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The Norwegian prison where inmates are treated like people

260 points by netvarun 13y ago

kghose 13y ago
I'm sure we have a country like Norway somewhere in the United States. Perhaps New Hampshire? Just like we have a country in these United States to match any small European country whose statistics are brought forward to push some kind of social agenda.
- tazjin 13y ago
  Hej from Sweden! Find me a US state (or area with equivalent population) with - national health care (dental might be exempted, but still capped after a certain amount) - stable, cheap, state-subsidized public transport with great coverage - school system equivalent to Sweden (though Sweden does arguably not have the best one in Europe I still encounter many shocking things when speaking to Americans) - included in that: ability to go to university without being in debt for the rest of your life / without scholarships / without rich family - clean cities, low crime rates, low to non-existent amount of guns in circulation - widespread atheism, embracing science - widespread high bandwidth, affordable internet access I could list more things but I think this is enough for now. I'm not saying that all of these are without flaws or that we are the best at them, but the US lacking so many of these in a widespread manner makes me not consider it a first world country. Edit: I forgot a big one! - Employment security: No unfair terminations, regulated pay, overtime/nightshift/weekend pay regulated ... Edit 2: This is in response to a "dead" comment I got. In case you've got show-dead disabled here's the comment "..And where your tax rate is up to 60% of your income. http://www.theguardian.com/money/2008/nov/16/sweden-tax-burd..." http://www.theguardian.com/money/2008/nov/16/sweden-tax-burd... - polaris9000 Yes, our tax rates are much higher but that's not the whole story. If you compare average personal income between Sweden and the US (I couldn't find a source on median income) you have approximately 10k USD more in net-income in the US. I'm not an expert in finances so I won't try to adjust this for things like the gap between poor&rich (which would pull the US down a bit). How much of these 10k are gone after spending them on all the things we get delivered through our taxes? (Health care, subsidised public transport, education and so on) And one thing that doesn't directly affect everybody's life quality: How much better is our infrastructure (paid for / subsidised by taxes)? I'm speaking about everything ranging from streets to power grids to internet connections. How much more stability do we have in our lives and how much better is the average life satisfaction? I'm sure there is no canonical answer to any of these but I'm also sure that Sweden scores better on average (and remember that this was originally about Norway, which is doing much better than Sweden)
  - polaris9000 13y ago
    ..And where your tax rate is up to 60% of your income. http://www.theguardian.com/money/2008/nov/16/sweden-tax-burden-welfare http://www.theguardian.com/money/2008/nov/16/sweden-tax-burd...
    - dalke 13y ago
      And your point is ...? Please bear in mind that 1) that number is the highest marginal tax bracket, only paid by those with the most income, and 2) it's actually 57% not the rounded up value of 60%. For comparison, the marginal tax rate for the highest tax bracket in the US was above 60% during 1932-1986, with a peak was 91% in 1946-1964. Of course you're mostly just sniping numbers, since that article you quoted also says Swedes say they are "very happy to pay high taxes because I know I am getting value for the money later on." In the US we pay for things directly which are, in Sweden, paid indirectly through taxes. Do you really care if you pay 5% less in taxes only to have to pay 10% of your income per year in health care?
      - polaris9000 13y ago
        My point is: It's absurd to be paying over half of your income in taxes, regardless of whether you are living in the United States or Sweden. What is the incentive for someone to get a higher paying job then? Just to pay higher taxes? What is the point then? With that being the case, we should all just earn the lowest possible income then.
      - ahomescu1 13y ago
        > Do you really care if you pay 5% less in taxes only to have to pay 10% of your income per year in health care? There is one difference: you can't shop around. It's probably not a problem in Sweden, but in a lot of other "government provides everything" countries, there's a huge variation in quality of government-provided services (like schooling and doctors). You might get stuck with a crappy doctor (because of geographical assignment), while there's a great one on the next street. If I can keep my 5%, I pick my own doctor (within my budget).
- Dewie 13y ago
  USA the country is roughly equal to Europe the continent in square kilometers. I think the ability to compare USA the country and Europe the continent ends there, though.
- Dewie 13y ago
  The article is written by The Guardian. I control-f'd things like "usa" and "america" and found nothing in the article itself. But sure, the article was written to discredit America. Everything revolves around you.
at-fates-hands 13y ago
The statistic mentioned in the article for recidivism was around 16% "the lowest in Europe" That's interesting considering the US had the same rate in 2007 and we have treat our criminals completely different. This would lead me to believe treating criminals like people isn't the key to successful punishment and eventual rehabilitation. "During 2007, a total of 1,180,469 persons on parole were at-risk of reincarceration. This includes persons under parole supervision on January 1 or those entering parole during the year. Of these parolees, about 16% were returned to incarceration in 2007." source: http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=17 http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=17
- Luc 13y ago
  > Of these parolees 16% of parolees, not 16% of ex-inmates, right?
- nerfhammer 13y ago
  Isn't that the % of people breaking parole, not the total recidivism rate? Elsewhere: > recidivism rates between 1994 and 2007 have consistently remained around 40 percent. http://www.pewtrusts.org/uploadedFiles/wwwpewtrustsorg/Reports/sentencing_and_corrections/State_Recidivism_Revolving_Door_America_Prisons%20.pdf http://www.pewtrusts.org/uploadedFiles/wwwpewtrustsorg/Repor...
  - JackFr 13y ago
