A Look at Race, Incarceration, and American Values

Glenn Loury, a professor in the Department of Economics at Brown University, has long been one of the nation's most outspoken Black intellectuals. For many years he was a leading conservative voice on topics like affirmative action, and whenever he focuses on a policy issue affecting the Black community, people pay attention. In his title essay in the recent book, Race, Incarceration, and American Values, Professor Loury sounds the alarm on some of the same concerns the Children's Defense Fund has been raising when we talk about the pipeline to prison crisis.

Professor Loury begins the book by pointing out just how out of proportion prison rates have become in our country, citing data like a 2005 report from the International Centre for Prison Studies in London that showed the United States had five percent of the world's population, but 25 percent of the world's inmates. As he says, "Our incarceration rate (714 per 100,000 residents) is almost 40 percent greater than those of our nearest competitors (the Bahamas, Belarus, and Russia). Other industrial democracies, even those with significant crime problems of their own, are much less punitive.... We have a corrections sector that employs more Americans than the combined work forces of General Motors, Ford, and Wal-Mart, the three largest corporate employers in the country."

This dramatic increase in incarceration rates wasn't in proportion to an equally dramatic increase in crime, as Professor Loury goes on to explain, but was instead tied to a shift in our nation's thinking about the purpose of incarceration--away from rehabilitation and towards punishment. He argues that "[d]espite a sharp national decline in crime, American criminal justice has become crueler and less caring than it has been at any other time in our modern history. Why? The question has no simple answer, but the racial composition of prisons is a good place to start."

Professor Loury describes how incarceration trends in the United States are connected to our country's legacy of slavery and segregation. He reminds his readers that cultural phenomena like lynching, Jim Crow, and legal segregation were all part of a deep-seated pattern of racial subordination in America that lasted long after slavery ended. Scholars are now noting that in the post civil-rights era, racially skewed incarceration rates have become a new way of continuing the same old pattern. Professor Loury argues that the United States is unique in the way historically marginalized groups are disproportionally "bearing the brunt of order enforcement." As he puts it, "Crime and punishment in America have a color."

The current incarceration crisis is creating a cycle too many children and youths are finding difficult to escape and that is ravaging Black families and communities. As an example, Professor Loury talks about a large group of Black men who have been devastated by the rise in incarceration rates--the nearly 60 percent of Black male high school dropouts born in the late 1960s who were imprisoned before they turned 40. This is the generation that should be the husbands and fathers at the centers of our communities right now. But even after some of these men have gained release, they and their families continue to be affected by lasting consequences. Professor Loury says, "While locked up, these felons are stigmatized--they are regarded as fit subjects for shaming. Their links to family are disrupted; their opportunities for work are diminished; their voting rights may be permanently revoked. They suffer civic excommunication. Our zeal for social discipline consigns these men to a permanent nether caste... [and] we are creating a situation in which the children of this nether caste are likely to join a new generation of untouchables."

Professor Loury then takes a philosophical look at the idea of justice to talk about whether any of this is consistent with our society's ideals of fairness. Ultimately, he reminds readers that we still live in a country where there is an undeniable racial gap in all kinds of life outcomes. Poor children of color simply aren't born with the same chances! He explains: "Our society--the society we have made--creates criminogenic conditions in our sprawling urban ghettos and then acts out rituals of punishment against them as some awful form of human sacrifice. This situation raises a moral problem that we cannot avoid. We cannot pretend that there are more important problems in our society, or that this circumstance is the necessary solution to other, more pressing problems--unless we are also prepared to say that we have turned our backs on the ideal of equality for all citizens and abandoned the principles of justice."

There is no more urgent priority for our nation than ensuring every child a level playing field from birth to successful adulthood. Our national soul and future depend on it.

Marian Wright Edelman, whose latest book is The Sea Is So Wide And My Boat Is So Small: Charting a Course for the Next Generation, is president of the Children's Defense Fund. For more information about the Children's Defense Fund, go to www.childrensdefense.org.

Comments

[arvay]

There are a number of ways out of this.

