Showing papers in "Punishment & Society in 2001"
TL;DR: To explain the astounding overrepresentation of blacks behind bars that has driven mass imprisonment in the United States, one must break out of the ''crime-and-punishment'' paradigm to reckon the e...
Abstract: To explain the astounding over-representation of blacks behind bars that has driven mass imprisonment in the United States, one must break out of the `crime-and-punishment' paradigm to reckon the e...
1,087 citations
TL;DR: The rapid growth of the US penal population over the last two decades has coincided with a decline in the number of welfare recipients as mentioned in this paper, while shifts in crime rates, economic and political consideration...
Abstract: Rapid growth of the US penal population over the last two decades has coincided with a decline in the number of welfare recipients. While shifts in crime rates, economic and political consideration...
482 citations
TL;DR: The relationship between power and resistance behind prison walls has long animated sociological discussions of imprisonment as discussed by the authors, and a fresh understanding of resistance that recursively advances a new understanding of power.
Abstract: The relationship between power and resistance behind prison walls has long animated sociological discussions of imprisonment. In this article we advance a fresh understanding of resistance that rec...
193 citations
TL;DR: This article used empirical research on the implementation of risk assessment and risk management procedures by public protection panels in England and Wales, to assess how far the evidence supports claims of a broad shift in modes of crime control from penal modernism towards a new risk penality characteristic of the late (or post-) modern period.
Abstract: This article uses empirical research on the implementation of risk assessment and risk management procedures by public protection panels in England and Wales, to assess how far the evidence supports claims of a broad shift in modes of crime control from penal modernism towards a new `risk penality' characteristic of the late (or post-) modern period. The result is a mixed and contradictory picture, in which the dominant discourse around measures to deal with sexual and `dangerous' offenders is in tune with this claim, but there are numerous aspects of agency culture and practice - for example, interest in the individual case, and the valuing of professional judgement above actuarial tools - which reflect the continuing strength of the `modernist' project. There are, however, signs of a growing populist challenge to the modernist assumption that risk knowledge and management should be left to small groups of `experts' working in secret. Overall, perhaps the strongest evidence of a shift towards new penal forms lies in (a) the emergence of new forms of partnership, driven by the `logic of risk', and (b) the significant dispersal of accountability which has accompanied their development.
182 citations
TL;DR: The unprecedented growth in the prison and jail population in the United States can be traced to a complex set of political developments and changes in sentencing practice as discussed by the authors, and the rise in crime in the...
Abstract: The unprecedented growth in the prison and jail population in the United States can be traced to a complex set of political developments and changes in sentencing practice. The rise in crime in the...
134 citations
133 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that if crime prevention policies are to succeed in the political or public spheres they must address some of the deeper emotional or affective dimensions of crime and its place in society.
Abstract: This article argues that if crime prevention policies are to succeed in the political or public spheres they must address some of the deeper emotional or affective dimensions of crime and its place in society. While crime prevention remains a predominantly `rationalist' approach to criminal policy it will fail to compete successfully with the more emotive law and order policies which tend to resonate with the public and which appear to meet deep-seated psychological and affective needs. It suggests that crime prevention can address the three core elements that must make up a response to crime: the instrumental, the emotional and the production of social cohesion. It outlines a range of values and symbols which crime prevention may tap into in order to meet some of the affective dimensions of criminal justice policy.
128 citations
TL;DR: Similar economic transformations, public opinion patterns, social developments and crime trends have affected most western countries over the past few decades as discussed by the authors. Punishment trends, however, whether whether m...
Abstract: Similar economic transformations, public opinion patterns, social developments and crime trends have affected most western countries over the past few decades. Punishment trends, however, whether m...
98 citations
TL;DR: Since the 1970s, crime policy has become politicized. Conservative parties have launched the law and order theme and exploited crime in political campaigns as discussed by the authors, and Social Democratic and other leftist part...
