Pros And Cons Of The United States Correctional System

The Prison-Industrial Complex introduced by Eric Schlosser, is a theory that claims that the prison system is constructed by political pressures, economic requirements, and commercial demands. The prison system has been continuously growing in the last three decades, regardless of the actual need for it. The PIC is specifically harmful to the most vulnerable of people, such as homeless people, mentally ill, etc. The PIC does more harm, than good, therefore, it is a poor system all-around.

Shawshank’s Redemption, an all-time best movie produced in 1994 starred and led by actors Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman. A story about two imprisoned men’s experience with the corrupted prison institution through their way of self-redemption. There is a line, which was well read by Morgan Freeman, I am particularly fond of. Here I quote ‘These walls are funny. First you hate them, then you get used to them. Enough time passes, you get so you depend on them. That 's institutionalized.’ A prison should aim at retribution, incapacitation, deterrence and rehabilitation. I am very well convinced that prison has served its first three purposes by depriving offenders’ freedom, but the

In America, the private prison industry was made for necessary profit based off of the management of prisons by large, private companies. In David Shapiro’s insightful report “Banking on Bondage”, he discusses the logistics of the United States prison system, saying “In America, our criminal justice system should keep us safe, operate fairly, and be cost-effective”. Today, the United States imprisons more people than any other nation in the world, including Russia, China, and Iran. Alongside the issues of private prisons, the increasingly apparent problem of mass incarceration has stripped record numbers of American citizens of their freedom, has a minimal effect on public

The United States incarcerates a greater percentage of the population than any country in the world (CBS, 2012). According to the US Bureau of Justice Statistics, over 2.3 million adults were incarcerated in federal and state prisons, and county jails in 2013. There are an additional 820,000 people on parole and 3.8 million people on probation (Wagner & Rabuy, 2016)

Treatment: “is the creation of an environment and provision of rehabilitative programs that encourage inmates to accept responsibility and to address personal disorders that make success in the community more difficult.”

In the article, Unwinding Mass Incarceration by Stefan Lobuglio and Anne Piehl, they argue that unwinding the mass incarceration “well neither be cheap nor easy, and to be done responsibly will require a new infrastructure of coordinated community-based facilities and services that can meet evidence-based incarceration needs while also ensuring public safety.” Hence, their argument is clean-cut with evidence in the article to back up their argument of unwinding the mass incarceration. Similarly, a solid fill of a concluding statement upon the unwinding of the mass incarceration as stated in the article, “requires much more than stopping current practices or reversing course by mass commutations and early release programs.”

The main part of this research paper is the reforms for the conditions of prison and make prison a better place for prisoner and make an alternative for incarceration.

Thesis: It is very important for the sake of Americans tax dollars that we change the way that prisons are run and increase the productivity of inmates so when they are released from jail they are ready to be a productive member in society and have the confidence to achieve new goals.

Those who find themselves sentenced to time in a penitentiary, jail, or prison are at risk of either being broken or strengthened by the time they spend behind bars. There is a great debate of whether or not the prison system in the United States is positive or negative. The following will briefly highlight the positives, negatives, and possible alternatives for our nation's prison system.

Prisons in in the United States of America are definitely overcrowded, they are understaffed and I believe put very little effort on rehabilitation. The U.S. prison system was set up to rehabilitate prisoners so they can blend back into society as good people. But the factors as high crime rate and of course, mandatory sentences have caused a very high over crowding in our jail systems. This have caused a high increase in the budget deficit. Some citizens will say, where was the rehabilitation that we once used and it has all but now disappeared in our prison and jail system today.

Does it make sense to lock up 2.4 million people on any given day, giving the U.S the highest incarceration rate in the world. More people are going to jail, this implies that people are taken to prison everyday for many facilities and many go for no reason. People go to jail and get treated the worst way as possible. This is a reason why the prison system needs to be changed. Inmates need to be treated better. The government treats prisoners as if they are nothing in this world. The U.S prison system needs to be reformed by building new and better prisons and making it more humane and fair.

Custody sentences are for punishment, rehabilitation and education, however, there are different views to youth imprisonment. Some critics say if you commit a crime you should take responsibility and jail will give you a ‘short sharp shock’ and you will receive rehabilitation. Whilst some say it is damaging to children and would lead to further reoffending once they are out due to learning crimes off other criminals. Evidence does suggest that children who have more than one risk factor present are more than likely to be involved in criminal activities (Hopkins Burke, 2016 p. 232). There are three penal institutions sometimes called secure estates - local authority secure children's homes, secure training centres and young offender’s institutes.

Professionalism as Bartollas and Siegel define it “refers to a set of character strengths and personal values directed at providing the highest quality service to others in the workplace, both colleagues and clients” (2013). In the field of corrections, professionalism affects not only those working in the facility or those imprisoned within its walls, but the families of inmates and officers /correctional staff, the local community, and the relationships within the law enforcement community as well.

There are three components that make up the criminal justice system – the police, courts, and correctional facilities – they all work together in order to protect individuals and their rights as a citizen of society to live without the fear of becoming the victim of a crime. Crime, simply put is when a person violates criminal law; the criminal justice system is society’s way of implementing social control. When all three components of the criminal justice work together, it functions almost perfectly.

Batley (2005) stated that restorative justice is about restoring, healing and re- integrating victims, offenders, as well as the society and also preventing further harm. In this assignment, I will be discussing approaches to restorative justice and illustrating their advantages and disadvantages to offending. I will also provide the applications of these five approaches of restorative justice which are retributive approach, utilitarian deterrence approach, rehabilitation approach, restitution approach and restorative approach in the given case study. I will then explain my preferred approach to justice through identifying a personal belief or value that underpins my choice.