Over the second half of this State and Local Government course we have been reading and discussing The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander. The overarching theme of this book is incarceration, and its purpose is to change the way we think about the world and its systems. All of our class discussions on incarceration, and all it entails, led me to wonder what the connection between incarceration and crime is. In this paper I will be using multiple sources that have to do with crime and incarceration in order to find out how incarceration relates to crime rates, and if incarceration is the reason for crime decline. I will go over all the information I found on this topic, including my findings on incarceration, statistics and rates, as well as
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Incarceration itself is a crime-control factor, and its effects are hard to determine.1 Analyses by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law found that an increase in incarceration, contradictory to what you would assume, has a very small ability to control crime. The researchers at the Brennan Center say that increased incarceration accounted for about 6% of the reduction in property crime in the 1990s and 1% in this century, but it had little to no effect on violent crime in the past two decades.4 In a study of the effect prison buildup had on the crime drops, the result was that there would have been a crime drop even if the buildup did not happen, but the drop would have been 27% less than what it was.5 Since a small part of the decline is attributed to increased incarceration, that means most of the decline was due to other factors. There are a few different factors that affect crime and incarceration rates. A main one is policing. This is because police officers play and important role in crime control and correctional population.4 A report by the Brennan Center was done to try to fill in the gap in research on the affect policing has on crime. In the 1990s, there were innovations in the way policing was done. Those innovations include “increases in the number of police officers on the street; community, problem-solving, and ‘zero-tolerance’ policing.”1 …show more content…
I wrote this paper to argue that incarceration does not affect crime rates like we would think. From researching the topic of incarceration as it relates to crime I have learned various things. I learned that America has the highest incarceration rate in the world, and Louisiana is at the forefront. I also learned that incarceration and crime are multifaceted. Some of the factors I went over were policing, the economy growing, community response, and demography. I also mentioned that all these factors work together, and one alone does not affect the crime rate. The next thing I discussed was incarcerations effectiveness, or lack thereof, when it comes to deterring crime, and the impact it has on a community. From researching the topic of incarceration, I was able to see that it has very little to no effect on the crime
Incarceration itself is a crime-control factor, and its effects are hard to determine.1 Analyses by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law found that an increase in incarceration, contradictory to what you would assume, has a very small ability to control crime. The researchers at the Brennan Center say that increased incarceration accounted for about 6% of the reduction in property crime in the 1990s and 1% in this century, but it had little to no effect on violent crime in the past two decades.4 In a study of the effect prison buildup had on the crime drops, the result was that there would have been a crime drop even if the buildup did not happen, but the drop would have been 27% less than what it was.5 Since a small part of the decline is attributed to increased incarceration, that means most of the decline was due to other factors. There are a few different factors that affect crime and incarceration rates. A main one is policing. This is because police officers play and important role in crime control and correctional population.4 A report by the Brennan Center was done to try to fill in the gap in research on the affect policing has on crime. In the 1990s, there were innovations in the way policing was done. Those innovations include “increases in the number of police officers on the street; community, problem-solving, and ‘zero-tolerance’ policing.”1 …show more content…
I wrote this paper to argue that incarceration does not affect crime rates like we would think. From researching the topic of incarceration as it relates to crime I have learned various things. I learned that America has the highest incarceration rate in the world, and Louisiana is at the forefront. I also learned that incarceration and crime are multifaceted. Some of the factors I went over were policing, the economy growing, community response, and demography. I also mentioned that all these factors work together, and one alone does not affect the crime rate. The next thing I discussed was incarcerations effectiveness, or lack thereof, when it comes to deterring crime, and the impact it has on a community. From researching the topic of incarceration, I was able to see that it has very little to no effect on the crime