    That article is one of the most thoughtful I've read -- at its heart it is not a simple or obvious problem. "For example, why do Wyoming and Oregon have the lowest overall recidivism rates for offenders released in 2004, and why do Minnesota and California have the highest? Why does North Carolina return relatively few ex-offenders to prison for technical violations of their parole, but reincarcerate a comparatively large proportion for new crimes? What drove the recidivism rate down by 22.1 percent in Kansas between 1999 and 2004, and what drove it up 34.9 percent in South Dakota during the same time period?" "Florida and New York began the twenty-first century with nearly the same size prison population (about 70,000 inmates). During the ensuing decade, Florida added 30,000 inmates and now has more than 100,000 persons behind bars. Meanwhile, New York’s prison population fell below 60,000. Yet the crime rate dropped in both states by about the same rate. In fact, New York’s crime drop was slightly larger (29.2 percent) compared with Florida’s (28.2 percent)."
wutbrodo 13y ago
It looks like the Norwegians have gotten over the fundamental problem that we have in the States (and presumably in other countries): the idea that people should be made to suffer for perceived transgressions even if it costs the rest of society more (and yes, I do mean after accounting for the accompanied reduction of the undesired behavior by making an example of offenders). Apparently we're too primitive to get beyond the juvenile practice of cutting off our nose to spite our face, and it informs our drug policy, the way we deal with the homeless, our prison system, our views on social welfare, etc.
- InclinedPlane 13y ago
  The US criminal justice system is very much about punishment and retribution and almost not at all about rehabilitation or protection of society. That's the sort of system one would expect in a medieval country, we can and should do better.
- Nicholas_C 13y ago
  It's a really crappy predicament. Any politician here in the US that would want to model our prisons in a more humane manner would be labelled soft/weak on crime and would never get elected. I can't see this changing anytime in the next 20 years.
- WizzleKake 13y ago
  Prison in the US isn't about punishment or rehabilitation. It's about money. Incarceration is big business.
  - rayiner 13y ago
    It's not. Only a small percentage of prisons are for profit (http://www.propublica.org/article/by-the-numbers-the-u.s.s-growing-for-profit-detention-industry http://www.propublica.org/article/by-the-numbers-the-u.s.s-g...), and our tendency to incarcerate people dates back to long before we had for profit prisons. Our incarceration rate is mostly a backlash against desegregation. It's mostly because of the war on drugs, which is at its base a war on black people.
jstalin 13y ago
This article digs up the age old question: is imprisonment intended to punish or to protect society? Or a little of both?
- Karunamon 13y ago
  I'd always thought of it as kind of being both. You don't need to subject inmates to the equivalent of torture and humiliation in order for them to become institutionalized, to fall behind on the world around them, to disrupt their careers and family ties. Those things alone are pretty terrible. And that's before you get into the whole "solitary confinement/tacitly accepted rape/etc" things that plague prisons.
  - scott_karana 13y ago
    I personally think those things are pretty terrible, but someone without a family, a steady career, and who is already behind the curve (out of work, remember?) might not particularly mind losing those liberties.
- TsiCClawOfLight 13y ago
  In my opinion, it should bring people to repentance and reintegrate them into normal life - helping them, as opposed to the society. They need the help, after all. Interesting fact: The word penitence, from which we get penitentiary, stems from the latin "paeniteō" - which means "to bring regret"...
masklinn 13y ago
> anything up to the 21-year maximum sentence (Norway has no death penalty or life sentence) One thing has to be noted every time: Norway has no life sentence (well it does, for the military) (and it has a 30 years sentence for crimes against humanity as required by the Rome Statute) but it has forvaring, "preventive detention". It is indeterminate length sentence tacked onto initial 21 years, which translates into the ability to extend the imprisonment by increments of 5 years if the prisoner is still considered a danger to society. The prisoner can petition for parole every year during forvaring, but there is no limit to the possibility of extension, so forvaring effectively allows for life in prison.
- bparsons 13y ago
  Canada has something similar, it is called "Dangerous Offender Status". There are of course, avenues of appeal, but it allows the state to imprison or place conditions upon extremely dangerous individuals for an indefinite period of time.
  - malandrew 13y ago
    If forced to make a choice, I would trade minimum mandatory sentencing for an adversarial process that permits dangerous offender status in the US. Every year that the person is reviewed, the people on the committee overseeing the review are randomly assigned at the last possible moment so that there can be no outside tampering with the judgement.
- hcarvalhoalves 13y ago
  This is good because in effect it can be life in prison, but the case is revised every X years - as opposed to being sentenced to life in prison beforehand, then making a lawyer rich trying to make a judge revisit your case.
  - scott_s 13y ago
    People sentenced to life in prison don't typically have the means to make a lawyer rich.
NovemberWest 13y ago
Well, America still doesn't deal with non-inmate populations humanely, so we have quite a ways to go.
anbu32 13y ago
Norway doesn't really have a permanent criminal class, and the main aim of the criminal justice system is to keep it that way. Whereas the US (and many others) have an enormous criminal social class, firmly-rooted criminal organizations seemingly in a prepetual state of war with law enforcement, and so on. That stuff isn't going away even if you did liberal prison reform. The circumstances are very different, maybe it's appropriate that the aims and methods of law enforcement are too?
- aestra 13y ago
  One of the arguments the article makes is the prison system elsewhere creates the permanent criminal class.
- 6d0debc071 13y ago
