Debating Justice: Punishment versus Rehabilitation

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Land of the Free or Land of Greed

Citizens are sold on the idea that criminals must be keep off the streets that the punishment must be harsh regardless of the crime, that three strikes and they are out. The justice system does not seem to focus on rehabilitation, rather in the punishment. The public constantly listens to slogans such as “protect our children”, “protect your rights”, and the public recognizes that maybe some of this laws, yet some of the harshest penalties have an ulterior motive. Can society endorse the fact that criminals should rot in jail, regardless of the crime? Think of the impact of an increased jail population on our taxes. For a moment consider the incarcerated population growing because of an increase in crime or …show more content…

The proponents of private prisons contend that private prison are a necessity because the criminal justice system is in crisis and governments do not have the willingness to spend public money building new prisons. According to Adrian Moore, Mr. Moore is the Vice President, Policy of the Reason Foundation, and this statement was published online “Private Prisons, Quality Corrections at a Lower Cost.” For the website reason.org on April 1998 Moore holds a Ph.D. in Economics …show more content…

There are many citizen concerns, including the premise that private prison companies lobby governments to increase punishments and penalties to fill their facilities. Mr. Geoffrey Segal writes “It is unlikely that private prison firms are going to sway policy in favor of greater incarceration when such polices are obviously already very popular with the general population” in his online article published also on The Reason on November of 2002, Mr. Segal is the director of privatization and government reform at Reason Foundation. witha B.A in political science from Arizona State University, and a Master of Public Policy from Pepperdine University. The prison system as an industry, according to Randy Gragg privately owned prisons are starting to flourish again, Mr. Gragg is the editor-in-chief of Portland monthly, he wrote the article “A High-Security, Low-Risk Investment: Private Prisons Make Crime Pay” for Harper’s magazine on August 1996 Mr. Gragg is a Harvard University graduate of the school of design, and the national art journalism fellow at Columbia University. The

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