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Persistence and Functionality of Prisons

The United States has the highest number of prisoners in the world. Each year the number of citizens locked up in prisons continues to increase fueling the need of for more prisons in the country. Surprisingly, the country’s prison population is much more than that of countries that have more than twice its population such as India and China. Furthermore, the number of prisoners also surpasses that in totalitarian states such as Russia. With the country being a democratic state, it begs the question of what feeds the country’s prison system, fueling its absurd reputation. Officially, the country has no prisons but correctional facilities. Similarly, the department of corrections insists that the state has no prisoners but inmates.  However, behind these semantic somersaults and linguistic shield, one can easily see an elaborate prison system that serves both political and social functions in the society.  The goal of this paper is to discuss the possibility that the persistence of prison is due to its functionality in society. The prisons ability to cause increased unemployment, stigma and social inequality among those who have passed through the system coupled with its ability to economically revitalize rural communities have led to their persistence in society.

Fundamentally, prisons all over the world are designed to serve four purposes; first, they are created to serve as places for retribution. This means that they are places where those convicted of criminal activities go to pay for their crimes.  For society to operate in harmony, there must be law and order. However, there are those people who focus their attention on breaking the law making it difficult for people to coexist in the society; for instance, a person who breaks into a family’s lovely house and steals their hard earned property. Such people are often locked up in prisons to give them time to pay for their crimes through denial of freedom of movement and other luxuries enjoyed by free citizens.

 Secondly, prisons serve the purpose of incapacitating criminals.  The number of repeat offenders has continued to rise in the country. This shows that for some criminals, the urge to break the law often supersede their fear of the consequences of breaking the law. Such criminals are dangerous since if left unchecked, can engage in criminal activities daily. For instance, serial killers who get a sense of accomplishment after taking their victims life will continue killing until they are caught. Prisons serve as a place to incapacitate such criminals through removing them from society and keeping them locked up in a place where they have no one to hurt.

Thirdly, prisons also serve as a source of deterrence for other members of society.  The idea behind prisons was that the difficult life and limited freedom of those behind bars would act to deter those who are still free from engaging in a life of crime. This was designed to ensure the fear of going to prison gives other would be criminals enough motivation to abide by the laws of the country. According to Lynch (2004), the modern prison system has failed to achieve this since they have become entertainment commodities with little to offer in terms of deterrence.

Prisons are also supposed to rehabilitate prisoners.  Apart from incapacitating criminals, this is one of the primary reasons behind the existence of prisons.  The facilities are supposed to remodel the behavior of criminals and transform them into law-abiding citizens.   Due to the sheer numbers of those arrested, prisons have also failed in this regard as most of their convicts always end up back in jail upon being released. According to Clear (2007), the revolving door phenomenon is partly due to prisons inability to adequately rehabilitate those incarcerated within its walls. Therefore, Clear (2007) asserts that these criminals leave prison after completing their sentences only to end up being arrested and locked up again. 

Apart from the four fundamental functions of prisons, the role of the correctional facilities in society has ensured they continue plaguing the society churning out people who have wasted most of their productive years.  The functions these institutions play in society ensure it has a constant supply of people to lock up resulting in the incarceration crisis in the country.

Stigmatization

Being locked up completely changes the identity of the convicts. The society believes that most people who have gone to prison are bad and broke the law. While this is largely true, some prisoners are in jail for simple mistakes that could have been punished through community work. This negative perception about convicts coupled with the high rate of recidivism among prisoners makes the people treat them differently after they have completed their time. This different treatment stigmatizes the ex-convicts in the society affecting the way they view themselves. Clear (2007), asserts that ex-convicts have low self-worth. They think they are useless and cannot amount to any good in society. This low self-esteem stems from the treatment they receive from their immediate community after being released from jail.

Such stigmatization makes them accept and internalize the notion that they are the black sheep with little ability to reform. Therefore, after leaving prisons they resort to engaging in lives of crime to prove a point to other criminals who are often their sole companion after their prison sentences. These crime sprees only last for a short time before the ex-convicts land in the hands of the criminal justice system where they are processed and ultimately end up in jail again. Also, low self-worth, especially in communities with high rates of incarceration, means the children growing up in such community lack good role models to look up to.  The environment plays a vital role in determining the behavior of a person. Such kids grow up around people with low self-esteem whose only achievement is going to jail. This promotes the cycle of incarceration as the high number of those arrested or have been arrested normalize going to prison in such communities. The stigma the prison has created in the minds of people about prisons ensures the institutions constantly receive people to lock up because it makes the external environment hostile for them to reintegrate easily.

Additionally, apart from the ex-convicts low self-esteem, the community also treats them with contempt and skepticism.  Most law abiding citizens are afraid of engaging anybody with a criminal history.  Community members refuse to believe in the ability of the system to rehabilitate prisoners. They, therefore, stay clear of anybody who has gone to jail. This makes it difficult for them to reintegrate into the community after being released from prison. They, therefore, feel out of place and end up right back in prison.

 Furthermore, Clear (2007) opines that people from communities with high rates of incarceration also add to the stigmatization through arguing that such individual destroy the reputation of their towns. Such myopic reasoning and lack of trust in the ability of the prisons to reform the convicts make communities become hostile and unwelcoming for ex-convicts. Without properly reintegrating into the community, such people find themselves back in the prison system. Therefore, negative societal perception about prisoners directly leads to an increase in the number of prisoners and prisons in the country.

