The United States of America, often referred to as the land of the free and the home of the brave, leads the world in incarceration.
With only 5% of world’s population here in the United States, we are home to 25% of the world’s prisoners.
What is the reason behind these high incarceration rates? Crime may seem like an obvious cause, but over the last 30 years violent crime rates have decreased while imprisonment rates have increased.
“Mass incarceration is a marker of social justice. This is the era of embracing the principles of social justice. The more people we incarcerate, the more we tie our own hands,” said professor Margaret Severson, professor of Social Welfare at the University of Kansas. Severson has studied different aspects of incarceration for the past 30 years and spent 8 years working in a jail where she developed a mental health and suicide prevention program.
Since the 1970s, the number of incarcerated Americans skyrocketed. The prison population went from around 350,000 to 2.3 million in under 50 years. The “war on drugs” during the Nixon presidency played a role in increased incarceration as did new drug and prison policies.
The three-strikes law is just one policy that Professor Severs mentions contributed to mass incarceration. “It was a matter of counting. After three felony convictions, one could be sentenced as a habitual offender adding a certain amount of time to their conviction. This resulted in a burgeoning prison population with people serving long sentences for felonies.”
When asked how easy it is for former inmates to get back on their feet once released from prison, Professor Severson wasn’t convinced. After being released from jail, felons often have trouble securing employment, as employers can choose to hire or not hire based on criminal history. Convicted criminals may be unable to utilize food stamps and public housing. In some cases, felons lose their right to vote. “We need job training, job opportunities, and opportunities in the community for felons. We have to prepare them to come out of their incarceration in a way where they are ready to go back to the community, work, have an income, join families, and have the support of the community,” said Severson.
What other alternatives are there to incarceration? Restorative justice is a new term and a new approach to justice. Severson defined restorative justice as “the idea that one can resolve the harms they have caused another person or the community through a process of communication and action that is all oriented toward healing the harm that was caused to a specific person or community.” With restorative justice, the offender recognizes the harm caused to a person or community and together through dialogue and negotiation they have the potential to reach an understanding about what happened and why it happened. “The beauty of restorative justice is that it takes out that anger and animosity and substitutes a view of the whole person,” said Severson.
Although there has been some movement away from longer sentencing and new alternatives to incarceration have been created, the effects of old policies continue to ripple. Communities and individuals must support people during the challenging days, months and years that happen after release from jail. It is important to support former inmates and help them find jobs, have food and pay attention to their mental health needs.