Reprinted from The Common Good, no 4, Pentecost 1997

www.catholicworker.org.nz

 

Abolition, an impossible dream?

 

Thomas Mathieson

 

In the 1960s and 1970s a complex set of political factors created a favourable context for a radical critique of prisons. Abolition of prisons — indeed, abolition of the criminal control system as we know it today — seemed to be possible goals, at least to some of us. And during the first part of the 1970s, the prison population of several Western countries in fact went down, a fact which seemed to substantiate our view. But towards the end of the 1970s and in the 1980s, the tide turned. The downward trend in the prison population during the first part of the 1970s ended as a ‘u-shaped curve’: by the end of the decade, the decrease had been cancelled out. And during the 1980s, the figures rocketed. They continued to do so in the 1990s, giving the Western world an all time high record in terms of prison population.

If people really knew how poorly prison, as well as other parts of the criminal control system, protected them — indeed, if they knew how prison only creates a more dangerous society by producing more dangerous people— a climate for dismantling the prisons would necessarily get underway.

Should we, then, conclude that abolition of prisons is ‘an impossible dream’? On the face of it, it seems that way. The present and immediate future appear dark, to say the least. The political climate strongly favours prison; indeed, the political climate favours a revival of something as medieval as the death sentence. The politician in the US today who goes out against the death sentence, is finished. ‘Three strikes and you’re out’ is the order of the day.

Yet, I think the conclusion of ‘impossible dream’ is too hasty. In a thought-provoking piece on the memories of abolitionist victories of the past, the German criminologist Sebastian Scheerer reminds us that ‘there has never been a major social transformation in the history of mankind that had not been looked upon as unrealistic, idiotic, or utopian by the large majority of experts even a few years before the unthinkable became reality’ (Scheerer, 1986: 7). As examples, Scheerer mentions the fall of the Roman Empire and the abolition of modern slavery. Slavery, he argues, had succeeded in looking extremely stable almost until the day it collapsed, and the abolitionists who were around were regarded as awkward customers, to say the least, almost until it happened. Similarly, to most of the observers at the time, the total collapse of the Roman Empire was unthinkable almost until it happened.

Other examples on the same scale may be added. A major example, perhaps the most important political example of the 1900s, are the political transformations which took place in central and eastern Europe during 1989 and 1990. We now have 1997. Think back ten or fifteen years. Who would have dared to predict those transformations in 1987, two to three years before they took place, let alone in 1982, seven to eight years before? In 1982, Soviet rule was solidly planted throughout Eastern Europe and unrest in Poland had resolutely been met, the year before, by martial law. In 1987, Gorbachov’s Glasnost was on the way, to be sure, but would you have predicted a total dissolution of the Soviet Union, and a complete dismantling of the Iron Curtain within three years? At least I would not, and did not. And who, for that matter, would have dared to predict, in 1989 and 1990, the disillusionment with the subsequent political and economic developments which came a little later, in the early 1990s? Developments like these are easy to ‘predict’ in retrospect, when we know that the answers. But that is actually postdiction rather than prediction.

My starting point is this: Prison, which I confine my analysis to, is a ‘giant standing on clay soil.’ The expression is translated from the Norwegian, connoting a seemingly solid system with very poor underpinnings, much like slavery, the Roman Empire in its final stage, and the Soviet rule in its final stage.

The Achilles heel, the clay soil, of the prison is its total irrationality in terms of its own stated goals. In terms of its own stated goals, the prison contributes nothing to our society and way of life. Report after report, study after study, by the dozens, by the hundreds, by the thousands, clearly show this.

If people really knew how poorly prison, as well as other parts of the criminal control system, protected them — indeed, if they knew how prison only creates a more dangerous society by producing more dangerous people— a climate for dismantling the prisons would necessarily get underway. Because people, in contrast to prisons, are rational in this matter. But dry information would clearly not be enough; the failure of prisons would have to be ‘known’ in the sense of felt on a deeper emotional level, and thus be a part of our cultural definition of the situation.

The Achilles heel, the clay soil, of the prison is its total irrationality in terms of its own stated goals.

The direction of that new climate is of course hard to predict, but most likely it would imply a renewed emphasis on real support to the victims as well as resources and social services on the offender side, since the highly repressive solution had failed so completely. The politicians, who have created and maintained, indeed expanded the present system, would have to follow suit in order not to lose voters — their prime preoccupation.

I envisage, and this is just a shorthand list, support to the victims in a number of ways: Economic compensation (from the state) when that is in order, a simplified insurance system, symbolic support in situations of grief and sorrow, shielded places where victims who need protection can get it, support centres for battered women, conflict resolution where that is natural, and so on. The victims get nothing out of the present system, and get nothing out of enlarging and accelerating the present system, and could get so much out of changing the direction of the system in the way I have suggested.

A fundamental idea and principle would be to change the system 180 degrees. Rather than increasing punishment of the offender with the gravity of the offence, which is basic to the present system, I would propose increased support to the victim with the gravity of the offence. In other words, not a punishment scale for offenders, but a support scale for victims. This would admittedly be a dramatic shift, but one which would be rational from the point of view of the victims, and probably also helpful in overcoming resistance to the dismantling of the present system.