  They're not going away without doing liberal prison reform either. # I honestly don't see how much good can come of the current setup. Maybe that say more about me than it does about the setup - but what good can come from brutalising these people? When you try to use pain to make someone comply, the underlying message is that when they start complying the pain will stop. But ex-cons are effectively black-listed from most respectable jobs, they generally have very little by way of life skills, their social network is generally tied to criminals, there's no real welfare system to speak of to support them. The pain doesn't sound like it really stops, changes intensity maybe. Meanwhile there's lots of relatively easy money to be made from drugs, slavery and the like.... I suspect you need a very strong character to work your way up decently from that sort of starting position - I just don't see how effectively torturing people would give them that.
ianstallings 13y ago
I've never been to prison but years ago I went to jail in the US for violent acts and weapon charges and wouldn't wish that on anyone. My co-defendant in the trial was charged with greater crimes and did 8 years in prison out of 13. I went to visit the guy about once a month and I can say one thing for certain - he will never be the same. And not in a good way. I know a lot of guys like him. The US prison system is not worried about rehabilitation. It's about punishment and removal from society, regardless of how you come out. It's a terrible place meant to scare the crap out of you and that's basically it. And now it's one big industry.
- shawndumas 13y ago
  has that experience served as a deterrent for you in any way?
  - ianstallings 13y ago
    Yes definitely. I was a different person back then but that experience in particular helped change me. I fear going to jail now more than before I ever went in. The sheer boredom of it all is enough to drive you mad. Concrete walls, hard metal beds, lights never go off, constant yelling, just enough food to make sure you don't starve, and of course the other inmates that are all criminals and a lot are willing to commit violence to get their way. You've haven't seen the true depths of human depravity until you see two grown men try to kill each other because one wanted to watch a different soap opera or sought revenge for some supposed sleight. And I had it easy compared to prison or the penitentiary.
    - claudius 13y ago
      I’m sorry, could you elaborate on the difference between prison, jail and penitentiary? To my non-native understanding, they’re exact synonyms.
      - NovemberWest 13y ago
        Off the top of my head: Jail is local and generally short term. Prison is regional and longer sentences. Penitentiary...I think federal (national rather than state level) and higher security.
dmix 13y ago
There's a movement in some law circles towards "Restorative Justice" which I think is even more forward thinking than Norway's prison system. It focuses on the victims interests instead of the governments (imagine this applied to Aaron Swartz). > Restorative justice (also sometimes called reparative justice) is an approach to justice that focuses on the needs of the victims and the offenders, as well as the involved community, instead of satisfying abstract legal principles or punishing the offender. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restorative_justice https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restorative_justice
- jackmaney 13y ago
  0_o Focusing on the needs of the offenders? Really? Why?! "Your Honor, I did burn down that orphanage, but I really need a new car. And prison is too punitive!"
  - 00rion 13y ago
    I would say the focus is more on the offenders' enlightened self interest. Not everyone is aware of the best course of action given a situation. That goes for both offenders and the people who have decided to perpetuate our punitive prison system.
zeidrich 13y ago
Prisoners are people. Thus, the question becomes, how do we treat our people?
- ChrisNorstrom 13y ago
  Someone who rapes your wife and stabs her is no longer a person but a primitive animal. A man who has reverted to a baboon and devolved. Grouping everyone together sounds nice and mushy and makes you look like a good hearted person but is unrealistic.
  - lawn 13y ago
    Someone who robs a bank is a primal animal who deserves to be raped in the shower?
  - vacri 13y ago
    Grouping everyone together You just implied that all inmates are rapists and stabbers. Herein lies the problem of the anti-rehabilitation crowd: they argue against rehabilitating prisoners using the worst examples they can find, ignoring that most prisoners don't fit their description.
  - prawn 13y ago
    When they're released from prison, would you rather they still be that baboon or be less likely to reoffend?
icecreampain 13y ago
Can't speak for Norway, but I imagine is as being about as lax as Swedish prisons: here the "prisoners", if you may call them such, even though they are murderers, assualters and other kinds of violent criminals, have better accommodations and food than the elderly. And school children. (Better as in: more money is spent per prisoner than per child or senior in government care [1]). Also, prisoners are given free health care and dental work, something that "free" Swedes have to pay for. Coincidentally, illegal aliens are also given free dental work (they pay 5$ per appointment). Something is seriously wrong with Sweden when criminals are taken care of better than [law-abiding] citizens. 1) http://www.pitea-tidningen.se/nyheter/varfor-far-fangarna-battre-mat-an-skoleleverna-6052081-default.aspx http://www.pitea-tidningen.se/nyheter/varfor-far-fangarna-ba...
- claudius 13y ago
  I would always expect that a society has a higher responsibility towards a person from whom it took away their personal freedom than towards a ‘free’ citizen. While this argument does not extend to school children and illegal immigrants, I find it absolutely necessary to consider when complaining about free healthcare for prisoners.
- dalke 13y ago
