In general, labeling theory proposes that someone commits crimes because they have been labeled a criminal. The first labeling theorist, Frank Tannenbaum, goes into a little more detail in his book Crime and the Community:

            The person becomes the thing he is described as being. Nor does it seem to matter whether the valuation is made by those who would punish or by those who would reform. In either case the emphasis is upon the conduct that is disapproved of. The parents or the policeman, the older brother or the court, the probation officer or the juvenile institution…Their very enthusiasm defeats their aim. The harder they work to reform the evil, the greater the evil grows under their hands. The persistent suggestion, with whatever good intentions, works mischief, because it leads to bringing out the bad behavior that it would suppress. The way out is through a refusal to dramatize the evil. The less said about it the better. The more said about something else, still better (Braithwaite, 17).

Tannenbaum’s suggestion about refusing to dramatize the evil is very interesting. In some ways it seems like a good idea, and for other purposes, not so much. The idea reminds me of training a dog or how adults tell children to handle bullies. If a dog is begging, trainers say to ignore the behavior, because if they get attention when they beg they will learn that they get attention every time they do so and they’ll continue to do it. When someone was picking on you in school the adults said to just ignore them and they’ll stop. To apply this idea to actual crimes, we could ignore crimes and maybe the people committing them will stop doing so. This of course could not apply realistically to all crimes, especially ones with an identifiable victim. However, if we decriminalized the use, possession and sale of drugs we would definitely have less people in our correctional system. After all, what people choose to put into their body, no matter how bad it is, is their choice. Alcohol and greasy foods are legal and they are bad for your body.

Okay rant over (for now), back to labeling theory.

            Labeling theory assumes that the opinion of others and society at large matters to the deviant person, or effects them in any way. I don’t know about you, but I never believe someone when they say they don’t care what others think. This assumption of course is more than just worrying what someone might think of you. It’s about how society’s view of a person affects their life.  For example, if someone is convicted of a felony they are labeled a felon, which means they do not have the same rights as other Americans. For example, they cannot receive federal student loans and in some states they cannot vote. They also have a hard time finding a job. Most applications ask the applicant to check a box asking whether or not they have been convicted of a felony. Also more and more jobs conduct background checks before hiring a person. This legal form of discrimination really hurts a felon’s (or anyone else with a criminal record) chance at getting a job. If a convicted drug dealer was making enough money to live comfortably when he was dealing, what is his motivation to apply to a number of businesses, only to get turned down by every one of them? Could you really blame that person for going back to the profitable work they know?

            Another way labeling effects crime and our society is labeling a person as deviant because of their race. As discussed in previous posts, a disproportionate amount of African Americans are in the correctional system in the United States. Evidence shows that because of that (and because of racism), police officers tend to stop and arrest them more than others. Therefore, African Americans (especially those that live in disadvantaged neighborhoods) are labeled as criminals. Discrimination also occurs during sentencing. When judges and juries look at an African American who allegedly committed a drug crime, they most likely see them as just another thug dealing drugs. However, if a white person is on trial for the same crime, they see them as a kid who got mixed up with the wrong people. These assumptions are based on sentence disparities between races, not personal assumptions about their thought processes.

I work as a probation officer and I see my coworkers discriminate all the time. When we’re out in the community and we see a child or teenager glares at us, or even if they are just playing with friends, my coworkers have said things like “unfortunately, they’ll probably be on probation when they grow up”. As if saying unfortunately makes it not racist, or makes it seem like they care. When people are labeled as criminals at young ages because of their race, neighborhood or family members they are much more likely to fulfill that prophecy.

References:

Braithwaite, J. (1989). Crime, Shame and Reintegration. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

The Development of a REAL Social Problem and CRISIS

 

“Penalties against possession of the drug should not be more

damaging than the drug itself”.

– President Carter

In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared that America was fighting a “war on drugs” after the popularization of drugs through the 1960s hippie subculture. 

In 1973, the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), was created.

Despite later efforts by President Carter to decriminalize marijuana and lessen prison sentences for drug crimes, President Reagan pressed on in the 1980s to prosecute those addicted to, selling, or using drugs.

