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Private prisons account for 8% of the total state and federal prison population in the United States+. Are they really a major driver of criminal policy? [+] h

by slavak 8y ago

Private prisons account for 8% of the total state and federal prison population in the United States+. Are they really a major driver of criminal policy? [+] https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-prisons-united-states/ https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-priso...

mieseratte 8y ago
Has the Netherlands, a country which has been closing prisons and even importing convicts from Belgium, faced any significant lobbying from the prison industrial complex and or any law enforcement organizations in favor of harsher sentencing? Or is this a uniquely American problem?
- crote 8y ago
  There is no prison industrial complex in The Netherlands, as all prisons and jails are owned by the government. There is no incentive to increase the inmate population. I wouldn't call it an American problem, but there is definitely a very large difference between the American and European approaches to imprisonment. If you're interested in learning more, check out Breaking the Cycle (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuLQ4gqB5XE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuLQ4gqB5XE): it compares a Norwegian high-security prison to an American one. Main takeaway: if you imprison people in order to make them better persons, threat them as actual human beings; punishment is not the primary incentive of imprisonment.
  - chimeracoder 8y ago
    > There is no prison industrial complex in The Netherlands, as all prisons and jails are owned by the government. There is no incentive to increase the inmate population. This is really off the mark. Having prisons and jails owned by the government does not mean that there's no incentive to increase the inmate population - in fact, the US is proof positive of that, because, for all the press that private prisons get, the number of them is quite small, and most of the worst abuses occur in state-run prisons. This isn't going to be a popular opinion here, but I should point out that, in general, people tend to underestimate the extent of the prison-industrial complex in Western/Central Europe, and particularly its effect on ethnic and religious minorities. It doesn't help that a lot of the countries that have problems with this also make it either difficult or illegal to access that data officially, so it's not discussed nearly enough.
  - mieseratte 8y ago
    > There is no prison industrial complex in The Netherlands, as all prisons and jails are owned by the government. How are food, clothes, supplies, etc. sourced? Who builds the prison? Is this all done by the government down to the farmer? Or is there a supply chain that makes profit by selling to prisons? If so, there is a prison industrial complex. How about the staff? Are they paid? Do they have a union? If there is a profit motive, there is a potential for political lobbying / corruption.
    - teekert 8y ago
      A farmer can also feed people who are not in jail, an industrial prison complex cannot make people who are not in jail perform free labor. To the farmer/clothing producer the prisoners are equal to free people, to the stake holder of an industrial prison complex, they are not.
    - SiempreViernes 8y ago
      Right, and I guess because the tax office buys its furniture from private companies there is a tax-industrial complex too? I'd say you are now pretty clearly arguing for diluting the meaning of the "military-industrial complex" context to nothingness.
      - mieseratte 8y ago
        I suppose you're right, but that wasn't the intent. I took the line off thinking off the logical cliff. However, in the US it is common for major inter/national firms to service entire state prison systems. This is surely a representation of the prison industrial complex, and that's what I was getting at. Simply having publicly run prisons does not preclude this type of situation, a major firm holding large contracts and thus having an incentive to grow the criminal population, unless it would be wholly socially and politically unacceptable to do so.