  You can't seriously expect that link to be meaningful. These were questions asked by 11-13 years olds to local politicians. There's no actual analysis there, and the only mention of money spent on prisoners is: "Varför får fångarna på fängelser bättre mat än oss i skolan? frågade John Edin." -- "Why do the prisoners in prison get better food than we do in school? asked John Edin" The response by the local politician Christer Lindström was: "Jag har ingen aning om vad internernas mat kostar. Men i skolan kostar en portion 30-35 kronor. Det är ointressant vad andras mat kostar, det viktiga är vad vi erbjuder." -- "I don't have a clue on what the internees' food costs. But in school a portion costs 30-35 kronor. The cost of others' foods isn't interesting, the important thing is what we offer." So from that dialog we don't know: 1) is John Edin correct? 2) what does "better" mean? and 3) is the price difference unreasonable? Regarding the last, children on average over the 12 or so years of school need fewer calories than adults, so I would expect that less money is spent per person in feeding a child than an adult. As for "criminals are taken care of better than [law-abiding] citizens" .. okay, that's where I know you're being deliberately obtuse. How good is the public road system for the criminals? How good is the mass transit system? How much parental leave time do criminals get, and how much are they paid for it? Do prisoners get paid sick leave? And so on through a long list of public services that prisoners don't get or can't use. Or more concisely, why not also complain that prisoners get free housing, free food, and free heat, while law-abiding citizens have to pay for those themselves?
richardlblair 13y ago
The thing I love most about this, is that it shows they still hold faith in human kind. They sincerely believe they can help people change, and people are changing. This is a seriously heart warming story.
pinaceae 13y ago
not an easy topic though. some crimes are easier to stomach than others. some sentences are not meant to help the person going to prison, but protecting the population from that very person. the lax practices in western europe have led to numerous cases where prisoners where able to rape/kill people while they were on "prison vacations", in german called "freigang". very often an expert psychatrist had deemed the prisoner to be stable and reformed. a guy in austria has just killed 3 policemen plus 1 ambulance driver. if he doesn't kill himself (standoff is still ongoing) - what exactly is there to reform? 4 people are dead, the lives of their families are forever impacted by this. why should the assailant have any right to return to society? he decided to deny this right to 4 direct victims. should marc dutroux ever go free? breivik? why do they need to be reformed? should the gangrapers in India go free? the victims and their families should come first. you rape, kill, maim? consciously? ok, face the consequences. this reformation BS is ignoring the plight of the victims and their families.
- hrkristian 13y ago
  I recently kayaked around Bastoy (prison), it's a great place; nice beaches; great view on all sides; rapists and axe murderers shuttling to or from places on their bikes. Does sound like I'm making a joke doesn't it? It's not, it's how it is and I like it and am proud of it. For cases like Breivik we have forced psychiatric admission, which can be a life-sentence. In fact this was the key point of the Breivik case: Whether he was in a psychotic state of mind, and even more importantly, whether his extreme (religious) views could be deemed delusional. Revenge is barbaric, and granted some degree of barbarism simply exists within all of us, some more than others. The court system shouldn't be based around barbarism, and the american use of "justice" really is just a synonym for revenge. Pure and simple. I don't want this. I don't want to live in a country where our flaws doom us, where mistakes are never forgiven. Norwegians live in a country where all the money in the world cannot have a man (legally) killed or sentenced to life. Norwegians live in a country where men and women who take wrong turns in their life are given the opportunity to redeem themselves (and they do, almost always.) I live here, I love it here, and I love it for reasons US citizens see in movies, but not in society.
  - 13y ago
chestnut-tree 13y ago
This is a really insightful article into Norway's prison system. I wish it had also gathered opinions from the victims of crime. I presume there is broad support among the Norwegian population for the length of sentencing. In the UK, the press often goads the public with stories of "soft" sentencing. The article mentions a young man serving 11 years for murder. That pain will last a lifetime for the family of the murdered person. If I wondered if I could accept a sentence of 11 years as suitable punishment for the murderer? Would I be so bitter and angry that I'd wish for more? (Yes, I know this is why we have courts to make judgements).
ffrryuu 13y ago
And the American inner city streets where people are treated like savages.
jonnathanson 13y ago
Just crunching some numbers here, and these are rough estimates, presented without comment: - Norway: 4,000 prisoners / 5M population (0.08% incarceration) - United Kingdom: 84,000 prisoners / 63M pop. (0.13%) - United States: 2,270,000 prisoners / 317M pop. (0.72%) The US prison population rises to about 7M when you include everyone "under correctional supervision" (e.g., in probation, on parole, in jail, etc.), increasing to a >2% figure. But I don't have apples-to-apples figures for the UK and Norway in this regard.
- vacri 13y ago
  The usual way to refer to incarcerated population is per 100k population. Norway is around 70/100k, 'first world' countries in general are around 70-150/100k, New Zealand is an outlier at 200/100k and the US is an extreme outlier at ~720/100k. The US really is way out of step with its contemporaries on this issue. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcerat...
  - jonnathanson 13y ago
    Got it, thanks for the clarification. But either way, the US looks pretty bad on this metric.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
- alexanderchr 13y ago
  Please go somewhere else with your racism. Thanks.
  - sgt 13y ago
    If something that you consider to be 'racist' is indeed a fact (or at least a debatable subject), then consider joining the real world.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
laichzeit0 13y ago
This would never work in South Africa for example. The conditions of such a prison are orders of magnitude better than what half the population have at home. Just having food, a bed and a flushing toilet would be a step up. Everyone would be lining up to go to prison :)
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- prawn 13y ago
  I don't think the equivalent in South Africa would necessarily have the same standard of living, but the emphasis on work opportunities, integration, etc would likely be emulated.
amerika_blog 13y ago
What works for a tiny ethnically homogenous country situated in the far north might just work for ANYONE! Or, not.

