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Throughout our country’s history, racial and ethnic minorities experience racism and discrimination at the highest rates. One of the main forms of racism and discrimination that these minorities face is through mass incarceration. Mass incarceration refers to the substantial increase of imprisonment over the years. The United States of America experiences the highest incarceration rate in the entire world, beating out countries such as Russia, Mexico, and Cuba. Although the United States population only accounts for about 4.4% of the world’s population, America’s mass incarceration rate is significantly higher than other countries. Mass Incarceration has been a huge problem in our society and the effects it has on the people and the community
Jeffrey Rieman is a Marxist Criminal Justice scholar who believes that the actual goal of the criminal justice ideology was to project to the public a visible image of the threat of crime as a threat from the poor, not to eliminate crime of achieve justice. He believes that the criminal is failing to actually reach the stated objectives. Rieman suggests that the criminal justice system is projecting an image of a criminal as the underclass, along with racial and ethnic minorities (Rieman
Mass incarceration has become not only a criminal justice issue, but a civil rights and race related issues, as well. Although drug use and drug crimes are committed at similar rates across all racial and ethnic groups, the offenders are not incarcerated in the same way. With the researched conducted, it becomes evident that there is a bias in sentencing, which minorities are convicted and sentenced more often, along with experiencing more harsh punishment. Our society needs to confront the racial issues that result from mass incarceration and take action to allow our society to focus on the drug issues and the racial
The US Justice Department statistics 2003 and onwards demonstrates significant disproportion in the incarceration rate of minority African American and Hispanic men between the ages of 25 and 29 years as compared to the rate associated with White men of the same age. Bell (2007), proposes that as minority groups grow in numbers within the dominant group they will experience greater equality. However, rate of incarceration among minority males remains alarmingly high and as compared to their White counterparts. As with health care there are racial disparities that will influence outcomes when an individual is brought before the criminal courts. Additionally, there is significant correlation between a person’s level of education and the likelihood of his involvement in criminal activities. Studies and statistics have shown that among male high school dropouts there is high incidence of unemployment, low income and rate of illicit drug use as compared to men with degrees from four year colleges. Further to this, although the rate of school dropout and even arrest is not significantly different across the race lines, literature alludes that African American men have a higher rate of conviction for the same crime committed.
Land of the Unfree: Mass Incarceration and Its Unjust Effects on Those Subjected To It and American Taxpayers
The majority of our prison population is made up of African Americans of low social and economic classes, who come from low income houses and have low levels of education. The chapter also discusses the amount of money the United States loses yearly due to white collar crime as compared to the cost of violent crime. Another main point was the factors that make it more likely for a poor person to be incarcerated, such as the difficulty they would have in accessing adequate legal counsel and their inability to pay bail. This chapter addresses the inequality of sentencing in regards to race, it supplies us with NCVS data that shows less than one-fourth of assailants are perceived as black even though they are arrested at a much higher rate. In addition to African Americans being more likely to be charged with a crime, they are also more likely to receive harsher punishments for the same crimes- which can be seen in the crack/cocaine disparities. These harsher punishments are also shown in the higher rates of African Americans sentenced to
Throughout the semester, we have discussed many different issues that are currently prevalent in the United States, specifically those related to racial discrimination. One specific issue that I have developed interest and research in is that of institutionalized racism, specifically in the form of mass incarceration, and what kinds of effects mass incarceration has on a community. In this paper, I will briefly examine a range of issues surrounding the mass incarceration of black and Latino males, the development of a racial undercaste because of rising incarceration rates, women and children’s involvement and roles they attain in the era of mass incarceration, and the economic importance that the prison system has due to its development.
Nationwide, blacks are incarcerated at 8.2 times the rate of whites (Human Rights Watch, 2000).” This difference in proportionality does not necessarily involve direct discrimination; it can be explained by a number of combined factors. Correctional agencies do not control the number of minorities who enter their facilities. Therefore, the disparity must come from decisions made earlier in the criminal justice process. Law enforcement, court pre-sentencing policies and procedures, and sentencing all have a direct effect on the overrepresentation of minorities in the correctional population.