Abstract: Since the 1970s, crime policy has become politicized. Conservative parties have launched the law and order theme and exploited crime in political campaigns. Social Democratic and other leftist part...
87 citations
TL;DR: While the rate of imprisonment in the United States has been increasing sharply for more than a quarter of a century, the seven years after 1993 present a special set of conditions because crime was high as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: While the rate of imprisonment in the United States has been increasing sharply for more than a quarter of a century, the seven years after 1993 present a special set of conditions because crime ra...
85 citations
TL;DR: The roots of massively disproportionate indigenous incarceration rates at the present time must be explored in relation to the history of regimes and cultures of racial segregation and governance in which indigenous peoples were coercively managed, for the most part outside normal legal and penal institutions, until the third quarter of the 20th century as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The article proposes that race is central to the historical sociology and contemporary practice of punishment in settler societies such as Australia. The roots of massively disproportionate indigenous incarceration rates at the present time must be explored in relation to the history of regimes and cultures of racial segregation and governance in which indigenous peoples were coercively managed, for the most part outside `normal' legal and penal institutions, until the third quarter of the 20th century. The advent of high indigenous incarceration coincides with the cessation of overtly segregationist policies and continues to produce some of the same social consequences for indigenous communities - of social marginalization and civic disenfranchisement - behind a facade of legal impartiality. The reasons for this are, however, complex rather than simple. They are to be found in the legacy of segregationist policies, especially the wholesale removal of children and attempts to annihilate the means of repro...
TL;DR: This paper reviewed the extent to which the movement to abolish capital punishment has been successful and discussed some of the influences which have produced a remarkable increase in the number of abolitionist countries in the past two decades.
Abstract: This article reviews the extent to which the movement to abolish capital punishment has been successful and discusses some of the influences which have produced a remarkable increase in the number of abolitionist countries in the past two decades. It asks whether this trend has now come to an end as many countries which retain the death penalty continue to defy, for a variety of reasons, international pressure to change their laws and practices. Finally, it discusses some actions that might prove effective in overcoming these obstacles.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that the emergence of a logic of risk is refiguring the way in which punishment is being used as a tactic of governance and explore the implication of shifts in the way security and justice are being conceived.
Abstract: The article explores the implication of shifts in the way in which security and justice are being conceived. It argues that the emergence of a logic of risk is refiguring the way in which punishment is being used as a tactic of governance.
TL;DR: The rise of mass incarceration in the USA is related to the historic character of American exceptionalism and the abandonment, over the past few decades, of policies of rehabilitation and radical social reform as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The rise of mass incarceration in the USA is related to the historic character of American exceptionalism and the abandonment, over the past few decades, of policies of rehabilitation and radical social reform. The components for a compararable penal expansion are, with the exception of high rates of lethal violence, in process of assembly in some European societies: rates of serious property crime surpassing those in the USA; a shift in the politics of law and order towards `governing through crime' and populist punitiveness; and rising anxieties about risk and insecurity, in particular relating to ethnic minorities and crime. The distinctive character of social democratic societies, which has so far shielded them against mass incarceration and which already face challenge due to globalization, face further adverse comparison with the more deregulated US economy in terms of unemployment rates which are significantly distorted by the size of the American prison population. Economic debate should be better...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors apply the Douglas and Wildavsky framework to the fear of crime in the United States since 1980 and conclude that crime has replaced pollution as the preferred risk for America's increasingly sectarian social order.
Abstract: Mass imprisonment is based in some way on the intense fear of crime in the United States but how should we think about this fear? Douglas and Wildavsky (1982) provided a productive framework for examining the relationship between social organization and risk selection in their path-breaking study of environmentalism. Douglas and Wildavsky argued that the contemporary obsession with pollution risk indicated a drift in society toward sectarian forms of social organization with weak incentives and internal social controls. This article applies the Douglas and Wildavsky framework to the fear of crime in the United States since 1980 and concludes that crime has replaced pollution as the preferred risk for America's increasingly sectarian social order.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors focus on the colonies of latest settlement, Western Australia and Queensland, and suggest that conventional modes of punishment were modified to accommodate indigenous offending, including public execution and corporal punishment of Aborigines.