One would be the immediate decriminalization of drugs. Not only would that bankrupt the drug lords, it would deprive the prison industry of the large number of black people who are arrested and disproportionately prosecuted for drug possession and drug dealing.

There also needs to be a confrontation with black criminals who victimize their own communities. Slavery is no excuse for this. We still need to remove violent people from society. Of course, rehabilitation is a better course than punishment, which only reenforces their anger.

The current "hate crime" laws punish those who attack people based on their race, maybe this can be interpreted as applying to people who victimize their own race since they are more vulnerable and closer at hand.

Of course, returning our economy to health is the primary method to reduce crime -- among all groups.

[Nommo]

"Hate crimes" represent double jeopardy. Crimes should be prosecuted for what they are, and not as they often are plea bargained into lesser offenses. Guns and drugs are the province of law enforcement. It is apparent to everyone in Black communities at least that the police are instrumental in illegal guns and drugs. There is incredible money to be made in those illegal activities, why should the police be denied a "piece of the action"?

Organized crime thrived for decades and everybody knew what they were doing. Every one knew who was on the payroll and who was protected and who was not. The point no one wants to acknowledge is how crime is encouraged in official circles and how prisons have always been for profit. Why would correction officers need a PAC? Just as crime is a profession, keeping criminals is a profession. As long as there is a profit to be made, all of the criminals will get in line to get theirs.

[arvay]

I disagree that "hate crimes" represent double jeopardy -- any more than a murder committed during a burglary does.

But I agree with much of what you say. Certainly the drug corruption -- which is why drugs should be legalized -- and I'll take the word of the people who live in those communities about the guns.

Re: crime encouraged in official circles. Yes, police even use the term "career criminals.­"
Not enough space in one posting, but briefly I think we need to totally revise our criminal justice system ( an unconscious irony, if ever there was one) to emphasize prevention rather than punishment and warehousing. Special, focused attention to first offenders and immersing them in whatever it takes to get them turned around, extending to financial support, free education,voluntary relocation out of threatening environments, for example.

Fundamentally, however, our society needs to be fundamentally re-shaped, a national plan that reorders national priorities and invests in people as our most valuable resource. Generalizations, I agree, but you get the idea.

[historymatters]

"Professor Loury describes how incarceration trends in the United States are connected to our country's legacy of slavery and segregatio­n..."

An aspect of the historical legacy is what was, essentially, legalized slavery during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. African Americans (and some poor whites) were routinely jailed for failing to pay debts, petty crimes such as "vagrancy", and the ever-popular trumped up charges for assaulting white women. These (mostly) men were given no access to unbiased legal representation, and no trial to a jury of their peers. Poor and uneducated, they had no idea what rights they had. They were railroaded into prison terms in hellish places, primarily in very rural areas, where they were forced to on cotton farms, at logging camps, in mines, and anyplace else that the work was deemed dirty and dangerous but essential to producing materials needed for industrial manufacturing. Countless thousands died in these labor camps. Countless hundreds of well-connected private businesses benefited from the work they performed without pay, or even access to decent housing, clothing, food, and medicine. This happened throughout the U.S., and especially in the South. Just one more example of how the poor and the powerless have been mercilessly exploited over the years. Growing intolerance for such injustices began during the 1950s and helped to ameliorate the worst of the offenses. And we all have this reform movement to thank for the Miranda warning.

[steamboat]

Go to Chicago Sun-Times website and read today's article (Mon., 3/9/09) concerning CHICAGO students. In the last 16 months, 508 students have been shot....An­d thats not counting young men and women who aren't students any longer.

Everybody is focusing on universities and prison sentences, etc.......­But hey, in the meantime there is a near genocide of children in the cities going on right under everybodies eyes. And NOBODY wants to do anything about it. Whats wrong---its not a money-maker for all these so-called civil rights/civic leaders.

