Author : Prison Research Education Action Project
Publisher :
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 45,57 MB
Release : 2005
Category : Alternatives to imprisonment
ISBN : 9780976707011
Originally published: Syracuse, N.Y.: Prison Research Education Action Project, 1976.
Author : Fay Honey Knopp
Publisher :
Page : 220 pages
File Size : 40,84 MB
Release : 1976
Category : Community-based corrections
ISBN :
"The authors propose that prisons be abolished. In place of prisons they spell out a variety of alternatives ranging from drastic reduction of the criminal law to the creation of nonpunitive responses to the problems of criminality"--back cover
Author : Angela Y. Davis
Publisher : Seven Stories Press
Page : 128 pages
File Size : 44,84 MB
Release : 2011-01-04
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 1609801040
With her characteristic brilliance, grace and radical audacity, Angela Y. Davis has put the case for the latest abolition movement in American life: the abolition of the prison. As she quite correctly notes, American life is replete with abolition movements, and when they were engaged in these struggles, their chances of success seemed almost unthinkable. For generations of Americans, the abolition of slavery was sheerest illusion. Similarly,the entrenched system of racial segregation seemed to last forever, and generations lived in the midst of the practice, with few predicting its passage from custom. The brutal, exploitative (dare one say lucrative?) convict-lease system that succeeded formal slavery reaped millions to southern jurisdictions (and untold miseries for tens of thousands of men, and women). Few predicted its passing from the American penal landscape. Davis expertly argues how social movements transformed these social, political and cultural institutions, and made such practices untenable. In Are Prisons Obsolete?, Professor Davis seeks to illustrate that the time for the prison is approaching an end. She argues forthrightly for "decarceration", and argues for the transformation of the society as a whole.
Author : Jacques Lesage de La Haye
Publisher : AK Press
Page : 92 pages
File Size : 48,5 MB
Release : 2021-07-13
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 1849354219
The Abolition of Prison provides a reflection from a longtime prison abolitionist, psychoanalyst, and former prisoner on the history, theory, and practice of anti-prison activism in France and globally over the last fifty years. This book powerfully makes the case for the end of prisons, punishment, and guilt and, instead, suggests we work towards social change, care, collectivity. The book weaves together Lesage de La Haye’s own experiences—in prison, as a psychiatrist, and as a social theorist—with the simple argument that, if we take the reasons for prison and punishment at their word, we must evaluate the system as a complete failure. So then why continue to support it and funnel money into it?
Author : Maya Schenwar
Publisher : The New Press
Page : 237 pages
File Size : 42,13 MB
Release : 2021-09-07
Category : Law
ISBN : 162097701X
With a new afterword from the authors, the critically praised indictment of widely embraced “alternatives to incarceration” Electronic monitoring. Locked-down drug treatment centers. House arrest. Mandated psychiatric treatment. Data driven surveillance. Extended probation. These are some of the key alternatives held up as cost effective substitutes for jails and prisons. But in a searing, “cogent critique” (Library Journal), Maya Schenwar and Victoria Law reveal that many of these so-called reforms actually weave in new strands of punishment and control, bringing new populations who would not otherwise have been subject to imprisonment under physical control by the state. Whether readers are seasoned abolitionists or are newly interested in sensible alternatives to retrograde policing and criminal justice policies and approaches, this highly praised book offers “a wealth of critical insights” that will help readers “tread carefully through the dizzying terrain of a world turned upside down” and “make sense of what should take the place of mass incarceration” (The Brooklyn Rail). With a foreword by Michelle Alexander, Prison by Any Other Name exposes how a kinder narrative of reform is effectively obscuring an agenda of social control, challenging us to question the ways we replicate the status quo when pursuing change, and offering a bolder vision for truly alternative justice practices.
Author : Angela Y. Davis
Publisher : Seven Stories Press
Page : 128 pages
File Size : 22,68 MB
Release : 2011-01-04
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781609801038
Revelations about U.S policies and practices of torture and abuse have captured headlines ever since the breaking of the Abu Ghraib prison story in April 2004. Since then, a debate has raged regarding what is and what is not acceptable behavior for the world’s leading democracy. It is within this context that Angela Davis, one of America’s most remarkable political figures, gave a series of interviews to discuss resistance and law, institutional sexual coercion, politics and prison. Davis talks about her own incarceration, as well as her experiences as "enemy of the state," and about having been put on the FBI’s "most wanted" list. She talks about the crucial role that international activism played in her case and the case of many other political prisoners. Throughout these interviews, Davis returns to her critique of a democracy that has been compromised by its racist origins and institutions. Discussing the most recent disclosures about the disavowed "chain of command," and the formal reports by the Red Cross and Human Rights Watch denouncing U.S. violation of human rights and the laws of war in Guantánamo, Afghanistan and Iraq, Davis focuses on the underpinnings of prison regimes in the United States.