260 points by netvarun 13y ago

I'm sure we have a country like Norway somewhere in the United States. Perhaps New Hampshire? Just like we have a country in these United States to match any small European country whose statistics are brought forward to push some kind of social agenda.

tazjin 13y ago
Hej from Sweden! Find me a US state (or area with equivalent population) with - national health care (dental might be exempted, but still capped after a certain amount) - stable, cheap, state-subsidized public transport with great coverage - school system equivalent to Sweden (though Sweden does arguably not have the best one in Europe I still encounter many shocking things when speaking to Americans) - included in that: ability to go to university without being in debt for the rest of your life / without scholarships / without rich family - clean cities, low crime rates, low to non-existent amount of guns in circulation - widespread atheism, embracing science - widespread high bandwidth, affordable internet access I could list more things but I think this is enough for now. I'm not saying that all of these are without flaws or that we are the best at them, but the US lacking so many of these in a widespread manner makes me not consider it a first world country. Edit: I forgot a big one! - Employment security: No unfair terminations, regulated pay, overtime/nightshift/weekend pay regulated ... Edit 2: This is in response to a "dead" comment I got. In case you've got show-dead disabled here's the comment "..And where your tax rate is up to 60% of your income. http://www.theguardian.com/money/2008/nov/16/sweden-tax-burd..." http://www.theguardian.com/money/2008/nov/16/sweden-tax-burd... - polaris9000 Yes, our tax rates are much higher but that's not the whole story. If you compare average personal income between Sweden and the US (I couldn't find a source on median income) you have approximately 10k USD more in net-income in the US. I'm not an expert in finances so I won't try to adjust this for things like the gap between poor&rich (which would pull the US down a bit). How much of these 10k are gone after spending them on all the things we get delivered through our taxes? (Health care, subsidised public transport, education and so on) And one thing that doesn't directly affect everybody's life quality: How much better is our infrastructure (paid for / subsidised by taxes)? I'm speaking about everything ranging from streets to power grids to internet connections. How much more stability do we have in our lives and how much better is the average life satisfaction? I'm sure there is no canonical answer to any of these but I'm also sure that Sweden scores better on average (and remember that this was originally about Norway, which is doing much better than Sweden)
- polaris9000 13y ago
  ..And where your tax rate is up to 60% of your income. http://www.theguardian.com/money/2008/nov/16/sweden-tax-burden-welfare http://www.theguardian.com/money/2008/nov/16/sweden-tax-burd...
  - dalke 13y ago
    And your point is ...? Please bear in mind that 1) that number is the highest marginal tax bracket, only paid by those with the most income, and 2) it's actually 57% not the rounded up value of 60%. For comparison, the marginal tax rate for the highest tax bracket in the US was above 60% during 1932-1986, with a peak was 91% in 1946-1964. Of course you're mostly just sniping numbers, since that article you quoted also says Swedes say they are "very happy to pay high taxes because I know I am getting value for the money later on." In the US we pay for things directly which are, in Sweden, paid indirectly through taxes. Do you really care if you pay 5% less in taxes only to have to pay 10% of your income per year in health care?
    - polaris9000 13y ago
      My point is: It's absurd to be paying over half of your income in taxes, regardless of whether you are living in the United States or Sweden. What is the incentive for someone to get a higher paying job then? Just to pay higher taxes? What is the point then? With that being the case, we should all just earn the lowest possible income then.
    - ahomescu1 13y ago
      > Do you really care if you pay 5% less in taxes only to have to pay 10% of your income per year in health care? There is one difference: you can't shop around. It's probably not a problem in Sweden, but in a lot of other "government provides everything" countries, there's a huge variation in quality of government-provided services (like schooling and doctors). You might get stuck with a crappy doctor (because of geographical assignment), while there's a great one on the next street. If I can keep my 5%, I pick my own doctor (within my budget).
Dewie 13y ago
USA the country is roughly equal to Europe the continent in square kilometers. I think the ability to compare USA the country and Europe the continent ends there, though.
Dewie 13y ago
The article is written by The Guardian. I control-f'd things like "usa" and "america" and found nothing in the article itself. But sure, the article was written to discredit America. Everything revolves around you.

at-fates-hands 13y ago

The statistic mentioned in the article for recidivism was around 16% "the lowest in Europe" That's interesting considering the US had the same rate in 2007 and we have treat our criminals completely different. This would lead me to believe treating criminals like people isn't the key to successful punishment and eventual rehabilitation. "During 2007, a total of 1,180,469 persons on parole were at-risk of reincarceration. This includes persons under parole supervision on January 1 or those entering parole during the year. Of these parolees, about 16% were returned to incarceration in 2007." source: http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=17 http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=17

