by Fire8storm
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The Effectiveness of the Prison Service

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Behind Bars

Source: Michael Coghlan, CC-BY, via flickr

The Evolution of the Modern Prison

Prison. This word conjures up images of big buildings with razor wire, locked gates and armed guards, enforced routine and a complete lack of freedom, or at least it does for me. I am disturbed by these images and fear ever being locked up in such a place. Prisons have evolved through the centuries, moving from being simple holding cells to the punishment itself. In the UK today, the suggestion is that imprisonment is the route to reform for individuals who commit criminal acts.

We keep those sentenced to prison in custody, helping them lead law-abiding and useful lives, both while they are in prison and after they are released.

This viewpoint has developed over centuries of society trying to effectively deal with criminality and issue appropriate punishment. In the 16 thand 17 thCenturies prisons were used as secure units to house criminals before acts of punishment and humiliation were carried out, usually hanging for the most severe of crimes. The conditions in holding cells were harsh, often unsanitary and poorly managed meaning many criminals died from disease before facing their punishment. During these times, punishments were public displays to show the consequences of criminal activity in order to deter others (Howard League for Penal Reform).

During the 18 thCentury society began struggling with the idea of public executions. Juries were becoming reluctant to convict individuals of the types of crime which would result in this punishment. The idea of ‘correction’ rather than just punishment became more popular and a gradual shift towards prisons housing criminals and punishing them through hard labour became more appealing. This was also the time where the notions of reform and rehabilitation started to emerge in a more serious light. The idea of using imprisonment as a vehicle to reform rather than just punishment is not a new one. Rehabilitation can be traced to ancient Greek philosophy when imprisonment was used as a penalty for unpaid fines handed down due to unacceptable behaviour. Over time due to widespread inability for people to pay fines at all, sentences of lengths of time were introduced (Allen, 2003) .Reform itself often came from religious ideas of crime being a sin and prison should be a place to teach proper and acceptable behaviour. Under this view prisons should be humane and focus on moral learning and correcting of behaviour to ensure release back into society was smooth and beneficial for all.

18th Century Public Punishment

Source: Paul Townsend, CC BY:ND, via flickr

Punishment or Rehabilitation?

An assumption that the simple imprisonment of an individual away from their community will automatically produce a level of reform is naïve. Prisons, it could be said, are communities of their own and humans are remarkable at adaptation. Even the feeblest individual will over time develop a method of dealing with their environment when they have no choice. While prison life is generally a very boring and mundane existence, networks form, contacts are made, new skills are gained and lessons are learnt. All of which will undoubtedly be taken with them upon release back into society. Add this to a criminal record making employment more difficult and the result is an individual with a battle on their hands to stay on the straight and narrow. Certainly there are instances where individuals have spent so much time in prison they have become institutionalised. They find life on the ‘outside’ very difficult to manage. Back within society they have to make their own decisions and fend for themselves. There is no set routine, no three meals a day and no one to tell them what to do and when. For this reason, many lifetime offenders fail out with prison walls and actively seek to return to prison life, where it is familiar and guaranteed.

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Figures from the Prison Reform Trustin 2013 state that in the UK, 47% of adults who were released from prison re-offended and were re-convicted within one year. These re-conviction figures increased further for those who were serving short sentences of less than 12 months (58%) and those under the age of 18 years (73%) . Research studies have indicated that re-offending rates have increased alongside the increase in prison population suggesting the continued and increasing use of custodial sentences is becoming less effective. Moreover, a large scale study published by Marsh et alin 2009 found no evidence for prison alone reducing re-offending. They found that alternative strategies including substance misuse treatment and monitoring more effective. Evidence to date is not conclusive, however information is building suggesting that simple imprisonment of offenders is not a solution to crime and is not acting as a deterrent to existing offenders or new offenders.