In recent years, there has been controversy over mass incarceration rates within the United States. In the past, the imprisonment of criminals was seen as the most efficient way to protect citizens. However, as time has gone on, crime rates have continued to increase exponentially. Because of this, many people have begun to propose alternatives that will effectively prevent criminals from merely repeating their illegal actions. Some contend that diversion programs, such as rehabilitation treatment for drug offenders, is a more practical solution than placing mentally unstable individuals into prison. By helping unsteady criminals regain their health, society would see an exceptional reduction in the amount of crimes committed. Although some
In recent decades, violent crimes in the United States of America have been on a steady decline, however, the number of people in the United States under some form of correctional control is reaching towering heights and reaching record proportions. In the last thirty years, the incarceration rates in the United States has skyrocketed; the numbers roughly quadrupled from around five hundred thousand to more than 2 million people. (NAACP)In a speech on criminal justice at Columbia University, Hillary Clinton notes that, “It’s a stark fact that the United States has less than five percent of the world’s population, yet we have almost 25 percent of the world’s total prison population. The numbers today are much higher than they were 30, 40
Mass incarceration may not seem like major issue to people, but according to article by Melinda D. Anderson it is causing the life of some children also their families. The growth of incarceration of black people presumably seems to be increasing, particularly more within the US. According to Naacp.org, “African Americans are incarcerated at nearly six times the rate of whites” therefore as those people are being incarcerated, it’s causing problems not only for them but also for their families as well. The children of incarcerated people are being criticized in school by their friends. Without having proper guardianship, a student’s academic life tends to fall. The article “How
Mass incarceration has put a large eye-sore of a target on the United States’ back. It is hurting our economy and putting us into more debt. It has considerable social consequences on children and ex-felons. Many of these incarcerations can be due to the “War on Drugs”. We should contract the use of incarceration.
According to statistics since the early 1970’s there has been a 500% increase in the number of people being incarcerated with an average total of 2.2 million people behind bars. The increase in rate of people being incarcerated has also brought about an increasingly disproportionate racial composition. The jails and prisons have a high rate of African Americans incarcerated with an average of 900,000 out of the 2.2 million incarcerateed being African American. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics 1 in 6 African American males has been incarcerated at some point in time as of the year 2001.
In the United States, the rate of incarceration has increased shockingly over the past few years. In 2008, it was said that one in 100 U.S. adults were behind bars, meaning more than 2.3 million people. Even more surprising than this high rate is the fact that African Americans have been disproportionately incarcerated, especially low-income and lowly educated blacks. This is racialized mass incarceration. There are a few reasons why racialized mass incarceration occurs and how it negatively affects poor black communities.
Mass Incarceration: The New Jim Crow is the direct consequence of the War on Drugs. That aims to reduce, prevent and eradicate drug use in America through punitive means. The effect of the war on drug policies returned de jure discrimination, denied African Americans justice and undermined the rule of law by altering the criminal justice system in ways that deprive African Americans civil rights and citizenship. In the “New Jim Crow” Alexandra argues that the effects of the drug war policies are not unattended consequences but coordinated by designed to deny African Americans opportunity to gain wealth, be excluded from gaining employment and exercise civil rights through mass incarceration and felony conviction. The war on drugs not only changes the structure of the criminal justice system, it also changes the ways that police officers, prosecutors and judges do their jobs.
Many Americans pretend that the days of racism are far behind; however it is clear that institutional racism still exists in this country. One way of viewing this institutional racism is looking at our nation’s prison system and how the incarceration rates are skewed towards African American men. The reasons for the incarceration rate disparity are argued and different between races, but history points out and starts to show the reason of why the disparity began. Families and children of the incarcerated are adversely affected due to the discrimination as well as the discrimination against African American students and their likelihood of going to prison compared to the white student. African American women are also affected by the discrimination in the incarceration rate. Many white Americans don’t see how racism affects incarceration rates, and that African Americans are more likely to face discrimination from the police as well as being falsely arrested.
Alexander (2010) suggests mass incarceration as a system of racialized social control that functions in the same way Jim Crow did. She describes how people that have been incarcer...
The most problematic conclusion about Mass Incarceration, whatever the causes or practices, is that currently America has had the highest national prison rates in the world; furthermore, the rates of minorities (particularly African Americans) are extraordinarily disproportionate to the rates of incarcerated Caucasians. Despite the overall rise in incarceration rates since the 1980s, the crime rates have not been reduced as would be expected. Researchers, activists, and politicians alike are now taking a closer look at Mass Incarceration and how it affects society on a larger scale. The purpose of this paper is to examine the anatomy of Mass Incarceration for a better understanding of its importance as a dominant social issue and its ultimate relation to practice of social work. More specifically the populations affected by mass incarceration and the consequences implacable to social justice. The context of historical perspectives on mass incarceration will be analyzed as well as insight to the current social welfare policies on the