A fundamental idea and principle would be to change the system 180 degrees... I would propose increased support to the victim... In other words, not a punishment scale for offenders, but a support scale for victims

I envisage resources on the offender side in the form of a whole string of measures. In general terms, the war on crime should become a war on poverty. Again, I am just giving you a shorthand list; many details would have to be sorted out: decent living quarters, work programs, school programs, treatment programs, but not programs based on force, and — most importantly — a change of our drug policy. Legalising drugs, and making drugs as well as methadone available under sanitary and supervised conditions, would neutralise the illegal drug market and reduce the amount of drug-related crime drastically. It would in itself go a long way towards emptying our prisons. A change of our drug policy would at the same time strike at the core of organised drug crime, dependent as it is on market forces. It would in other words, effectively threaten and undermine the power of the big fish who do not end up in prison today, because prison today is systematically reserved for the poor.

You may ask who should pay for this? The answer is that the prisons should pay for it. The dismantling of the prisons would give us extremely large sums of money, billions and billions of US dollars, which we could spend generously on the victims and the offenders.

Admittedly, perhaps a facility to hold a few individuals would remain. Our handling of them would have to be very different from what goes on in our prisons today. One way of ensuring against an increase in their numbers due to a change in criteria would to set an absolute ceiling on the number of closed cells to be accepted in our society for such people. The call for a ceiling on prison space could also be a useful weapon in our present struggle against prison. In a time of dramatic acceleration it should be carefully considered as a strategy.

Let us return to the present, and to where we are — in the difficult first stage: People do not know how irrational our prisons are. People are made to believe that prison works. The true irrationality of prison is one of the best guarded secrets in our society. If the secret got out, it would strike at the roots of the present system, and imply the beginning of its fall. Three ‘layers’ function as protective shields for prison, keeping the irrationality of prison a secret.

The first and innermost layer consists of the administrators, in a wide sense of the word, of the criminal control system. The administrators largely know about the dismal state and total failure of the prisons, but are silent. Three processes make for silence.

For one thing, the administrators are silent because they have become co-opted by the system, they have become part and parcel of it. Co-option takes place through a subtle process by which evidence going against the system — abundant as it is in the prison context — is selectively weeded out, relegated to the background, and not taken into account. When reminded of it, those representing the evidence rather than the evidence itself become the target of attack Those representing the evidence are defined and labelled as theoreticians, dreamers, revolutionaries, while the evidence per se is not focused, let alone challenged.

Furthermore, the administrators are silent out of loyalty with the system. There is a culture of loyalty, just as there was a culture of loyalty to the German leaders among the rank and file during the latter part of World War II. Besides, the system is considered legal, which adds to the spirit of loyalty.

Finally, the administrators are silenced by being disciplined. The processes of social discipline, which vary along a continuum from very subtle hidden measures to blunt open measures, are continuously operating within the prison and penal context. The subtle, hidden measures, for example, include the many meetings where the means and goals have the authority of the taken-for-granted, thus inculcating increased pulse, insecurity, and silence among would-be opponents. The blunt, open measures include reprimand and perhaps the threat of loss of job.

The second layer consists of intellectuals and researchers — social scientists in a broad sense of the word. Also they are silent, or at best whispering their protests.

The third and most important layer exists over the edge or border of the prison system. It is the mass media, the all-embracing public sphere or space in modern Westernised society.

If the media, especially television, changed content from superficial entertainment to critical knowledge, it would create a basic cultural change, a change in the cultural climate, which would have repercussions throughout the ranks of researchers and intellectuals as well as administrators.

The information which comes out of the prison system is systematically filtered and skewed by the mass media. This has occurred increasingly through our century. But a significant qualitative jump took place roughly from the mid-1970s on, with the many ingenious technological advances which occurred in the late 1900s, making television instantaneously reach all of the corners of the world.

The point is that with the advent and accelerating development of television, we have entered something which is equivalent to a new religion.

My basic point is this: Of the three ‘layers which protect the prison and keep the irrationality of prison a secret — the administrators in a wide sense of the word, the researchers and the media — the media are the most fundamental.

If the media, especially television, changed content from superficial entertainment to critical knowledge, it would create a basic cultural change, a change in the cultural climate, which would have repercussions throughout the ranks of researchers and intellectuals as well as administrators. As I have alluded to already, the administrators and the researchers, inside and along the edge of the system, generally ‘follow suit’: When the cultural climate surrounding the prison becomes tougher, they become tougher. When the cultural climate softens, they soften. They are not independent heroes; rather, their antennae are basically directed outwards, toward the cultural climate, mediated as it is through the mass media. A shift in the external cultural climate, in the opinion about what is the ‘correct line’, would create a parallel shift among the researchers close to the system and the administrators inside it. To be sure, there would still be long drawn struggles along the edge of as well as inside the prison. Perhaps the basic cultural change in along the edge and inside would partly have to wait for the next generation, but it would follow over time.

From this we may conclude that much of our struggle to reach, rip open, lay bare and thus strike at the Achilles heel of the prison system — its fundamental and total irrationality — must be geared towards television and the mass media in general as its most protective shield. This would make the other shields fall, and let the secret out. In view of the great economic interests in show business and the enormous technological advances involved, this is a formidable task.

Thomas Mathieson is Professor of Sociology and Law, University of Oslo, Norway, and a founder of the Norwegian Association for Penal Reform.