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Evidence suggests shorter sentences increase risk of re-offending

Source: Ministry of Justice – Proven re-offending statistics quarterly report, 2011-2012

This doesn’t mean prisons don’t have an important role to play in criminal justice. If an individual commits a crime, breaks the law that has been set by this country, there should indeed be consequences.

Difficulties and hardships faced by offenders upon their release could be said to be their own making and some will have little sympathy. Furthermore, there is the issue of justice for the victims of the crime and suitable punishment for those who have committed that crime. The UK does not have sentences which commit an individual to prison for the rest of their natural lives. On average a ‘life’ sentence in the UK means 13 – 16 years, therefore most offenders will be released at some point and be expected to reintegrate back into society. The problem is whether current practices are simply creating a cycle for many offenders which is of no benefit to them or to the communities they are released back into. The question has to be asked; if there were more opportunities for those released from prison for employment, treatment and support for generally leading socially moral and productive lives, would this decrease the re-offending rate and prevent this cycle culture?

Prison SMART – Prisoner rehabilitation training http://www.prisonsmart.eu/

The Search for Alternatives

Certainly a big factor in such a drive for alternatives is cost and the dramatic increase in revenue required to continue to house, feed and contain an ever growing prison population. According to the Prison Reform Trust, a prison place in England and Wales cost, on average, £37,648 in 2011-2012 and re-offending during 2007-2008 cost the economy between £9.5 and £13 billion. Community based services are becoming an increasingly popular option in addressing this issue. Recent years have seen an increase in initiatives aimed to support and prepare offenders before release such as the Samaritans Listener Scheme in 2011 and the National Grid-led offender training and employment programme. The National Offender Management Servicehas reported that community sentences resulted in an 8% improvement in re-offending rates within a year, when compared to custodial sentences of less than 12 months.

The United States has also provided some good examples of community based services that have been effective. For example, the Drug Market Intervention (DMI) and Smart Probation Strategies are multi-agency collaborative approaches to addressing substance misuse and probation services in a more appropriate and cost effective manner for low-risk offenders. A 2003 Centre for Court Innovation and NPC Researchstudy in New York has demonstrated that by ensuring offenders receive treatment and access to support services under community-based programs, the re-offending rate can be reduced.

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Source: Victim Support and Make Justice Work (2012), London, Victim Support Populus Poll

Public support for interventions, training and treatment for offenders does appear to be on the increase. In fact, a report from the Home Office in 2009 stated that only 11% of the UK population surveyed believed that continuing to imprison offenders is the most effective way to reduce crime. Recognition of substance misuse as being a factor in criminality is clear, with 67% of people stating they thought treatment would be an effective way of preventing crime (Prison Reform Trust) . Furthermore, results suggested the public supported options of interventions at the level of families and parenting skills and activities for young people. This represents a shift in opinion towards preventing crime in the first place rather than longer and harsher prison sentences for offenders.

Conditional sentences are in some cases imposed for lower level crimes. Under such sentences, while restrictions are imposed on the individual to limit their movement and capacities to an extent, they are not removed from society completely. Whether or not such sentences are appropriate and proportionate to the crime that was committed and essentially provide justice to the victims of that crime does raise some concerns.

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Justice, Death, Punishment, Avarice & Envy, Royal Palace Citizens Hall, Amsterdam

Source: Dominik Bartsch, CC-BY, via flickr

Prisons have evolved from dark solitary enclosures designed to hold criminals before punishment, to modern day compounds capable of housing multiple prisoners under humane conditions. This development has come from a change in attitude in how to effectively and appropriately deal with criminality in our society. Not everybody accepts capital punishment as an appropriate consequence for crime. Public executions and hard labour are a thing of the past in the UK, replaced by ideas of reform and rehabilitation through teaching, guidance and experience. The soaring costs of operating prisons, particularly with such increasing prison populations, are demanding change and a consideration of alternatives. Substance misuse and mental health are now recognised as significant issues which cannot be solved by incarceration alone. Addressing the cycle of crime evident through re-offending while adopting suitable punishment acceptable as justice is a challenge our society is still struggling to meet.