  - cm2187 8y ago
    But prisons aren't a sort of "hospital" for bad behavior. The primary reason for prisons is punishment, and its secondary role is to inflict a pain that should discourage other criminals to commit similar crimes. It doesn't mean that it should be inhuman, overcrowded, underfunded, etc. But I don't believe in the idea is that crime is a disease and that prisons are there to "cure" criminals.
    - malloryerik 8y ago
      If punishment isn't supposed to be a cure, and if discouraging "other criminals" is only secondary ("future crimes" might be less loaded), then what exactly is the primary purpose of punishment?
      - sudoke 8y ago
        Primary reason is to remove criminals from society so they can't continue to hurt people.
    - SiempreViernes 8y ago
      Sure, there are certainly people who hold that justice can only be achieved if the perpetrator pays in pain, with any discouraging effects being incidental. On the other hand, there are also plenty of people who want to reduce the amount of crime that happens, and then they are more concerned with if the justice system actually achieves this goal. Pain based justice plainly doesn't.
    - burfog 8y ago
      You forgot incapacitation. This is removal of the capability to commit crime, typically by keeping an offender separate from society. You can't rob a bank if you can't go to the bank. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incapacitation_(penology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incapacitation_(penology)
  - s73v3r_ 8y ago
    So, one important part is the jails/prisons being owned and operated by the Government. But what about services, like the video calling in this story, or things like the commissary? Those services can be just as, if not more exploitative.
KirinDave 8y ago
But it varies wildly by state, with some states having nearly half their prison population in pivate prisons. I imagine in those states, the lobby is pretty powerful at the state level. Lots of state-specific interests have a great deal of federal lobbying power.
joncrane 8y ago
8% is still billions of dollars, I reckon. The other 92% doesn't lobby for laws that result in more prisoners, but a billion dollar industry does. So the 8% statistic is a red herring.
s73v3r_ 8y ago
For-profit prison industry is more than just running the prison itself. The other 92% of public (I guess?) prisons still need services.
- Fjolsvith 8y ago
  Yeah, and all those inmates and families gotta stay in touch somehow - so charge for video calls.
  - s73v3r_ 8y ago
    Not just charge; charge out the ass. Just like everything else in the prison.
xr4ti 8y ago
Not just private prisons. The prison guards union has been one of the most potent political forces in California over the last 20-30 years. https://www.nytimes.com/1995/11/07/us/political-gains-by-prison-guards.html https://www.nytimes.com/1995/11/07/us/political-gains-by-pri...
jaredklewis 8y ago
I'm also skeptical of the influence of private prisons on criminal policy (mostly just because voters unfortunately seem to love putting people in prison regardless, no special lobbying required), but I think there are some interesting correlations at the state level. For example, the 6 states with the lowest incarceration rates (New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Minnesota, Maine) have no private prisons. And 9 out of the 10 states with the highest incarceration rates do have private prisons. - Percent of privately incarcerations: https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-prisons-united-states/ https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-priso... - Incarceration rates by state: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_incarceration_and_correctional_supervision_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_incarce...

