PDF pending restoration
ERIC Number: ED495134
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 2004
Pages: 17
Abstractor: Author
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: N/A
EISSN: N/A
Why Are We So Punitive? Some Observations on Recent Incarceration Trends
Shelden, Randall G.
Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice
In the early 19th century, the famous Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville spent a considerable amount of time touring America and writing about what he saw. He is, of course, most famous for his book Democracy in America (1961), but he also wrote, along with a fellow Frenchman Gustav de Beaumont, a book called On the Penitentiary System in the United States and Its Application in France (1964). In this latter book, they observed that while the United States has the most extended liberty, the prison system displays little more than despotism. The contradiction between the liberties we enjoy in this country and the system of punishment has been noted by virtually everyone who has written about crime and punishment in America (one of the best treatments on this subject can be seen in the work of Elliot Currie, 1998 and Michael Tonry, 2001). Currently the United States is the only western democracy that has the death penalty, we rank well ahead of everyone else in the rate at which we incarcerate people, while ironically continuing to have the highest rate of violent crime among all those countries who keep such statistics. I would like to make an attempt to explain why this is so, with an emphasis on explaining one consequence of our extreme punitiveness, the ever-growing criminal and juvenile justice system and how this affects young women. (Contains 2 tables.)
Descriptors: Punishment, Juvenile Justice, Crime, Correctional Institutions, Death, Violence, Females
Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice. 54 Dore Street, San Francisco, CA 94103. Tel: 415-621-5661; e-mail: cjcj@cjcj.org; Web site: http://www.cjcj.org
Publication Type: Collected Works - General; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice, San Francisco, CA.
Identifiers - Location: United States
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A