Luc 13y ago
> Of these parolees 16% of parolees, not 16% of ex-inmates, right?
nerfhammer 13y ago
Isn't that the % of people breaking parole, not the total recidivism rate? Elsewhere: > recidivism rates between 1994 and 2007 have consistently remained around 40 percent. http://www.pewtrusts.org/uploadedFiles/wwwpewtrustsorg/Reports/sentencing_and_corrections/State_Recidivism_Revolving_Door_America_Prisons%20.pdf http://www.pewtrusts.org/uploadedFiles/wwwpewtrustsorg/Repor...
- JackFr 13y ago
  That article is one of the most thoughtful I've read -- at its heart it is not a simple or obvious problem. "For example, why do Wyoming and Oregon have the lowest overall recidivism rates for offenders released in 2004, and why do Minnesota and California have the highest? Why does North Carolina return relatively few ex-offenders to prison for technical violations of their parole, but reincarcerate a comparatively large proportion for new crimes? What drove the recidivism rate down by 22.1 percent in Kansas between 1999 and 2004, and what drove it up 34.9 percent in South Dakota during the same time period?" "Florida and New York began the twenty-first century with nearly the same size prison population (about 70,000 inmates). During the ensuing decade, Florida added 30,000 inmates and now has more than 100,000 persons behind bars. Meanwhile, New York’s prison population fell below 60,000. Yet the crime rate dropped in both states by about the same rate. In fact, New York’s crime drop was slightly larger (29.2 percent) compared with Florida’s (28.2 percent)."

wutbrodo 13y ago

It looks like the Norwegians have gotten over the fundamental problem that we have in the States (and presumably in other countries): the idea that people should be made to suffer for perceived transgressions even if it costs the rest of society more (and yes, I do mean after accounting for the accompanied reduction of the undesired behavior by making an example of offenders). Apparently we're too primitive to get beyond the juvenile practice of cutting off our nose to spite our face, and it informs our drug policy, the way we deal with the homeless, our prison system, our views on social welfare, etc.

InclinedPlane 13y ago
The US criminal justice system is very much about punishment and retribution and almost not at all about rehabilitation or protection of society. That's the sort of system one would expect in a medieval country, we can and should do better.
Nicholas_C 13y ago
It's a really crappy predicament. Any politician here in the US that would want to model our prisons in a more humane manner would be labelled soft/weak on crime and would never get elected. I can't see this changing anytime in the next 20 years.
WizzleKake 13y ago
Prison in the US isn't about punishment or rehabilitation. It's about money. Incarceration is big business.
- rayiner 13y ago
  It's not. Only a small percentage of prisons are for profit (http://www.propublica.org/article/by-the-numbers-the-u.s.s-growing-for-profit-detention-industry http://www.propublica.org/article/by-the-numbers-the-u.s.s-g...), and our tendency to incarcerate people dates back to long before we had for profit prisons. Our incarceration rate is mostly a backlash against desegregation. It's mostly because of the war on drugs, which is at its base a war on black people.

jstalin 13y ago

This article digs up the age old question: is imprisonment intended to punish or to protect society? Or a little of both?

Karunamon 13y ago
I'd always thought of it as kind of being both. You don't need to subject inmates to the equivalent of torture and humiliation in order for them to become institutionalized, to fall behind on the world around them, to disrupt their careers and family ties. Those things alone are pretty terrible. And that's before you get into the whole "solitary confinement/tacitly accepted rape/etc" things that plague prisons.
- scott_karana 13y ago
  I personally think those things are pretty terrible, but someone without a family, a steady career, and who is already behind the curve (out of work, remember?) might not particularly mind losing those liberties.
TsiCClawOfLight 13y ago
In my opinion, it should bring people to repentance and reintegrate them into normal life - helping them, as opposed to the society. They need the help, after all. Interesting fact: The word penitence, from which we get penitentiary, stems from the latin "paeniteō" - which means "to bring regret"...

masklinn 13y ago

> anything up to the 21-year maximum sentence (Norway has no death penalty or life sentence) One thing has to be noted every time: Norway has no life sentence (well it does, for the military) (and it has a 30 years sentence for crimes against humanity as required by the Rome Statute) but it has forvaring, "preventive detention". It is indeterminate length sentence tacked onto initial 21 years, which translates into the ability to extend the imprisonment by increments of 5 years if the prisoner is still considered a danger to society. The prisoner can petition for parole every year during forvaring, but there is no limit to the possibility of extension, so forvaring effectively allows for life in prison.

bparsons 13y ago
Canada has something similar, it is called "Dangerous Offender Status". There are of course, avenues of appeal, but it allows the state to imprison or place conditions upon extremely dangerous individuals for an indefinite period of time.
- malandrew 13y ago
  If forced to make a choice, I would trade minimum mandatory sentencing for an adversarial process that permits dangerous offender status in the US. Every year that the person is reviewed, the people on the committee overseeing the review are randomly assigned at the last possible moment so that there can be no outside tampering with the judgement.
hcarvalhoalves 13y ago
This is good because in effect it can be life in prison, but the case is revised every X years - as opposed to being sentenced to life in prison beforehand, then making a lawyer rich trying to make a judge revisit your case.
- scott_s 13y ago
  People sentenced to life in prison don't typically have the means to make a lawyer rich.