© 2014 Fiona Last updated on November 7, 2014

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Follow (12) 37 comments

Colleen Swan 2 weeks ago from County Durham Level 5 Commenter

Good article well researched and nice illustrations. How times have changed.

Fire8storm 2 weeks ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Hi Colleen, thank you very much for your comments. My first hub so I very much appreciate the feedback!

HSchneider 2 weeks ago from Parsippany, New Jersey Level 5 Commenter

Excellent Hub, Fire8storm. We as a society indeed need to find a better balance between punishment and rehabilitation with our prisons. Punishment is indeed essential but we need to spend more resources to give prisoners the resources and talents to not re-commit their crimes. This is especially true for convicts of lesser crimes.

Fire8storm 2 weeks ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Thank you HSchneider! I completely agree and I think you make a good point about convicts of lesser crimes. Certainly it appears that low-level criminality and short prison terms can lead to higher rates of re-offending which is not beneficial to anyone. Most high-level offenders started by committing low level crimes. The sooner this cycle can be broken through intervention, alongside adequate punishment of course, the better.

FlourishAnyway 13 days ago from USA Level 8 Commenter

I used to do volunteer work with youth prison populations when I was much younger. It was an eye opening experience, teaching me that 1) I needed to pursue another volunteer interest and 2) that some people’s behavior can be made worse by a badly managed “corrective” system.

Fire8storm 12 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

I think youth offenders can definitely be more challenging! The problem is also that individuals need to want to change, and if they are not open to that it can make the whole process much more complicated. Some individuals in my experience have come out of prison more bitter and angry than when they were sentenced which often fuels their future behaviour.

Lady Guinevere 11 days ago from West Virginia Level 7 Commenter

Oh you have to read my hubs on prison memoirs and there is lots o information on them at is is from a friend who has been in the prison system for about 13 years now. He tells it like it is and it isn’t cushy or soft at all.

Fire8storm 11 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Wonderful Lady Guinevere – thank you! I have been working my way through your hubs, you have such interesting work! I will be seeking out those prison memoirs hubs most definitely, thank you for highlighting them to me.

lone77star 10 days ago from Cebu, Philippines Level 4 Commenter

Fascinating.

One of the key elements of any corporate activity (and more and more, prisons have become big business), is selfishness. The U.S. Supreme Court has insanely declared that corporations are “people,” too. Too bad we can’t throw corporations in jail. Too many corporate officers have skipped jail and opted for $Trillion$ dollar bailouts.

Like the pharmaceutical industry, cures are bad for the bottom line, so prisons would love repeat offenders or offenders who are kept indefinitely. How would we ever know if guards or administrators lie about a prisoner’s behavior in order to increase the quarterly profits?

And how can we admire any corporation if they were the lowest bidder? Shoddy work in order to increase the profits. Our military in Iraq and Afghanistan had to put up with diseased water, double billing for laundry and similar crimes by Halliburton and others. Dick Cheney made a killing off of 9/11. Of course he told the military officer that day to let the airplane all the way into the Pentagon. Ka-ching! Laughing on the way to the bank. Even though the vice president no longer worked for Halliburton on paper, he was still on their payroll.

The psychopathic elite don’t care about most of us. When we are no longer useful, we will be imprisoned or worse. America already has family prisons with razor wire atop 30-foot fences and millions of plastic coffins for the ebola or some other plague. How can they ensure they can use such facilities and coffins? Lace the pathogen in vaccines and make it illegal to refuse vaccination. Then, all the “useless eaters,” as one female world leader put it, can be culled.

Grim future?

