On the Politics of Imprisonments: A Review of Systematic Findings

Abstract

The great expansion in imprisonments in the United States in the past 35 years is puzzling partly because this abrupt growth is completely unprecedented. Changes in the crime rates alone cannot explain this trend, and ideational accounts that focus on penal styles are problematic. Political explanations, however, show promise, given that governments must provide domestic order and candidates can use public concerns about race and street crime to win elections. This review highlights the empirical literature in sociology and also discusses some important findings in political science and economics. Law-and-order campaign appeals combined with a covert emphasis on the links between race and street crime used to overcome Republican electoral disadvantages seem to provide the most plausible explanations for the rapid increase in U.S. imprisonment rates in this racially divided society. Dissimilar political arrangements help explain why imprisonment trends in the United States have sharply departed from these trends in the affluent but less direct democracies in Western Europe. 129 Annu. Rev. Law. Soc. Sci. 2010.6:129-149. Downloaded from www.annualreviews.org Access provided by Mahidol University on 02/08/15. For personal use only.

Race and Imprisonments: Vigilante Violence, Minority Threat, and Racial Politics

“…There is agreement in the most recent statistical studies about the explanatory power of U.S. politics (Jacobs and Carmichael 2001; Stucky et al. 2005; Western 2006; Spelman 2009; Jacobs and Jackson 2010). Yet no consensus exists about the degree to which race influences incarceration rates in this literature.…”

Incarceration, Prisoner Reentry, and Communities

“…Several related literature reviews have been published in recent years, including those on parole and prisoner reentry (National Research Council 2008, Visher & Travis 2003), the social and economic consequences of incarceration (Wakefield & Uggen 2010), the health consequences of incarceration (Schnittker et al 2011), the behavioral and political determinants of the prison boom (Gottschalk 2008, Jacobs & Jackson 2010, Raphael 2011), the consequences of mass incarceration for the children and families of those incarcerated (Comfort 2007, Wildeman & Muller 2012), and the effectiveness of correctional rehabilitation programs (Lipsey & Cullen 2007). Although we will touch on some of the topics covered in these reviews, we focus on a set of interrelated questions that have been given relatively little attention in prior work: (1) How has mass incarceration affected the social and economic structure of American communities, and (2) How do residential neighborhoods influence the process of reintegration among returning prisoners?…”

Shifting Power: The Impact of Incarceration on Political Representation

“…Today, the average black person lives in a neighborhood that is 45% black and only 35% white, while the average white person lives in a neighborhood that is 75% white and only 8% black (Logan and Stults, 2011). Meanwhile, a racialized criminal justice system expanded dramatically (Alexander 2010;Beckett 1997;Jacobs and Jackson 2010;Garland 2001;Wacquant 2000Wacquant , 2001 and as a result, prison beds were in demand. With the decline of urban areas as economic and political power bases and rural communities also in economic turmoil, politicians outside of urban areas began competing for prison contracts in their districts (Beale 1996;Schlosser 1998;Wilson 1987).…”