NovemberWest 13y ago

Well, America still doesn't deal with non-inmate populations humanely, so we have quite a ways to go.

anbu32 13y ago

Norway doesn't really have a permanent criminal class, and the main aim of the criminal justice system is to keep it that way. Whereas the US (and many others) have an enormous criminal social class, firmly-rooted criminal organizations seemingly in a prepetual state of war with law enforcement, and so on. That stuff isn't going away even if you did liberal prison reform. The circumstances are very different, maybe it's appropriate that the aims and methods of law enforcement are too?

aestra 13y ago
One of the arguments the article makes is the prison system elsewhere creates the permanent criminal class.
6d0debc071 13y ago
They're not going away without doing liberal prison reform either. # I honestly don't see how much good can come of the current setup. Maybe that say more about me than it does about the setup - but what good can come from brutalising these people? When you try to use pain to make someone comply, the underlying message is that when they start complying the pain will stop. But ex-cons are effectively black-listed from most respectable jobs, they generally have very little by way of life skills, their social network is generally tied to criminals, there's no real welfare system to speak of to support them. The pain doesn't sound like it really stops, changes intensity maybe. Meanwhile there's lots of relatively easy money to be made from drugs, slavery and the like.... I suspect you need a very strong character to work your way up decently from that sort of starting position - I just don't see how effectively torturing people would give them that.

ianstallings 13y ago

I've never been to prison but years ago I went to jail in the US for violent acts and weapon charges and wouldn't wish that on anyone. My co-defendant in the trial was charged with greater crimes and did 8 years in prison out of 13. I went to visit the guy about once a month and I can say one thing for certain - he will never be the same. And not in a good way. I know a lot of guys like him. The US prison system is not worried about rehabilitation. It's about punishment and removal from society, regardless of how you come out. It's a terrible place meant to scare the crap out of you and that's basically it. And now it's one big industry.

shawndumas 13y ago
has that experience served as a deterrent for you in any way?
- ianstallings 13y ago
  Yes definitely. I was a different person back then but that experience in particular helped change me. I fear going to jail now more than before I ever went in. The sheer boredom of it all is enough to drive you mad. Concrete walls, hard metal beds, lights never go off, constant yelling, just enough food to make sure you don't starve, and of course the other inmates that are all criminals and a lot are willing to commit violence to get their way. You've haven't seen the true depths of human depravity until you see two grown men try to kill each other because one wanted to watch a different soap opera or sought revenge for some supposed sleight. And I had it easy compared to prison or the penitentiary.
  - claudius 13y ago
    I’m sorry, could you elaborate on the difference between prison, jail and penitentiary? To my non-native understanding, they’re exact synonyms.
    - NovemberWest 13y ago
      Off the top of my head: Jail is local and generally short term. Prison is regional and longer sentences. Penitentiary...I think federal (national rather than state level) and higher security.

dmix 13y ago

There's a movement in some law circles towards "Restorative Justice" which I think is even more forward thinking than Norway's prison system. It focuses on the victims interests instead of the governments (imagine this applied to Aaron Swartz). > Restorative justice (also sometimes called reparative justice) is an approach to justice that focuses on the needs of the victims and the offenders, as well as the involved community, instead of satisfying abstract legal principles or punishing the offender. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restorative_justice https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restorative_justice

jackmaney 13y ago
0_o Focusing on the needs of the offenders? Really? Why?! "Your Honor, I did burn down that orphanage, but I really need a new car. And prison is too punitive!"
- 00rion 13y ago
  I would say the focus is more on the offenders' enlightened self interest. Not everyone is aware of the best course of action given a situation. That goes for both offenders and the people who have decided to perpetuate our punitive prison system.

zeidrich 13y ago

Prisoners are people. Thus, the question becomes, how do we treat our people?

ChrisNorstrom 13y ago
Someone who rapes your wife and stabs her is no longer a person but a primitive animal. A man who has reverted to a baboon and devolved. Grouping everyone together sounds nice and mushy and makes you look like a good hearted person but is unrealistic.
- lawn 13y ago
  Someone who robs a bank is a primal animal who deserves to be raped in the shower?
- vacri 13y ago
  Grouping everyone together You just implied that all inmates are rapists and stabbers. Herein lies the problem of the anti-rehabilitation crowd: they argue against rehabilitating prisoners using the worst examples they can find, ignoring that most prisoners don't fit their description.
- prawn 13y ago
  When they're released from prison, would you rather they still be that baboon or be less likely to reoffend?

icecreampain 13y ago

Can't speak for Norway, but I imagine is as being about as lax as Swedish prisons: here the "prisoners", if you may call them such, even though they are murderers, assualters and other kinds of violent criminals, have better accommodations and food than the elderly. And school children. (Better as in: more money is spent per prisoner than per child or senior in government care [1]). Also, prisoners are given free health care and dental work, something that "free" Swedes have to pay for. Coincidentally, illegal aliens are also given free dental work (they pay 5$ per appointment). Something is seriously wrong with Sweden when criminals are taken care of better than [law-abiding] citizens. 1) http://www.pitea-tidningen.se/nyheter/varfor-far-fangarna-battre-mat-an-skoleleverna-6052081-default.aspx http://www.pitea-tidningen.se/nyheter/varfor-far-fangarna-ba...