Regan believed “it’s far more effective if you take the customers away than if you try to take the drugs away from the customers”.  During this time, more and more Americans were being charged, convicted, and imprisoned for drug crimes.  While President Clinton did work to make some progressive strides in pushing for more rehabilitative programs, his efforts were mostly unsuccessful in the grand scheme of things.

According to Michelle Alexander’s “The New Jim Crow”, the United States prison population sky rocketed in the last thirty years from 300,000 to over 2 million thanks in large part to drug convictions.

Mass incarceration became a problem in the United States over the last 30 years because it is a direct result of the United States “war on drugs”. According to Alexander, Governments often use punishment as a means of social control.  The “war on drugs” was the United States’ vehicle for creating social control and the social problem of mass incarceration we are faced with today.

“The problem with jail is that people get meaner when you out them in jail”.

 – First grade student from Atlantic City, NJ

Mass incarceration is a crisis.

According to Michelle Alexander, “one in three young African American men will serve time in prison if these current trends continue”.  If mass incarceration was a disease reaching this many individuals, it would be considered an epidemic and there would be a large public outcry and demands for change.

However, unfortunately, the issue of mass incarceration is not being widely recognized as a crisis.  If even first grade students are aware of the prison system and what it does to individuals, while on a very basic scale, then it is known to the public that this is an issue.

Nevertheless, while mass incarceration is a legitimized issue that is widely recognized in many circles as a social problem and hits close to home for many Americans, it is not as large of a public issue as it should be and does not gain the recognition and it support that it should.  More Americans need to mobilize behind this cause, create a plan of action, and let Americans know that this is a crisis!

 

Sources:

Dufton, Emily. "The War on Drugs: How President Nixon Tied Addiction to Crime." The Atlantic. Atlantic Media Company, 26 Mar. 2012. Web. 16 Mar. 2014. <http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/03/the-war-on-drugs-how-president-nixon-tied-addiction-to-crime/254319/>.

Alexander, Michelle. The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. New York: New, 2010. Print.

"The United States War on Drugs." The United States War on Drugs. Stanford University, n.d. Web. 16 Mar. 2014. <http://www.stanford.edu/class/e297c/poverty_prejudice/paradox/htele.html>.

 

Mass Incarceration and Social Work Values

“Our problems are man-made therefore they may be solved by man.

And man can be as big as he wants.

No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings”. – JFK

As a social worker, the founding principles we must abide by are to promote social justice and fight for human rights. Social workers must remain aware of injustices, spread awareness, and work towards solutions. Mass incarceration is one of those injustices that social workers must take responsibility for alleviating.

In order for a social problem to be recognized by the public as a crisis, it must be legitimized. In order for a problem to be legitimized it must be recognized and people must be aware of it.

Who is responsible for spreading awareness?

Naturally, those who are directly affected by an injustice will spread awareness to garner support. For example, members of the LGBTQ community, their families, and friends will rally and, usually, support their loved ones in fighting for rights like marriage equality.

What about those who don’t have a voice?

Social workers must speak on behalf of the oppressed and give them a voice.

Individuals who have been incarcerated and currently are incarcerated face such grave injustices in the United States. A lot of the time, these individuals are so oppressed that they cannot find a voice to speak up for themselves or a platform to do so. Social workers must take responsibility in assisting to spread awareness of mass incarceration in order to legitimize is as a social crisis.

If not us, then who? If not now, then when?

According to Jonathon Simons’ “Mass Incarceration: From Social Policy to Social Problem”,mass incarceration was a public policy and form of control over people living in poor urban settings. This trend began over thirty years ago with “the drug war” and the hype surrounding it in the 1970s-1980s. However, in recent years American society has made the shift to recognizing mass incarceration as a social problem.

The fight is not over…

Awareness is just beginning to spread. As social workers we must recognize our established values, fight against injustices, and work to make the change we promise in the National Social Worker’s Code of Ethics.