[GrainOSand]

My focus is man/woman on the street...i­n the situation.­..going through the struggle. It is personal because it is where I came from in terms of my boyhood neighborho­od...my earliest societal interactions -- I will never forget or deny. It is real people, suffering real horrors and real bleak existences. There is no governmental solution for the problem however, it will take a nation to stem that tide. Government is impotent to solve the problem described. A manifestation of love on a global level will be the wave that washes away struggle of the sort that stems from generational poverty, ignorance, despair, hopelessness, and an amnesia of who one really is, as an individual. Until that happens...­struggle continues.

[steamboat]

I live in the city----CH­ICAGO....I­n a very mixed blue-collar neighborho­od....Yeah­, there is alot of violence and drug use....But I'm tired of the excuses. NOBODY is making another person get into drugs unless they want too. And I'm tired of "I'm a victim". Where I live we have Olive-Harvey College (part of the Chicago Community Colleges system). A beautiful modern facility. Accredited college + training classes in many fields. Even a truck-driving school. For almost next to nothing price wise. Guess what, the parking-lot is usually 1/3rd filled. A half-mile way there is a Off-Tracking Betting Parlor. That parking-lot is OVER-FLOWING at all times of the day. And I get to watch bus after bus after bus drive-by taking customer to a nearby casino right across the stateline (Horseshoe Casino in Hammond, In). So you know what, the PEOPLE themselves also need to look into the mirror for where the problem lies.

[Tanyars5]

what do you suggest we do with the chicago students?

[steamboat]

Stupid question. What do you think we should do? Make it so they can go to school in a SAFE environmen­t.........­......Whic­h won't happen due to Chicago political and cultural corruption which is imbedded into Chicago life and needs to be overhauled. . BTW, Chicago HAS Gun-Control laws. See, it didn't do any good.

[GrainOSand]

Some other people in that peer group Professor Loury cites had and have loving family connections and friends. They went to school and took the career path. They towed the line. They did not go to jail or engage in activity promoting jail. Still, they were not able to escape the boot heel harshness and unacceptability of an occasional brush with evil incarnate posing as law enforcement, or societal misimpressions of justice, fairness, kindness, and mutual respect manifest via the myopic prism of sanctioned response and reaction based on stereotypes of fictitious boogeymen living within the framework of a backwards indoctrination of fear promoting hate. Concisely, some were not able to escape the ignorance of individuals claiming authority for illegal stop, search, harass, threaten, brutalize, and in some cases, murder and ask questions later. It is enough to turn your stomach if not break your spirit...i­f you let it. Anyone who has ever had this happen to them knows that life and death can be an ignorant cop away. Jail and going on about your business can depend on how much you can bite your tongue when it becomes obvious you are dealing with a cretin with a gun and a badge. String out slight over a lifetime and tolerance for nonsense diminishes greatly. Yet, some wonder... Inspiration is a sense of belonging. Alienation is the realization you are a target. Self annihilation is “making it” and thinking -- problem solved, while the killing fields continue to bleed...bl­ood red.

[BanalDrivel]

The prison guard union is one of the most powerfull PACs pushing for harsher laws to lock more people in jail.

[Vickster]

Back in the Eighties when Michigan took its first economic hit (and when, in my opinion, this recent depression began), the state began a program to retrain people who lost their jobs in automotive industries for a job with similar pay and benefits. Of course, the only job this program trained them for was prison guard ("correctional officer"). That's when some of us Michiganders began to say in jest that the only growing industry in Michigan was the prison industry.

And that's a heartfelt shame.

[BanalDrivel]

The prison guard union is one of the most powerfull PACs

http://blip.tv/file/1356143/

[rlugbill]

It seems that everyone is seeing this issue through the same ideological lense that they view every issue- throught the lense of race or the lense of punishment for evildoers or the lense of libertarianism, etc.

I suggest instead that people do something unpleasant. Check it out for yourself. Visit your local courthouse and local jail. Talk with some inmates. See what is really happening for yourself. You will see that it is much more complex than your ideological lense.

But, I know people are unwilling to really examine what is going on because it is unpleasant, so the system will likely get perpetuated. That's the price of everyone clinging to their preconceived ideas and ideologies.

