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| Mass incarceration’s tragic success |
| By washingtonpost.com - Michael Gerson |
| Published: 06/28/2013 |
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At a time of earnest debate on the size and role of government, relatively little attention has been paid to the Hoover Dam of American social engineering: mass incarceration. As crime rates increased in the 1960s and ’70s, the prototypical liberal response — the amelioration of the social conditions thought to generate crime — seemed ineffective and woolly headed. “Law and order” campaigns became the norm in both parties, accompanied by policies, including mandatory minimum sentences, aimed at incapacitating the criminal class. The number of people behind bars in America rose from 314,000 in 1979 to about 2 million in mid-2013. Few objected because this approach was accompanied by a dramatic decline in crime rates, which fell by half in some categories. Not all this was because of increased incarceration — better policing techniques played a significant role — but public safety was clearly improved by separating convicted criminals from prospective victims for longer periods. As the crime problem became less urgent, the issue largely faded. In polls, few Americans rank crime as a top concern. Read More. |
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Some great literary meat to digest and try to see how the system plans to remedy this quagmire.