Abstract: The European settlement of Australia from 1788 was accompanied by a prolonged dis-possession of the indigenous people, who became British subjects at law. Regimes of punishment played an important role in this dispossession. Focusing on the colonies of latest settlement, Western Australia and Queensland, the evidence here suggests also that conventional modes of punishment were modified to accommodate indigenous offending. Public execution and corporal punishment of Aborigines was practised after their exclusion as options for the settler population - but imprisonment too was shaped to the end of managing a seemingly intractable indigenous population. In completing the process of dispossession, the colonial state developed less violent punitive resources to manage the indigenous population. Incarceration within unique institutions, segregation from the settler population and surveillance and regulation through an expanding bureaucracy were strategies of social control increasingly deployed in an attempt to address the distinctive challenges posed by a dispossessed indigenous population.
TL;DR: In this article, it is suggested that ''deserved'' punishments for juveniles should be scaled well below those applicable to adults, for three kinds of reasons: (1) juveniles' lesser culpability, (2) punishments' greater ''bite'' when applied to adolescents, and (3) a principle of greater tolerance in the application of penal censure to juveniles.
Abstract: Although an extensive theoretical literature has developed on proportionality and desert as it relates to the sentencing of adult offenders, there has been less discussion of desert theory as it concerns the disposition of juvenile offenders. The present article addresses this latter topic. It is suggested that `deserved' punishments for juveniles should be scaled well below those applicable to adults, for three kinds of reasons: (1) juveniles' lesser culpability, (2) punishments' greater `bite' when applied to adolescents, and (3) a principle of greater `tolerance' in the application of penal censure to juveniles. The article argues that these three kinds of reasons must rest not just on factual claims regarding juveniles' lesser self-mastery or greater sensitivity to punishment, but must depend on different, age-related normative expectations for judging the behaviour of young persons. It is suggested that the present topic - of the criteria for proportionate punishment of juveniles - should be treated ...
TL;DR: Fashions in punishment policies and forms vary with changes in sensibilities as mentioned in this paper, as do fashions of the arts, attitudes towards homosexuality, drug use, and religious tolerance.
Abstract: Fashions in punishment policies and forms vary with changes in sensibilities (as do fashions in the arts, attitudes towards homosexuality, drug use and religious tolerance). Propositions and polici...
TL;DR: In this paper, an analysis of the consciously moral attempts to combat suicide at a women's prison via organizational innovation is presented, with important lessons not only in the governance of women's prisons, but also in the conditionality and politics of contemporary penal probity.
Abstract: Analyses of the consciously moral attempts to combat suicide at a women's prison via organizational innovation provide important lessons not only in the governance of women's prisons, but also in the conditionality and politics of contemporary penal probity. At the policy level they call into question the adequacy of quantitative methods for assessing staff efficiency in delivering an appropriate anti-suicide policy. In the realms of theory and penal politics they provoke an unease with studies in governmentality which give primacy to the teleological meanings of explicitly reform-oriented penal strategies. Insofar as such analyses omit to specify the points at which prevailing power relations and their conventional practices were under threat or open to challenge, they also omit to identify new configurations of resistance to penal oppression. Thus, while, on the one hand, successive studies of governmentality suggest that prevailing power relations ensure that all practices of imprisonment are inevitabl...
TL;DR: In this article, a young inner-city ex-convict's successful effort to ''go straight'' after release from prison is described, where the author examines the two orientations, decent and street, and the way that they socially organize the community.