[Pippen]

I took several classed in criminal justice with the FBI and have 4 family members in law enforcement, two in the DEA. I'm familiar with the issues with incarceration enough to discuss the broader portions of whats happening.

This is becoming a cultural norm. Inner city minorities dont want to work and dont want to finish highschool and dont have parents and the ones that do are crack addicts or drunks with low paying jobs and they are ignorant and lazy. The kids grow up without leadership, discipline or respect and heeped in ignorance watching MTV. They like the gang mentality and see it as a place to belong without working, just sell drugs and hang out all day.

Before you know it, they're in their 20s and they are hardcore criminals and no longer qualified for decent employment and dont have any marketable skills anyway. They father a few children and never see the woman again. The cycle continues again.

We're paying for it as a society, one way or the other we're paying for it.

[prd mom to 4]

That comment is very insulting to those of us who don't fit into that category and our parents. Way to stereotype a whole people based on a few examples!

[Haditup2here]

Your ignorance is very telling and while I can discount lack of personal responsibility as factor of a number of "inner city minorities", I don't see this as being exclusive to minorities.
"We're paying for it as a society, one way or the other we're paying for it."

Yes, we are. You want to know why? Instead of trying to rehabilitate people, provide more opportunity for minorities and "the disadvantage", people would rather build more prisons even though it costs more. While these prisons provide cheap labor to companies they sap taxpayer dollars from the school systems. Therefore, People move into neighborhoods with supposedly less crime, better schools, but higher property taxes. However, they’re the first ones to complain when they getscrewed by the very leaders they elect to keep the "criminals" out of their neighborhoods. See this is what happens when you look down on the disenfranchisement of others. You become so blinded by your racism that you can't see how your actions allow yourself to be disenfranchised by the ones above you. As of now there are those in the Wall Street who doesn't seem to have a conscious and are wreaking the most havoc on our economy and society as a whole --but you chose to focus on "inner-city minorities". So tell me, as someone taking “FBI” courses, what’s your plan for taking down fraudulent traders -- or is it just easy to come down on the downtrodden versus going against the corporate-political complex?

[egal]

Wow, that was completely biased and wrong.

I suppose it is because they don't "want" to finish high school that most of those students have to drop out to get jobs so they and their families can EAT;

and because they would "rather" be criminals that even more of them are forced into such positions because THERE ARE NO JOBS IN THEIR AREAS--not that they would be qualified for decent ones, anyway, considering the HORRIBLE educations we grudgingly provide them--since our nation DOESN'T INVEST in those regions, leaving crime as the only viable option for far too many;

and because their is something inherently wrong with minorities that they are only SEVENTEEN percent of drug users/sellers but are FORTY percent of drug arrests and TWENTY-EIGHT percent of those jailed for drug-related crimes.

The slums create the environment in which crimes are the biggest and best options, and these exist because of ECONOMIC DISCRIMINATION largely built upon racial discrimination.

And guess who are the MOST discriminatory and the LEAST accurate when it comes to perceptions of minorities? I'll save you the trouble: law enforcement professionals.
They have the most warped view of race and crime, one only entrenched by their personal and employers' prejudices and the biased training they receive.

The law's mistaken preconceptions in targeting minorities more, even when whites commit the same crimes in the same or greater amounts and with the same or greater degree of violence, is well-documented and widely ignored.

[Vickster]

One of the points made in this article is that so many black men who were born in the late Sixties have been incarcerat­ed... men who may have been able to provide some stability and moral guidance in their children's lives if they hadn't been in jail. And in my opinion, it's safe to assume that these men first went to prison as a result of Ronald Reagan's version of the "War On Drugs" that made possession of crack cocaine, used for the most part by poor people, a more serious offense then possession of powdered cocaine which is the way more affluent people prefer this drug.

[papapj]

The presence of which sociologic­al/biologi­cal/geneti­c trait moves you to state that "Inner city minorities don't want to work" and that "They like the gang mentality"?

Why shouldn't ANYBODY reading this feel that you are racially stereotyping?

