6 ms·

There's one single paragraph in this entire article that addresses the root of the problem: > In 1970 the proportion of Americans behind bars was below one in

There's one single paragraph in this entire article that addresses the root of the problem: > In 1970 the proportion of Americans behind bars was below one in 400, compared with today’s one in 100. Since then, the voters, alarmed at a surge in violent crime, have demanded fiercer sentences. Politicians have obliged. New laws have removed from judges much of their discretion to set a sentence that takes full account of the circumstances of the offence. Since no politician wants to be tarred as soft on crime, such laws, mandating minimum sentences, are seldom softened. On the contrary, they tend to get harder. On top of that, you also have an entrenched set of special interests who benefit from the status quo (police unions, prison guard unions, private prisons, etc.), so the pressure on politicians is from two sides. So how do you "solve" a problem that special interests, along with a sizable majority of the voting population, have no interest whatsoever in solving? Without a massive culture shift, you don't.

nhnifong 16y ago
How do you start a massive culture shift without a really infectious idea? you don't.
- woodall 16y ago
  A better question, I think, is "how does something become infectious"? An idea alone is not going to sway the masses. An idea with proper execution and backing might. Think of it like education- a great follow along would be Plato's cave. You can bring one person into the idea-out into the world- but when they go back the majority still cannot understand what they are saying. Because of this you must convince small portions of the population either by education or force so that they may spread this new knowledge. How do you spread said idea? By using human nature as a weapon. A powerful weapon would be confirmation basis. Get the powerful to back your idea- with money, fancy words, anything- and you can get most people to follow along. The weak depend on the powerful for survival- this could be reversed, but not likely to ever happen(see uprising). Even if you are able to infect people with your ideologies you now have the problem of, what if this idea was the wrong? Infections ideas, just as viri in nature, are hard to cure once there is an epidemic. So your idea does not need to be infectious or catchy or even right, it just needs to be adopted. Once you establish a user base you can then use that base to your advantage in order to spread your idea. Interesting reads. Some have nothing really to do with what I said, just allow for a better understanding of what I mean. I am all for bad ideas, because without them how would we know the good ones? [1] http://www.prisonexp.org/ http://www.prisonexp.org/ [2] http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/search/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=EJ518618&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=EJ518618 http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/search/detailmini.jsp?_... [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment [4] opr.princeton.edu/papers/opr0901.pdf [5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_momentum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_momentum [6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_momentum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_momentum [7] http://www.entrepreneur.com/tradejournals/article/194270145.html http://www.entrepreneur.com/tradejournals/article/194270145.... [8] http://core.ecu.edu/psyc/wuenschk/stathelp/Dichot-Not.doc http://core.ecu.edu/psyc/wuenschk/stathelp/Dichot-Not.doc
SoftwareMaven 16y ago
Another piece (brought up in the comments) that warrants investigation is the role of privatization of prisons. With that, you have private organizations lobbying the government to increase their bottom lines, and politicians get to look tough on crime as a nice bonus. The part that scares me the most is that is may be impossible to live in the US without breaking some law. When everybody is a criminal, the state gets too much power.
- pmcginn 16y ago
  It's easy to blame privitization, but large public sector unions can be just as influential. As a politican I'd be much more afraid of angering, say, the AFT than I would be of any single private company. Just because someone you don't like is clamoring for more money doesn't mean no one was clamoring for money before.
  - chadmalik 16y ago
    You think the teachers' union is more powerful than any single company? that is a joke. If teachers had the power of the top dogs in the finance, pharma, defense or energy industries (to take a few obvious examples) have they'd all make 7 figures.
    - jfarmer 16y ago
      Nobody is talking about teachers. But in California the Prison Guard Union holds immense sway.
      - gruseom 16y ago
        There was a superb NPR investigative piece on that maybe a year ago. I remember being shocked at the guards' union's role in creating the problem. And to think that California prisons just a generation ago were so good -- recidivism so low -- that other countries were sending delegations to find out how they did it.
    - anamax 16y ago
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
notaddicted 16y ago
Your hypothesis isn't the only plausible one. Have you considered that more crime = more inmates, sentences aside? First: since you go to prison after the crime, the inmate population size should be a trailing indicator of the crime rate. More serious crimes affect the prison population for a long period, since their sentences are longer. Second: take a look at these graphs, and how dramatically they shoot up around 1965: http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=murder+USA http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=murder+USA http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=rape+USA http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=rape+USA http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=crime+USA http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=crime+USA
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- euroclydon 16y ago
  Why does the data collection only start in 1960? The fact that the rates shoot up five years after they start collecting data might just mean that for the first five years, the data collection system was just getting ramped up.