Perhaps. But we can change it. If we change ourselves, we can heal the world. If we love others as ourselves and wish for them everything that they desire, we are being just like God (Love). The coming world war will prove that to all of us. The choice between oblivion and shrugging off self-concern (ego) will become startlingly clear. We can reduce the coming suffering, though, if we start sooner. That’s the loving thing to do.

lone77star 10 days ago from Cebu, Philippines Level 4 Commenter

The Poll is a bit too limiting. There are other options besides the two given. Too dichotomous.

Fire8storm 9 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Thank you lone77star for your insightful comments! Our current world is a worrying place with too many people looking to serve their own purposes regardless of the damage caused. I agree, change is possible and entirely within our reach. Fair point regarding the Poll too, this would have been much more useful with extended options. Thank you for reading and commenting!

PinoyMom 7 days ago from Philippines Level 1 Commenter

Great and detailed article Fire8storm. We also have many prisoners in the country. Few politicians assists them and talks with them because their cases are different and not all of them are proven guilty. Since a reputation of one man was ruined due to wrong accusations, once they left the cell and look for job opportunities outside, it would be difficult.

Fire8storm 7 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Thank you PinoyMom! To be in prison when innocent must truly be awful. I do worry about the rate of wrongful convictions, and possibly worse, not being convicted at all but still finding yourself in prison. Once people have decided you are guilty that is the label you must carry. It is definitely an area that needs more attention in this world.

Fhrecel 4 days ago from Dubai, UAE

Good article and well researched. It is also one of the major problems we have there in our country Philippines, hope our government can put priority to our justice system to avoid innocent lives to be shut into prison.

Fire8storm 4 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Thank you Fhrecel! I have heard so many cases of wrongful conviction that often take years to be resolved if they are resolved at all. The development of DNA testing does appear to be helping but I think there is so much work still to be done.

Kathleen Cochran 4 days ago from Atlanta, Georgia Level 5 Commenter

This was your first hub? Wow! Looking forward to many more! Congrats!

Fire8storm 4 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Thank you Kathleen! Have to say I was pretty shocked this morning, but delighted – thank you again!

mySuccess8 4 days ago Level 3 Commenter

Many countries face the need to reduce re-offending rate as prison facilities are getting inadequate, and to reduce prison operating costs to the taxpayers. Your informative and well-written article has rightly stressed the need to punish people properly when they break the law, but also support them so they don’t commit crime in the future. Congrats on Hub of the Day!

Fire8storm 4 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Thank you mySuccess8 for reading and leaving such nice words! I think this is exactly the challenge, criminal activity needs to have consequences severe enough to deter and to be appropriate punishment, but equally the cycle of re-offending needs to be addressed if we are ever going to move forward. Exactly how to do this however, is the question!

Keisha Hunter 4 days ago from Kingston, Jamaica Level 2 Commenter

Congrats on HOTD. As someone who works with the prison industry here in Jamaica, I must say that the experiences are quite different in UK and USA. I bet the poll for non-custodial sentencing would be higher in Ja and USA. But even then, the Jamaican system in my view deals with inmates more as humans than what I have estimated in at least the US, based on fb pages of correctional officers that I have seen. Our difficulty is with resources for rehabilitation. Great hub.

colorfulone 4 days ago from Minnesota Level 4 Commenter

I am all for “reform and rehabilitation” in the prison systems. There are some crimes / re-offending crimes that are hard to deal with, but predictable at a high cost to victims. I do not know what the answers are, but I do hope the predictability can be weighted in heavily before some offenders are released into communities.

Fire8storm 4 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Hi Keisha, thank you for your kind words! It is really interesting how prison services differ in different countries and I am sure there are things services could learn from each other!

