Mass probation: Toward a more robust theory of state variation in punishment

Abstract

Scholarship on the expansion of the U.S. carceral state has primarily focused on imprisonment rates. Yet the majority of adults under formal criminal justice control are on probation, an “alternative” form of supervision. This article develops the concept of mass probation and builds a typology of state control regimes that theorizes both the scale and type of punishment states employ. Drawing on Bureau of Justice Statistics data from 1980 and 2010, I analyze whether mass probation developed in the same places, affecting the same demographic groups and driven by the same criminal justice trends, as mass imprisonment. The results show that mass probation was a unique state development, expanding in unusual places like Minnesota and Washington. The conclusions argue for a reimagining of the causes and consequences of the carceral state to incorporate the expansion of probation.

Mass supervision, misrecognition and the ‘Malopticon’

“…This paper aims to contribute to important contemporary debates about the emergence of 'mass supervision' (McNeill, 2013;McNeill and Beyens, 2013;Robinson, McNeill and Maruna, 2013), 'mass probation' or 'mass penal control' (Phelps, 2013;2017a). Even in the world-leader in mass incarceration, the number of people subject to probation or parole far exceeds the number imprisoned; of the 6,741,400 people under some form of penal control at yearend 2015 in the USA, 4,650,900 were being supervised in the community (Kaeble and Glaze, 2016).…”

Fracturing the penal state: State actors and the role of conflict in penal change

“…In Europe, scholars tend to prefer the penal state nomenclature, foregrounding the fact that most criminal sentences end in “non-custodial or community penalties” even if such punishments are explicitly framed and named in reference to confinement (Zedner, 2016: 5). The numerical dominance of non-carceral sanctions is, of course, true in the US as well, despite the heavy use of the carceral state concept and a concomitant focus on mass incarceration (Phelps, 2017). And as we show below, many scholars use the carceral state to refer to this broader archipelago of punishing institutions.…”

American Exceptionalism in Community Supervision

“…While the trend toward greater incarceration rates has been well documented (see Western, 2006), the development of mass probation (Phelps, 2016) has gone relatively unnoticed. Between 1980 and its peak in 2007, the U.S. state and federal probation population reported to the Bureau of Justice Statistics grew from 1 million to over 4.2 million.…”

“…Using population data from the census, this translates into an overall prevalence rate of 1 in 53 U.S. adults. For black Americans, that rate rises to 1 in every 21 adults being on probation at the end of the year-and up to 1 in 12 black men (Phelps, 2016). Even after recent declines in the probation population, nearly 3.8 million adults remain under probation supervision as of 2015 (Kaeble & Bonczar, 2016).…”

“…If some aspects of probation are counterproductive to the reentry process, or outright "criminogenic," it should be a high priority everywhere to discontinue them. The financial expense and opportunity costs of mass supervision scholars argue we must also understand probation as another facet of overcriminalization in the U.S. (Doherty, 2016;Klingele, 2013;Phelps, 2016;Robinson, McNeill, & Maruna, 2013).…”