- cabalamat 16y ago
  All of those graphs show peaks in the early 1990s and a decline after then. That's long enough that if the number of crimes was the main causal factor, prison numbers would be going down by now.
  - gndlf1 16y ago
    The issues are basically correct on both sides, however there exists the problem fact that while prison populations are - and have been on the increase - actual crime rates have been declining over the past decade plus. This is indicative that while crime has been diminishing, arrests and convictions for existing laws have been increasing disproportionately. The reason for the "peak" in the stats in the 90's is partially due to the discovery by private prison investors and private sector corporations of the federal PIECP program. This program allows partnerships between private sector companies and prison industries to use prison labor to manufacture their products or provide their services, which allows lower overhead and increased profits. In the mid 90's corporate America discovered the program and began to manipulate it. At the same time, prison numbers began to increase while the crime rate declined. This was a direct result of the realization of the amount of labor needed to fully exploit the program.To use the program to the maximum benefit, there had to be a continuous supply of manpower - whether the crime rate was holding steady or in decline.
ugh 16y ago
US incarceration are ridiculous and irrational. Why are European countries and Japan so different, though? They also have elected politicians and special interest groups, what’s going on there? I think it mostly has something to do with the directness of democracy, not with a difference in opinion or mentality. Democracy in the US is very local and direct, politicians can actually be punished by the voters for not being tough on crime. That’s not so easy in (for example) Germany. You vote predominantly for parties – the whole package – not politicians. Something as comparatively unimportant as criminal law is going to get swamped by all the other issues, hardly anybody will focus on the particular weak spots of one lowly member of parliament. That would be a waste of effort. Moreover all decisions about the criminal law are made on the federal level, in commissions full of experts (a lot of academics: criminologists, psychologists …). There is no reason for politicians in those commissions not to follow their recommendations. Voters will hardly ever notice what they decide, it is going to get lost under all the other issues. You can actually be successful as a German politician who has a image for being tough on crime on the very local level (in, say, a city state), but on that level you can do no more than strictly enforce the rules that already exist. That will hardly change incarceration rates, though. You don’t need a culture shift, you need a different political system :)
- dieterrams 16y ago
  Upvoted. However, a different political system would itself necessitate a cultural shift.
  - ugh 16y ago
    Sure. I was being facetious. Lowering incarceration rates in the US is probably a hard problem which would need all kinds of shifts.
    - patrickaljord 16y ago
      If "direct democracy" was so powerful, how come they keep making laws against p2p or legalization of weed given that most people are against those laws?
tmsh 16y ago
Well said. And massive culture shifts are hard to get started on account of the inertia involved. However, piggy-backing on other culture shifts already in progress is easier. This may sound overly idealistic. But a technology shift that is clear about openness and transparency of information, and which gradually supports voting in efficient, electronic ways (with checks and balances that prevent mob-like behavior) could help solve these problems. Could eventually be what solves a lot of this. Obama may be remembered not so much for being the first African American president, but the first one elected with social media. Information wants to be free and networks are fast.
madair 16y ago
Before throwing our hands up in despair we should consider that some simple reforms of the prosecution system in the U.S. would make a huge difference. There are a lot of shakedowns going on in the U.S. system (it's hard to call it a justice system at this point). But a wide-ranging list of abuses of power feature prosecutors actively participating. Prosecutors in the U.S. have a lot of incentives for corruption and very few safeguards. The problem is in the U.S. a lot of objectively unethical activities and policies are not considered unethical. A lot of horrendous official behavior passes by without people call it what it is: Corruption. Of course it's not just prosecutors, it's amazing sometimes to see judges, lawyers, and many other public officials participating in cases in which they clearly have stake in the outcome without people calling it out with the C-word. My conjecture is just that reforming the prosecutorial system would have a big effect on the quality of the overall system and may not be as hard as some other approaches. Regardless I've been in despair about this for a long time myself, but more recently I've started coming to believe that shifting the ethical goal posts in this country just by using a small list of very simple and objective guidelines and focusing on key centers of corruption. Ethics are not universal, or at least are not proven to be universal. They are a social construction. It's clear, as others have said, that it's society that needs to change. How about starting by more of us being jerks in the level and ferocity with which we decry unethical behavior large and small and place our highest priority for social and political activism within the U.S. (and many other places) on that.
isnoteasy 16y ago
You say: "The voters, alarmed at at surge in violent crime ...", this can be the reason that explain more people in jail, and I think is a sound one. But this implies that more laws are not the cause but the consequence of a raise in violent crime so the title is misleading. You should say in the title: There are more people in jail because there is a rise in violent crimes and I would be happy with this.
thomasfl 16y ago
It would solve your problem if you moved to Europe.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]

nhnifong 16y ago

How do you start a massive culture shift without a really infectious idea? you don't.