by slavak 8y ago

mieseratte 8y ago

Has the Netherlands, a country which has been closing prisons and even importing convicts from Belgium, faced any significant lobbying from the prison industrial complex and or any law enforcement organizations in favor of harsher sentencing? Or is this a uniquely American problem?

crote 8y ago
There is no prison industrial complex in The Netherlands, as all prisons and jails are owned by the government. There is no incentive to increase the inmate population. I wouldn't call it an American problem, but there is definitely a very large difference between the American and European approaches to imprisonment. If you're interested in learning more, check out Breaking the Cycle (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuLQ4gqB5XE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuLQ4gqB5XE): it compares a Norwegian high-security prison to an American one. Main takeaway: if you imprison people in order to make them better persons, threat them as actual human beings; punishment is not the primary incentive of imprisonment.
- chimeracoder 8y ago
  > There is no prison industrial complex in The Netherlands, as all prisons and jails are owned by the government. There is no incentive to increase the inmate population. This is really off the mark. Having prisons and jails owned by the government does not mean that there's no incentive to increase the inmate population - in fact, the US is proof positive of that, because, for all the press that private prisons get, the number of them is quite small, and most of the worst abuses occur in state-run prisons. This isn't going to be a popular opinion here, but I should point out that, in general, people tend to underestimate the extent of the prison-industrial complex in Western/Central Europe, and particularly its effect on ethnic and religious minorities. It doesn't help that a lot of the countries that have problems with this also make it either difficult or illegal to access that data officially, so it's not discussed nearly enough.
- mieseratte 8y ago
  > There is no prison industrial complex in The Netherlands, as all prisons and jails are owned by the government. How are food, clothes, supplies, etc. sourced? Who builds the prison? Is this all done by the government down to the farmer? Or is there a supply chain that makes profit by selling to prisons? If so, there is a prison industrial complex. How about the staff? Are they paid? Do they have a union? If there is a profit motive, there is a potential for political lobbying / corruption.
  - teekert 8y ago
    A farmer can also feed people who are not in jail, an industrial prison complex cannot make people who are not in jail perform free labor. To the farmer/clothing producer the prisoners are equal to free people, to the stake holder of an industrial prison complex, they are not.
  - SiempreViernes 8y ago
    Right, and I guess because the tax office buys its furniture from private companies there is a tax-industrial complex too? I'd say you are now pretty clearly arguing for diluting the meaning of the "military-industrial complex" context to nothingness.
    - mieseratte 8y ago
      I suppose you're right, but that wasn't the intent. I took the line off thinking off the logical cliff. However, in the US it is common for major inter/national firms to service entire state prison systems. This is surely a representation of the prison industrial complex, and that's what I was getting at. Simply having publicly run prisons does not preclude this type of situation, a major firm holding large contracts and thus having an incentive to grow the criminal population, unless it would be wholly socially and politically unacceptable to do so.
- cm2187 8y ago
  But prisons aren't a sort of "hospital" for bad behavior. The primary reason for prisons is punishment, and its secondary role is to inflict a pain that should discourage other criminals to commit similar crimes. It doesn't mean that it should be inhuman, overcrowded, underfunded, etc. But I don't believe in the idea is that crime is a disease and that prisons are there to "cure" criminals.
  - malloryerik 8y ago
    If punishment isn't supposed to be a cure, and if discouraging "other criminals" is only secondary ("future crimes" might be less loaded), then what exactly is the primary purpose of punishment?
    - sudoke 8y ago
      Primary reason is to remove criminals from society so they can't continue to hurt people.
  - SiempreViernes 8y ago
    Sure, there are certainly people who hold that justice can only be achieved if the perpetrator pays in pain, with any discouraging effects being incidental. On the other hand, there are also plenty of people who want to reduce the amount of crime that happens, and then they are more concerned with if the justice system actually achieves this goal. Pain based justice plainly doesn't.
  - burfog 8y ago
    You forgot incapacitation. This is removal of the capability to commit crime, typically by keeping an offender separate from society. You can't rob a bank if you can't go to the bank. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incapacitation_(penology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incapacitation_(penology)
- s73v3r_ 8y ago
  So, one important part is the jails/prisons being owned and operated by the Government. But what about services, like the video calling in this story, or things like the commissary? Those services can be just as, if not more exploitative.

KirinDave 8y ago

But it varies wildly by state, with some states having nearly half their prison population in pivate prisons. I imagine in those states, the lobby is pretty powerful at the state level. Lots of state-specific interests have a great deal of federal lobbying power.

joncrane 8y ago

8% is still billions of dollars, I reckon. The other 92% doesn't lobby for laws that result in more prisoners, but a billion dollar industry does. So the 8% statistic is a red herring.

s73v3r_ 8y ago

For-profit prison industry is more than just running the prison itself. The other 92% of public (I guess?) prisons still need services.

Fjolsvith 8y ago
Yeah, and all those inmates and families gotta stay in touch somehow - so charge for video calls.
- s73v3r_ 8y ago
  Not just charge; charge out the ass. Just like everything else in the prison.

xr4ti 8y ago

Not just private prisons. The prison guards union has been one of the most potent political forces in California over the last 20-30 years. https://www.nytimes.com/1995/11/07/us/political-gains-by-prison-guards.html https://www.nytimes.com/1995/11/07/us/political-gains-by-pri...

jaredklewis 8y ago

I'm also skeptical of the influence of private prisons on criminal policy (mostly just because voters unfortunately seem to love putting people in prison regardless, no special lobbying required), but I think there are some interesting correlations at the state level. For example, the 6 states with the lowest incarceration rates (New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Minnesota, Maine) have no private prisons. And 9 out of the 10 states with the highest incarceration rates do have private prisons. - Percent of privately incarcerations: https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-prisons-united-states/ https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/private-priso... - Incarceration rates by state: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_incarceration_and_correctional_supervision_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_incarce...