Fire8storm 4 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Hi Colorfulone, thank you for reading! I wonder whether that is where part of the answer lies, if we had a better understanding of an individual and their likelihood to re-offend before they were released from prison, could more be done to prevent such re-offending? I suppose that is what much of the rehabilitation work is about and I hope at least is making strides forward with some individuals. It is such a complex area.

suzettenaples 4 days ago from Naples, FL Level 7 Commenter

Interesting and informative article. I can tell you in the U.S. the prison system is horrid. There is no rehabilitation and those that go into prison for lesser crimes come out more of a criminal. There is abuse (even from guards), gang activity, drugs and other crimes within our prison system. Punishment is not doled out on an equal basis. Most prisons are full of minorities, blacks and hispanics, specifically. Too bad we don’t take a lesson from the UK. Congrats on HOTD!

Fire8storm 4 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Thank you suzettenaples! That does sound horrid and most unfair. From what I know of the UK system at least there does appear to be movement towards rehabilitation and acceptance that intervention is required if we expect any change to happen. I have heard so much about prison causing more harm to individuals creating more anger and resentment which potentially only contributes to attitudes and re-offending upon release.

Keisha Hunter 4 days ago from Kingston, Jamaica Level 2 Commenter

The UK really deserves commendation and has worked closely with Jamaica in the past in this regard. Even then, we can all learn something from each other. Your representatives were amazed at how we are able to interact with our inmates and not have to watch our backs with bated breath when walking among them or even working along with them. Our system has great potential but like I said, resources are a main factor for rehabilitation, as well as overcrowding. We’d probably be called ‘hug a thugs’ by our US counterparts. Likewise, our inmates hardly ever breach parole which is a real privilege that you have to apply for after showing progress in the path of rehabilitation. I gather that it is more of a right in the US, I could be wrong.

Fire8storm 4 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Sounds to me like you have the right idea! I hope with more resources you can continue the work you are doing and approach you have as it is clearly having a positive effect. I think it is important to see what others are doing, what approach they are taking and what results are being achieved. While every area is different there are clearly lessons to be learnt!

Keisha Hunter 4 days ago from Kingston, Jamaica Level 2 Commenter

So true. Thanks.

cam8510 4 days ago from (currently) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Level 4 Commenter

Fire8storm, Great job on your article of the day. I was happy to hear about the Prison Smart program. With so many in prison who also are substance abusers, the connection is obvious. I am a recovering alcoholic, so I get that side of the equation very well. Criminal behavior and addiction are a bomb waiting to explode. Thanks for your thorough article. I have a hub on the history of Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia. You might be interested in reading it as that institution became the template for prisons worldwide for a number of years.

Robert Levine 4 days ago from Brookline, Massachusetts

Very thorough treatment of the subject. Prison reform was a cause celebre of 19th Century liberals, & figures prominently in the works of writers such as Dickens, Victor Hugo, and Alexandre Dumas. Especially important was the elimination of the debtor’s prison.

Fire8storm 4 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Thank you Cam8510! I couldn’t agree more re addiction and criminal behaviour and it is such a devastating cycle. Programs such as Prison Smart look fantastic and effective, I do hope more of these types of programs are developed. I will certainly be looking up your hub on the Philadelphia Penitentiary, it sounds great, thank you for highlighting it to me!

Fire8storm 4 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Hi Robert – thank you for reading and commenting! I found it really interesting to read about the early prisons and ideas on reform particularly as the system is so different now. I think it is definitely an area I would like to learn more about!

PinoyMom 4 days ago from Philippines Level 1 Commenter

Congratulations Fire8storm, your hub was chosen as the Hub for this day, I’ll be waiting for your next hubs. I voted this hub for Editor’s Choice. Keep up the good work.

Fire8storm 3 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

Thank you PinoyMom! Such lovely comments and a vote too, I am glad you find my hubs interesting. Thank you again!

PinoyMom 3 days ago from Philippines Level 1 Commenter

Your welcome Fire8storm

J – R – Fr13m9n 3 days ago from Morris County, New Jersey Level 2 Commenter

This is a well researched and written article concerning the problems the modern prison system faces. Interesting reading.

Fire8storm 3 days ago from Scotland, UK Hub Author

J – R – Fr13m9n – thank you for reading!

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