woodall 16y ago
A better question, I think, is "how does something become infectious"? An idea alone is not going to sway the masses. An idea with proper execution and backing might. Think of it like education- a great follow along would be Plato's cave. You can bring one person into the idea-out into the world- but when they go back the majority still cannot understand what they are saying. Because of this you must convince small portions of the population either by education or force so that they may spread this new knowledge. How do you spread said idea? By using human nature as a weapon. A powerful weapon would be confirmation basis. Get the powerful to back your idea- with money, fancy words, anything- and you can get most people to follow along. The weak depend on the powerful for survival- this could be reversed, but not likely to ever happen(see uprising). Even if you are able to infect people with your ideologies you now have the problem of, what if this idea was the wrong? Infections ideas, just as viri in nature, are hard to cure once there is an epidemic. So your idea does not need to be infectious or catchy or even right, it just needs to be adopted. Once you establish a user base you can then use that base to your advantage in order to spread your idea. Interesting reads. Some have nothing really to do with what I said, just allow for a better understanding of what I mean. I am all for bad ideas, because without them how would we know the good ones? [1] http://www.prisonexp.org/ http://www.prisonexp.org/ [2] http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/search/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=EJ518618&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=EJ518618 http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/search/detailmini.jsp?_... [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment [4] opr.princeton.edu/papers/opr0901.pdf [5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_momentum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_momentum [6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_momentum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_momentum [7] http://www.entrepreneur.com/tradejournals/article/194270145.html http://www.entrepreneur.com/tradejournals/article/194270145.... [8] http://core.ecu.edu/psyc/wuenschk/stathelp/Dichot-Not.doc http://core.ecu.edu/psyc/wuenschk/stathelp/Dichot-Not.doc

SoftwareMaven 16y ago

Another piece (brought up in the comments) that warrants investigation is the role of privatization of prisons. With that, you have private organizations lobbying the government to increase their bottom lines, and politicians get to look tough on crime as a nice bonus. The part that scares me the most is that is may be impossible to live in the US without breaking some law. When everybody is a criminal, the state gets too much power.

pmcginn 16y ago
It's easy to blame privitization, but large public sector unions can be just as influential. As a politican I'd be much more afraid of angering, say, the AFT than I would be of any single private company. Just because someone you don't like is clamoring for more money doesn't mean no one was clamoring for money before.
- chadmalik 16y ago
  You think the teachers' union is more powerful than any single company? that is a joke. If teachers had the power of the top dogs in the finance, pharma, defense or energy industries (to take a few obvious examples) have they'd all make 7 figures.
  - jfarmer 16y ago
    Nobody is talking about teachers. But in California the Prison Guard Union holds immense sway.
    - gruseom 16y ago
      There was a superb NPR investigative piece on that maybe a year ago. I remember being shocked at the guards' union's role in creating the problem. And to think that California prisons just a generation ago were so good -- recidivism so low -- that other countries were sending delegations to find out how they did it.
  - anamax 16y ago

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

notaddicted 16y ago

Your hypothesis isn't the only plausible one. Have you considered that more crime = more inmates, sentences aside? First: since you go to prison after the crime, the inmate population size should be a trailing indicator of the crime rate. More serious crimes affect the prison population for a long period, since their sentences are longer. Second: take a look at these graphs, and how dramatically they shoot up around 1965: http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=murder+USA http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=murder+USA http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=rape+USA http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=rape+USA http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=crime+USA http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=crime+USA

deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
euroclydon 16y ago
Why does the data collection only start in 1960? The fact that the rates shoot up five years after they start collecting data might just mean that for the first five years, the data collection system was just getting ramped up.
cabalamat 16y ago
All of those graphs show peaks in the early 1990s and a decline after then. That's long enough that if the number of crimes was the main causal factor, prison numbers would be going down by now.
- gndlf1 16y ago
  The issues are basically correct on both sides, however there exists the problem fact that while prison populations are - and have been on the increase - actual crime rates have been declining over the past decade plus. This is indicative that while crime has been diminishing, arrests and convictions for existing laws have been increasing disproportionately. The reason for the "peak" in the stats in the 90's is partially due to the discovery by private prison investors and private sector corporations of the federal PIECP program. This program allows partnerships between private sector companies and prison industries to use prison labor to manufacture their products or provide their services, which allows lower overhead and increased profits. In the mid 90's corporate America discovered the program and began to manipulate it. At the same time, prison numbers began to increase while the crime rate declined. This was a direct result of the realization of the amount of labor needed to fully exploit the program.To use the program to the maximum benefit, there had to be a continuous supply of manpower - whether the crime rate was holding steady or in decline.

ugh 16y ago

US incarceration are ridiculous and irrational. Why are European countries and Japan so different, though? They also have elected politicians and special interest groups, what’s going on there? I think it mostly has something to do with the directness of democracy, not with a difference in opinion or mentality. Democracy in the US is very local and direct, politicians can actually be punished by the voters for not being tough on crime. That’s not so easy in (for example) Germany. You vote predominantly for parties – the whole package – not politicians. Something as comparatively unimportant as criminal law is going to get swamped by all the other issues, hardly anybody will focus on the particular weak spots of one lowly member of parliament. That would be a waste of effort. Moreover all decisions about the criminal law are made on the federal level, in commissions full of experts (a lot of academics: criminologists, psychologists …). There is no reason for politicians in those commissions not to follow their recommendations. Voters will hardly ever notice what they decide, it is going to get lost under all the other issues. You can actually be successful as a German politician who has a image for being tough on crime on the very local level (in, say, a city state), but on that level you can do no more than strictly enforce the rules that already exist. That will hardly change incarceration rates, though. You don’t need a culture shift, you need a different political system :)

dieterrams 16y ago
Upvoted. However, a different political system would itself necessitate a cultural shift.
- ugh 16y ago
  Sure. I was being facetious. Lowering incarceration rates in the US is probably a hard problem which would need all kinds of shifts.
  - patrickaljord 16y ago
    If "direct democracy" was so powerful, how come they keep making laws against p2p or legalization of weed given that most people are against those laws?

tmsh 16y ago

Well said. And massive culture shifts are hard to get started on account of the inertia involved. However, piggy-backing on other culture shifts already in progress is easier. This may sound overly idealistic. But a technology shift that is clear about openness and transparency of information, and which gradually supports voting in efficient, electronic ways (with checks and balances that prevent mob-like behavior) could help solve these problems. Could eventually be what solves a lot of this. Obama may be remembered not so much for being the first African American president, but the first one elected with social media. Information wants to be free and networks are fast.

madair 16y ago

Before throwing our hands up in despair we should consider that some simple reforms of the prosecution system in the U.S. would make a huge difference. There are a lot of shakedowns going on in the U.S. system (it's hard to call it a justice system at this point). But a wide-ranging list of abuses of power feature prosecutors actively participating. Prosecutors in the U.S. have a lot of incentives for corruption and very few safeguards. The problem is in the U.S. a lot of objectively unethical activities and policies are not considered unethical. A lot of horrendous official behavior passes by without people call it what it is: Corruption. Of course it's not just prosecutors, it's amazing sometimes to see judges, lawyers, and many other public officials participating in cases in which they clearly have stake in the outcome without people calling it out with the C-word. My conjecture is just that reforming the prosecutorial system would have a big effect on the quality of the overall system and may not be as hard as some other approaches. Regardless I've been in despair about this for a long time myself, but more recently I've started coming to believe that shifting the ethical goal posts in this country just by using a small list of very simple and objective guidelines and focusing on key centers of corruption. Ethics are not universal, or at least are not proven to be universal. They are a social construction. It's clear, as others have said, that it's society that needs to change. How about starting by more of us being jerks in the level and ferocity with which we decry unethical behavior large and small and place our highest priority for social and political activism within the U.S. (and many other places) on that.

isnoteasy 16y ago

You say: "The voters, alarmed at at surge in violent crime ...", this can be the reason that explain more people in jail, and I think is a sound one. But this implies that more laws are not the cause but the consequence of a raise in violent crime so the title is misleading. You should say in the title: There are more people in jail because there is a rise in violent crimes and I would be happy with this.

thomasfl 16y ago

It would solve your problem if you moved to Europe.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]