Abstract: Living in the poor inner-city black community places young people at special risk of falling victim to aggressive behavior. Although forces exist in the community that can counteract the influences that spawn violence and aggression - by far the most powerful is a strong, loving, `decent' (as inner-city residents put it) family committed to conventional social values - the despair is so pervasive that it has created an oppositional culture. The norms of this `street' culture are often consciously opposed to those of mainstream society. This article examines these two orientations, decent and street, and the way that they socially organize the community, by telling the story of a young innercity ex-convict's successful effort to `go straight' after release from prison.
TL;DR: Wacquant and Anderson as mentioned in this paper plumb current statistical data on incarceration along with case examples and draw important social policy implications; and they also present case examples from the case of incarceration.
Abstract: The articles by Wacquant and Anderson in the present issue (1) plumb current statistical data on incarceration along with case examples and thereby draw important social policy implications; and (2...
TL;DR: The authors analyzes social and penal control strategies in the GDR with special emphasis on the role of the Ministry for State Security in East German society, which by reinforcing party control of state and society through surveillance and political policing was an essential element of the socialist system.
Abstract: This article analyzes social and penal control strategies in the GDR with special emphasis on the role of the Ministry for State Security (Stasi) in East German society, which by reinforcing party control of state and society through surveillance and political policing was an essential element of the socialist system. Empirical evaluation of the case of the GDR suggests that the carceral society Foucault imagined cannot achieve its aims of creating a self-regulating, obedient citizenry where a disciplinary regime diverges from popular values and aspirations. Such a regime may secure compliance so long as its power seems unassailable, but once its authority is threatened it may suddenly experience a revolt that is a more accurate reflection of popular sentiments. The citizens of the GDR adapted to the panoptic, disciplinary regime enforced by the Stasi by maintaining the outward appearance of conformity and compliance. At the same time, however, the state failed to penetrate the private lives of individual...
TL;DR: The influence of television in and on public space was discussed in this paper, where the authors argue that television facilitates prison growth in the sense of opening up for it, dismantling defenses that might otherwise be mustered against escalation.
Abstract: The article discusses the influence of television in and on public space. It maintains that with television, the world entered a qualitative new stage in the development of the mass media. Television has transformed public space into an enormous market place for entertainment, and functions as the spearhead of the modern entertainment industry. It is well known that crime is a perfect focus of attention for such an industry. The article does not suggest that the development of television is the only factor behind prison growth. But television facilitates prison growth in the sense of opening up for it, dismantling defenses that might otherwise be mustered against escalation. It corrodes values like civil rights, the rule of law and humanity. First, penal policy has become much more of a commodity than was the case a few decades ago. Second, a change has taken place from political legitimation in terms of principles to legitimation in terms of popularity. Third, a change has occurred in public debate from ...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors discuss methodological and interpretive issues raised by Beckett and Western's (2001) statistical analysis of US state imprisonment rates and consider Downes' argument that ma
Abstract: The article discusses methodological and interpretive issues raised by Beckett and Western's (2001) statistical analysis of US state imprisonment rates It considers Downes' (2001) argument that ma
TL;DR: In this article, the authors consider the attempt to justify punishment in terms of its ability to restore the breached rights of the crime victim and examine the arguments put forward by Immanuel Kant and Georg...
Abstract: This article considers the attempt to justify punishment in terms of its ability to restore the breached rights of the crime victim. It examines the arguments put forward by Immanuel Kant and Georg...
TL;DR: The assumption that penal practice is a matter of public policy, susceptible to rational debate about social good and soci... as mentioned in this paper, has been criticised by many of the recent commentary on America's incarceration crisis.
Abstract: Much of the recent commentary on America's incarceration crisis operates on the assumption that penal practice is a matter of public policy, susceptible to rational debate about social good and soc...
TL;DR: The study of the Homeric epics may be useful for understanding the historical roots of our modern institutions of criminal justice as mentioned in this paper, and the Iliad and the Odyssey (both of which are used in this paper).
Abstract: This article intends to show that the study of the Homeric epics may be useful for understanding the historical roots of our modern institutions of Criminal Justice. The Iliad and the Odyssey (both...