Author : Committee on Causes and Consequences of High Rates of Incarceration
Publisher : National Academies Press
Page : 800 pages
File Size : 33,19 MB
Release : 2014-12-31
Category : Law
ISBN : 9780309298018
After decades of stability from the 1920s to the early 1970s, the rate of imprisonment in the United States has increased fivefold during the last four decades. The U.S. penal population of 2.2 million adults is by far the largest in the world. Just under one-quarter of the world's prisoners are held in American prisons. The U.S. rate of incarceration, with nearly 1 out of every 100 adults in prison or jail, is 5 to 10 times higher than the rates in Western Europe and other democracies. The U.S. prison population is largely drawn from the most disadvantaged part of the nation's population: mostly men under age 40, disproportionately minority, and poorly educated. Prisoners often carry additional deficits of drug and alcohol addictions, mental and physical illnesses, and lack of work preparation or experience. The growth of incarceration in the United States during four decades has prompted numerous critiques and a growing body of scientific knowledge about what prompted the rise and what its consequences have been for the people imprisoned, their families and communities, and for U.S. society. The Growth of Incarceration in the United States examines research and analysis of the dramatic rise of incarceration rates and its affects. This study makes the case that the United States has gone far past the point where the numbers of people in prison can be justified by social benefits and has reached a level where these high rates of incarceration themselves constitute a source of injustice and social harm. The Growth of Incarceration in the United States examines policy changes that created an increasingly punitive political climate and offers specific policy advice in sentencing policy, prison policy, and social policy. The report also identifies important research questions that must be answered to provide a firmer basis for policy. This report is a call for change in the way society views criminals, punishment, and prison. This landmark study assesses the evidence and its implications for public policy to inform an extensive and thoughtful public debate about and reconsideration of policies.
Author : Rachel Herzing
Publisher : Verso Books
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 13,13 MB
Release : 2023-09-05
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 1786632764
What is prison abolition? In the 1960s and 1970s, groups like the U.S. Prison Research Education Action Project and the Norwegian Association for Penal Reform advocated for a world without prisons. Instead, incarceration boomed, growing in the United States from about 200,000 prisoners to unprecedented 2 million and more. Now, a movement to abolish prisons has returned, with grassroots movements and critical research converging on an uncompromising critique of the regime of mass incarceration. This book provides a trenchant guide to prison abolition, explaining why the solution to the criminal justice crisis is ending policing, imprisonment, and mass surveillance, and building a society that creates alternatives to punishment and carceral solutions to social contradictions. The book details and evaluates abolitionist projects throughout North America that provide alternative models, and reveals what it means to work for abolition today, what are ways to "de-carceralize" society.
Author : Stephen J. Hartnett
Publisher : University of Illinois Press
Page : 314 pages
File Size : 12,73 MB
Release : 2011
Category : Education
ISBN : 0252035828
Boldly and eloquently contributing to the argument against the prison system in the United States, these provocative essays offer an ideological and practical framework for empowering prisoners instead of incarcerating them. Experts and activists who have worked within and against the prison system join forces here to call attention to the debilitating effects of a punishment-driven society and offer clear-eyed alternatives that emphasize working directly with prisoners and their communities. Edited by Stephen John Hartnett, the volume offers rhetorical and political analyses of police culture, the so-called drug war, media coverage of crime stories, and the public-school-to-prison pipeline. The collection also includes case studies of successful prison arts and education programs in Michigan, California, Missouri, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania that provide creative and intellectual resources typically denied to citizens living behind bars. Writings and artwork created by prisoners in such programs richly enhance the volume. Contributors are Buzz Alexander, Rose Braz, Travis L. Dixon, Garrett Albert Duncan, Stephen John Hartnett, Julilly Kohler-Hausmann, Daniel Mark Larson, Erica R. Meiners, Janie Paul, Lori Pompa, Jonathan Shailor, Robin Sohnen, and Myesha Williams.
Author : Bruce L. Benson
Publisher :
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 29,3 MB
Release : 2011
Category : Law
ISBN : 9781598130447
In the minds of many, the provision of justice and security has long been linked to the state. To ask whether non-state institutions could deliver those services on their own, without the aid of coercive taxation and a monopoly franchise, runs the risk of being branded as naive anarchism or dangerous radicalism. Defenders of the state's monopoly on lawmaking and law enforcement typically assume that any alternative arrangement would favor the rich at the expense of the poor--or would lead to the collapse of social order and ignite a war. Questioning how well these beliefs hold up to scrutiny, this book offers a powerful rebuttal of the received view of the relationship between law and government. The book argues not only that the state is unnecessary for the establishment and enforcement of law, but also that non-state institutions would fight crime, resolve disputes, and render justice more effectively than the state, based on their stronger incentives.