Unemployment

Incarceration significantly reduces a person’s chances of getting employment opportunities in the community.  According to Gowan (2002), most people in American prisons were arrested for committing nonviolent crimes such as being found in possession of common drugs such as crack cocaine. The brutal laws were created to end drug problem in the country significantly increased the number of inmates in the country. Gowan (2002) asserts that most of those arrested were youth who engaged in drugs due to peer pressure and were not actual criminals. These first-time offenders ended up in jails.  Clear (2007) opine that jails saver family bonds and relationships. Upon their release, these people were alone with nowhere to go.

Unemployment is a serious problem bedeviling ex-convicts after finishing their jail terms. Most employers do not employ people with a criminal history (Clear 2007, Gowan 2002). This exposes ex-convicts to uncertain future because they need money to survive in the society the prison system’s ability to foster unemployment among former convicts increases the persistence of prisons through the following ways; first, unemployed ex-convicts cannot finance their day to day operations. After looking for jobs with little success, they resort to crimes of desperation in an attempt to survive (Gowan 2002). Such petty crimes often land them in jail. This continues the vicious cycle of incarceration, reducing the possibility of doing away with prisons.

Secondly, incarceration results in homelessness. According to Gowan (2002), several men interviewed in the city of San Francisco first experienced homelessness after leaving prison.  There is a positive correlation between incarceration and homelessness (Gowan 2002). Clear (2007) highlighted the effects of prisons on family relationships. Being arrested savers the bond between families. When one is eventually released, he/she is alone and has to live on the streets as they try to piece their lives together.  Streetlife coupled with the inability to get jobs makes it difficult for such people to survive without engaging in crime.  Desperation to survive drives them to commit crimes solely to survive. Law enforcement officers arrest these offenders for their mistakes making them find their way back to prison. A similar scenario also plays out with inmates coming from low-income neighborhoods.  According to Clear (2007), such inmates join the society with high expectations about the community only to find it worse off than they left it.  This deterioration as Wacquant (2003) assets increases the cycle of movement between the ghettos and prison.

Social Inequality

The prison system exists to serve entrenched stereotypical assertions that negatively affect the wellbeing of minority groups in the country.  After several decades of systemic marginalization by the federal government, minority communities have had less opportunity in the past. These factors stemmed from poor education reducing their ability to get employed. This increased incidences of crime committed by minority communities in the country. The prison population was therefore dominated by a few racial groups in the country.   According to Simmons (2009), inequality that currently results in an increased population of minorities in prison can be traced from schools.

  From an early age, young miniseries are viewed as problematic dangerous and delinquent (Simmons, 2009). This blanket stereotyping of an entire race results in the presence of increased policing in areas around schools and in schools attended by minority communities. The police presence argued to improve security coupled with zero tolerance policies has only served as a conduit pipe to replenish prisons with inmates. Simmons (2009) argues that zero tolerance policies implemented by schools strategically set up young minority children for a criminal life in society.  The policies punish students through measures such as taking them to detention which robs of them of valuable learning hours. Secondly, depending on the severity of the mistakes, the children can also be suspended for a fixed duration of time.

 These forms of punishments remove the student from the classroom reducing the contact hours they have with their teachers.  As other children learn and prepare to pass their exams, the ones sent on suspensions due to zero tolerance policies face the likelihood of failing their exams and reduced chances of graduating.   Today,   youths without high school certification cannot easily get jobs in the country (Simmons, 2009).   They will, therefore, be lured into illegal businesses such as selling drugs which has increased likelihood of landing them in jail.

Additionally, apart from minority youths who go to prisons as a result of the failure of the public school system and its zero-tolerance policies, there are those who are also victims of biased policing.  One’s social standing plays a vital role in determining whether or not they go to prison or get community sentences. The poor in society are easily sentenced to prison terms because they could not afford a good attorney to argue their case. On the other hand, the rich who can easily hire the best lawyers easily get out of the problem or receive reduced sentences. Therefore the role of prisons in promoting societal inequality through locking up the less fortunate make incarceration problem persevere because the issues that make some members of minority communities to commit crime have not been addressed.

Economic Function

Unfortunately, lucrative prison economics also contribute to their persistence in most societies in America. The country locks up more people than any other country in the world. The massive number of prisoners has introduced prison economics in the country. Several people and towns directly benefit from the presence of prisons in the country. These direct economic benefits of prisons limit their chances of reducing in number.

 Rural towns are always ready to welcome the construction of a prison in their neighborhoods. Such towns are often plagued by lack of job opportunities and poorly diversified economies.  They, therefore, see prisons as a good source of economic diversity.   For instance, prisons are massive structures whose construction requires a lot of manpower. During the construction, people from local communities are guaranteed of construction jobs. Additionally, since in most cases the number of those available to work is often too low for the total manpower requirement, workers often come from nearby towns boosting businesses such as motels in the town.

Secondly, jobs created after the project is completed and the prison is operational also make such communities welcome prisons.  Their young men with little military or police training are employed as security guards while the other people in the town can also get employment depending on the skills they possess.  Apart from rural communities, commercialization of correctional facilities through the creation of private jails also makes the problem of incarceration endemic and unlikely to end.  Investors in the prisons sector want the government to arrest more people to fill up their facilities to enable them to make more money. The private prison is a $4.8 billion industry. The facilities make annual profits that are as high as $629 million. With this massive income, the problem of mass incarceration is not likely to end in the country because society incentivizes their continued existence.

In conclusion, prisons ability to create unemployment, stigma and social inequality helps ensure a large percentage of those released from such facilities find their way back due to problems with reintegration into society. Additionally, prison economics has also created a lot of people who directly benefit from the existence of prisons in the society.  Such benefits which are in terms of jobs will continue making mass incarceration a problem in the country.