Whether at the micro level of clinical social work or the policy changing level of macro social work, every social worker can play a role in ending policies that promote mass incarceration and negatively affect individuals who are and have been incarcerated.

Macro social workers can put forth efforts to create policy changes surrounding drug crimes, which account for many of the reasons why individuals are incarcerated, as well as the systematic barriers that inhibit individuals once released from prison.

Micro, or clinical, social workers can counsel incarcerated individuals and work with individuals who have been released from prison by providing rehabilitative counseling an connecting them to services for housing, employment, and others.

The possibilities for social workers to effect change are endless. Mass incarceration provides a limitless platform for social workers to make a difference on many levels.

Sources:

"Code of Ethics." Code of Ethics. National Association of Social Workers, 2014. Web. 15 Mar. 2014. https://www.socialworkers.org/pubs/code/default.asp.

Petersilia, Joan, and Kevin R. Reitz. The Oxford Handbook of Sentencing and Corrections. New York: Oxford UP, 2012. Print.

 

Defining the Problem

            Mass incarceration is a major issue facing the United States today. America is number one in the world in number of prisoners per capita, and has been for quite some time now. As of 2013 American incarceration rates were 716 per 100,000 citizens, which is much higher than other industrialized countries (Wing 2013, paragraph 2).  A New York Times article by Adam Liptak puts this into perspective, “The United States has less than 5 percent of the world’s population. But it has almost a quarter of the world’s prisoners” (paragraph 1). As you can imagine, this leads to more tax money being spent on running and maintaining these prisons. It also tears apart families and communities. People are ripped away from their families and sent to jail for nonviolent offenses such as probation violations and drug possession. Prisons should be used to keep violent criminals off the streets, but they are essentially turning into a place to hold members of society that we don’t know how to handle.  Instead of really looking into the reasons why people commit crimes and addressing that, we just lock up offenders and throw away the key. Treatment and programming should be our response to crime, not a solution that won’t benefit the offender at all. Sure prison can be a wake up call for some, but if they don’t have the resources or ability to change on their own, this wake up call will only work for so long.

            President Johnson’s war on crime, which was declared in 1965, is often cited as the cause of mass incarceration. The war on drugs declared by President Regan in 1982 is also cited as a cause (Alexander 2010, p.5). The war on crime and the war on drugs allocated more resources for police departments. According to Alexander, when the war on drugs was declared, police officers did not like the federal government telling them which type of crime to focus their efforts on. Especially since they thought they should focus on more serious and violent crime. In response, the federal government offered grants to departments that made fighting the war on drugs a top priority (2010, p.73).  The war on drugs also led to police officers riding the line between constitutional and unconstitutional when it comes to searching individuals and their property. The Supreme Court ruled in a number of cases that police officers were allowed to search an individual and their belongings if the individual consented to the search (Alexander 2010, p. 62). Since most people do not refuse when asked by a police officer to do so, this led to an increase in drug related arrests.

Another major part of the problem is the mandatory sentences imposed for drug crimes.  The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 enacted mandatory minimums for drug crimes. This took discretion away from the judges, which means they cannot take mitigating factors into account such as a first offense.

By defining mass incarceration this way, we are assuming that our high incarceration rates are caused by political decisions such as declaring war on drugs and crime. When we point to these “wars” declared by Presidents and claim these are the sole causes, we take blame away from individuals. Yes, most offenders are products of their environment, an environment that exists to keep certain people down, but is that the sole cause for their criminal behavior? Also, we are assuming that crime rates would not have risen without these wars. The increased crime rates could be due to more violence on television and violent video games.  Yes, we are assuming the war on crime and the war on drugs are the cause of mass incarceration, but with the data and information available, it is hard not to.

References

Alexander, M. (2010). The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. New York, NY: The New Press.

Liptak, A. (2008, April 23). Inmate Count in U.S. Dwarfs Other Nations’. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/23/us/23prison.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&

Wing, N. (2013, August 13). Here Are All of the Nations That Incarcerate More of Their Population Than The U.S. The Huffington Post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/13/incarceration-rate-per-capita_n_3745291.html