The cultural norm YOU engage in is the exercise of your White privilege to feel that it's OK to state such things unassailably smug in the assuredness of your reply.Your superficial, simplistic analysis appeals only to the intellectually lazy who'd rather the problem were swept under the rug instead of given the proper attention and thought it deserves.

[amerima]

Professor Loury has drawn attention to a disturbing trend. When are we ever going to realize that as a country we cannot afford to send offenders to prison for ANYTHING other than getting the most violent off the streets? Surely we can solve issues of punishment with giving back to society rather than taking away. We hurt the society that has already been hurt by the actual crime by sending the person to prison where we have to spend more on the prisoner than a student in the public school system. It is time to make the punishment fit the crime. Giving and working for the society where a crime was committed could lower our prison population greatly. Why send a person to prison on drug charges when that person could do something positive in the community to give back. Let Bernie Madoff work in a soup kitchen or homeless shelter for 15 years. Or let him sell his assets and divide the money among all the people he owes and then work the rest of his life paying them back living on a small salary. What good will he do for those people in prison? Let him help people with financial advising! This same tactic could and should apply in crimes that public safety is not an issue. Let THEM GIVE BACK TO SOCIETY!!!!!

[TRYKER]

Wall Street is just as big a part of this as it is in all their other injustices we see tearing this country down. Prison Industries need warm bodies to fill their "for profit" private prisons...­so they send lobbyists to Washington to make more draconian laws that will insure their stock goes up and their stockholders benefit from jailing more and more people. By having even more crimes to abuse citizens' rights we see a solid "prisoner class" that will continue indefinite­ly...unles­s we DO SOMETHING.
Surely President Obama was exposed to this menace when he was a Community Organizer, so he knows it is heinous and needs immediate attention. When States need to cut their budgets, this is the first place they could save money...if we could just get the lobbyists out of the mix, maybe we could start a return to common sense and justice.

[Dolmance]

This is all due to the Republican empowered Religious Right calling the shots in the US for the last thirty years. These traitorous crackpots have been exposed utterly and now is the time to roll back the awful programs they instituted that did nothing but harm the country and trample on the Constitution.

End the Drug War today. If we hadn't been saddled with the Religious Right's prohibition against drugs, we'd have enough money saved today to climb out of our current Republican engineered economic problems AND institute Universal Health care for all Americans.

[TheBlackCat]

Unfortunately, it's not just Republicans on this one.

The drug war was greatly expanded under Clinton, drug arrests soared under his administration, and the DEA was given even more power.

[Nommo]

I have posted here before that Clinton did more damage to Black people that Bush1 and Reagan combined. It is not about Democrats or Republicans, liberals or conservatives, ultimately. They are all simply racists of slightly different stripes whose job is to create profit. America needs to get over its addiction to enslaving people.

[Pippen]

"....... Scholars are now noting that in the post civil-rights era, racially skewed incarceration rates have become a new way of continuing the same old pattern. ......."

I fail to see this proven.

What came first ? The crime or the justice ?

First of all, the huge increase in minority Judges, Law Enforcement, Education, and local government has influenced inner city society exponentially. If there is a ethnic bias at work in these statistics then the source is either of minority origin on the professional side or the community in which the candidate grew up. That observation alone would negate Prof. Loury's postulate since the same system doesn't even exist. Even the laws have changed.

Some people in today's society appear to be very influenced by the media and dramatic glorification of gang life and rapgangsters more than they are influenced by their teachers, clergy, community leaders or parents. The road to incarceration is now an accepted path to higher rank within gang life. It's a career move as much as a failure to comply with society rules.

It's a cycle. It needs to be addressed. And it needs to be stopped. But blaming the system or it's history is not going to be a successful method of implementing a turn around. Here's an idea. Lets start with not blaming. And find out what is needed to restore these influences and reduce the gang influence.