claudius 13y ago
I would always expect that a society has a higher responsibility towards a person from whom it took away their personal freedom than towards a ‘free’ citizen. While this argument does not extend to school children and illegal immigrants, I find it absolutely necessary to consider when complaining about free healthcare for prisoners.
dalke 13y ago
You can't seriously expect that link to be meaningful. These were questions asked by 11-13 years olds to local politicians. There's no actual analysis there, and the only mention of money spent on prisoners is: "Varför får fångarna på fängelser bättre mat än oss i skolan? frågade John Edin." -- "Why do the prisoners in prison get better food than we do in school? asked John Edin" The response by the local politician Christer Lindström was: "Jag har ingen aning om vad internernas mat kostar. Men i skolan kostar en portion 30-35 kronor. Det är ointressant vad andras mat kostar, det viktiga är vad vi erbjuder." -- "I don't have a clue on what the internees' food costs. But in school a portion costs 30-35 kronor. The cost of others' foods isn't interesting, the important thing is what we offer." So from that dialog we don't know: 1) is John Edin correct? 2) what does "better" mean? and 3) is the price difference unreasonable? Regarding the last, children on average over the 12 or so years of school need fewer calories than adults, so I would expect that less money is spent per person in feeding a child than an adult. As for "criminals are taken care of better than [law-abiding] citizens" .. okay, that's where I know you're being deliberately obtuse. How good is the public road system for the criminals? How good is the mass transit system? How much parental leave time do criminals get, and how much are they paid for it? Do prisoners get paid sick leave? And so on through a long list of public services that prisoners don't get or can't use. Or more concisely, why not also complain that prisoners get free housing, free food, and free heat, while law-abiding citizens have to pay for those themselves?

richardlblair 13y ago

The thing I love most about this, is that it shows they still hold faith in human kind. They sincerely believe they can help people change, and people are changing. This is a seriously heart warming story.

pinaceae 13y ago

not an easy topic though. some crimes are easier to stomach than others. some sentences are not meant to help the person going to prison, but protecting the population from that very person. the lax practices in western europe have led to numerous cases where prisoners where able to rape/kill people while they were on "prison vacations", in german called "freigang". very often an expert psychatrist had deemed the prisoner to be stable and reformed. a guy in austria has just killed 3 policemen plus 1 ambulance driver. if he doesn't kill himself (standoff is still ongoing) - what exactly is there to reform? 4 people are dead, the lives of their families are forever impacted by this. why should the assailant have any right to return to society? he decided to deny this right to 4 direct victims. should marc dutroux ever go free? breivik? why do they need to be reformed? should the gangrapers in India go free? the victims and their families should come first. you rape, kill, maim? consciously? ok, face the consequences. this reformation BS is ignoring the plight of the victims and their families.

hrkristian 13y ago
I recently kayaked around Bastoy (prison), it's a great place; nice beaches; great view on all sides; rapists and axe murderers shuttling to or from places on their bikes. Does sound like I'm making a joke doesn't it? It's not, it's how it is and I like it and am proud of it. For cases like Breivik we have forced psychiatric admission, which can be a life-sentence. In fact this was the key point of the Breivik case: Whether he was in a psychotic state of mind, and even more importantly, whether his extreme (religious) views could be deemed delusional. Revenge is barbaric, and granted some degree of barbarism simply exists within all of us, some more than others. The court system shouldn't be based around barbarism, and the american use of "justice" really is just a synonym for revenge. Pure and simple. I don't want this. I don't want to live in a country where our flaws doom us, where mistakes are never forgiven. Norwegians live in a country where all the money in the world cannot have a man (legally) killed or sentenced to life. Norwegians live in a country where men and women who take wrong turns in their life are given the opportunity to redeem themselves (and they do, almost always.) I live here, I love it here, and I love it for reasons US citizens see in movies, but not in society.
- 13y ago

chestnut-tree 13y ago

This is a really insightful article into Norway's prison system. I wish it had also gathered opinions from the victims of crime. I presume there is broad support among the Norwegian population for the length of sentencing. In the UK, the press often goads the public with stories of "soft" sentencing. The article mentions a young man serving 11 years for murder. That pain will last a lifetime for the family of the murdered person. If I wondered if I could accept a sentence of 11 years as suitable punishment for the murderer? Would I be so bitter and angry that I'd wish for more? (Yes, I know this is why we have courts to make judgements).

ffrryuu 13y ago

And the American inner city streets where people are treated like savages.

jonnathanson 13y ago

Just crunching some numbers here, and these are rough estimates, presented without comment: - Norway: 4,000 prisoners / 5M population (0.08% incarceration) - United Kingdom: 84,000 prisoners / 63M pop. (0.13%) - United States: 2,270,000 prisoners / 317M pop. (0.72%) The US prison population rises to about 7M when you include everyone "under correctional supervision" (e.g., in probation, on parole, in jail, etc.), increasing to a >2% figure. But I don't have apples-to-apples figures for the UK and Norway in this regard.

vacri 13y ago
The usual way to refer to incarcerated population is per 100k population. Norway is around 70/100k, 'first world' countries in general are around 70-150/100k, New Zealand is an outlier at 200/100k and the US is an extreme outlier at ~720/100k. The US really is way out of step with its contemporaries on this issue. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcerat...
- jonnathanson 13y ago
  Got it, thanks for the clarification. But either way, the US looks pretty bad on this metric.

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alexanderchr 13y ago
Please go somewhere else with your racism. Thanks.
- sgt 13y ago
  If something that you consider to be 'racist' is indeed a fact (or at least a debatable subject), then consider joining the real world.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]

laichzeit0 13y ago

This would never work in South Africa for example. The conditions of such a prison are orders of magnitude better than what half the population have at home. Just having food, a bed and a flushing toilet would be a step up. Everyone would be lining up to go to prison :)

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prawn 13y ago
I don't think the equivalent in South Africa would necessarily have the same standard of living, but the emphasis on work opportunities, integration, etc would likely be emulated.

amerika_blog 13y ago

What works for a tiny ethnically homogenous country situated in the far north might just work for ANYONE! Or, not.