Why Are So Many Americans in Prison?

Why Are So Many Americans in Prison?
Author :
Publisher : Russell Sage Foundation
Total Pages : 337
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781610448161
ISBN-13 : 1610448162
Rating : 4/5 (162 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Why Are So Many Americans in Prison? by : Steven Raphael

Download or read book Why Are So Many Americans in Prison? written by Steven Raphael and published by Russell Sage Foundation. This book was released on 2013-05-14 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Between 1975 and 2007, the American incarceration rate increased nearly fivefold, a historic increase that puts the United States in a league of its own among advanced economies. We incarcerate more people today than we ever have, and we stand out as the nation that most frequently uses incarceration to punish those who break the law. What factors explain the dramatic rise in incarceration rates in such a short period of time? In Why Are So Many Americans in Prison? Steven Raphael and Michael A. Stoll analyze the shocking expansion of America’s prison system and illustrate the pressing need to rethink mass incarceration in this country. Raphael and Stoll carefully evaluate changes in crime patterns, enforcement practices and sentencing laws to reach a sobering conclusion: So many Americans are in prison today because we have chosen, through our public policies, to put them there. They dispel the notion that a rise in crime rates fueled the incarceration surge; in fact, crime rates have steadily declined to all-time lows. There is also little evidence for other factors commonly offered to explain the prison boom, such as the deinstitutionalization of the mentally ill since the 1950s, changing demographics, or the crack-cocaine epidemic. By contrast, Raphael and Stoll demonstrate that legislative changes to a relatively small set of sentencing policies explain nearly all prison growth since the 1980s. So-called tough on crime laws, including mandatory minimum penalties and repeat offender statutes, have increased the propensity to punish more offenders with lengthier prison sentences. Raphael and Stoll argue that the high-incarceration regime has inflicted broad social costs, particularly among minority communities, who form a disproportionate share of the incarcerated population. Why Are So Many Americans in Prison? ends with a powerful plea to consider alternative crime control strategies, such as expanded policing, drug court programs, and sentencing law reform, which together can end our addiction to incarceration and still preserve public safety. As states confront the budgetary and social costs of the incarceration boom, Why Are So Many Americans in Prison? provides a revealing and accessible guide to the policies that created the era of mass incarceration and what we can do now to end it.


Why Are So Many Americans in Prison? Related Books

Why Are So Many Americans in Prison?
Language: en
Pages: 337
Authors: Steven Raphael
Categories: Social Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2013-05-14 - Publisher: Russell Sage Foundation

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Between 1975 and 2007, the American incarceration rate increased nearly fivefold, a historic increase that puts the United States in a league of its own among a
Do Prisons Make Us Safer?
Language: en
Pages: 365
Authors: Steven Raphael
Categories: Social Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2009-01-22 - Publisher: Russell Sage Foundation

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The number of people incarcerated in U.S. prisons and jails more than quadrupled between 1975 and 2005, reaching the unprecedented level of over two million inm
The Growth of Incarceration in the United States
Language: en
Pages: 800
Authors: Committee on Causes and Consequences of High Rates of Incarceration
Categories: Law
Type: BOOK - Published: 2014-12-31 - Publisher: National Academies Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

After decades of stability from the 1920s to the early 1970s, the rate of imprisonment in the United States has increased fivefold during the last four decades.
Race, Incarceration, and American Values
Language: en
Pages: 96
Authors: Glenn C. Loury
Categories: Political Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2008-08-22 - Publisher: MIT Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Why stigmatizing and confining a large segment of our population should be unacceptable to all Americans. The United States, home to five percent of the world's
The Effects of Incarceration and Reentry on Community Health and Well-Being
Language: en
Pages: 89
Authors: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Categories: Medical
Type: BOOK - Published: 2020-04-17 - Publisher: National Academies Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The high rate of incarceration in the United States contributes significantly to the nation's health inequities, extending beyond those who are imprisoned to fa