[caldog]

Actually the research has been done, beginning with the language in the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished and continues to prohibit slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. Once this amendment was passed, the penal system as we know it today was created. Consult the research of scholars like WEB DuBois and Dr. Angely Y. Davis, whose work spans the century since the Amendment was enacted. Incarceration has been an endeavor of inequality since, and racialized sentencing persists, as does racial profiling. If whites were incarcerated for the crimes they commit at a comparable rate to people of color (and this crosses gender lines now, as well) there would be public outrage rather than complacence on the part of whites. This so-called ideological approach is based upon raw data - not feel-good liberalism.

[RoloTomassi]

You are dancing around the core issue and justifying by it exclusion; the biggest part of the racial incarceration issue is directly tied to NON-VIOLENT DRUG USE, and the privatized prison industry.

Take away the non-violent drug user aspect of the issue and you've put a big dent in the problem--but if we listen to folks like you we'll just continue to misdirect the conversation towards irrational mantras like "Lets start with not blaming."

There's plenty of blame to be placed, but unfortunately folks like you would rather talk BS than address the issue.

[steamboat]

There is much truth to what you say.......­.But it didn't happen yesterday as far as non-violent drug users being put in prison....­.Are YOU aware during the Clinton Administration MORE young African-Americans (mostly non-violent druggies) were incarcerated then any two other administration. Yet, NONE OF YOU said a word back then. Except having fans like Toni Morrison call him the 'first black president'. Thats how blinded everybody is by partisan-party poilitics, regardless of which end......A­nd didn't he push through NAFTA? All these trucks coming in freely from Mexico. There's more then just vegetables in the bottom of those trucks, isn't there? So how come gain there was no criticism?

[Pippen]

So you are saying it's more productive to spend time and money on advertising blame than to stop the cycle of violence and poor parenting and a failing family system ?

I have not seen anything but accusation about the penal system's "privatization" driving the incarceration rate. Until I see more evidence, I'm not going to draw a generalized conclusion.

I agree the prison system should NOT include nonviolent drug offenders. There should be another facility where treatment and rehab is possible if the candidates elects to go through it. But I'm not in favor of an endless number of "chances" while they keep getting busted for 10 years. There has to be a limited number of "rehab" offers.

[whitemerlot]

If people committ a crime, they should expect to be punished, and they should in fact be punished. I don't buy into the theory that the reason that so many black men (proportionally) are in prison is that they are just incapable of living inside of the law. Most of the people in prison deserve to be there. However, the lifelong punishments, such as forbidding a released felon from ever voting in any election, are clearly racist and were made with racist intent and have achieved racist outcomes. They need to be undone.

[Dystopic]

most of the people in prison are nonviolent drug offenders.

[whitemerlot]

It doesn't matter if they're violent or not. If you committ a crime that's punishable by imprisonment, then don't committ that crime unless you want to go to prison. Is it so hard to follow the rules?

[Scar1]

While these statements reflect that point of view, Brown University needs to spread the word to those who create the cycle and help other Universities in the zest for research and the responsibility that comes with that statistically research that everyone assumes as the Gospel according to Brown.

[Scar1]

Certain Universities have always protrayed some minorities in a negative light. They use a few to describe the majority. There are bad apples in every group but, when it comes to Blacks they make the whole barrel of apples seem bad.

Men are not men. Women are overpowering and our children are just lost. This is what they want us to be. So, stop going along with the crap, please. We need Black writers of History. We need newspapers that just don't socialize but, really have something intellectual to say. We need strong voices. We need our Black Universities to do statistics, economics etc. Time out for clubs, frats and sorors--- good but, we need education to return to hard core basics and reality.

[Nommo]

They have been there and ignored. I only found out recently that Dr. Ben is dying lonely. JA Rogers, Cheikh Anta Diop and too many to name have left a mark in the study of history, Chancellor Williams wrote a landmark book that is still in print if any care to find it. It is difficult to embrace history if one aims for glitter instead of stars.

[steamboat]

This goes for ALL universities, not just predominent-black ones......­...More of the economics, math and sciences. Less of this Sociology, Philosophy, African-American Studies, General Studies, Physical Therapy junk

[Scar1]

Oh you are just finding out about Brown University? Good Lord!! Blacks have known for years. Anyone with sense knows Brown University Statistics are one-sided bullshit.