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State University of New York Press - Graeme R. Newman

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139 pages

English

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The practice of mass incarceration has come under increasing criticism by criminologists and corrections experts who, nevertheless, find themselves at a loss when it comes to offering credible, practical, and humane alternatives. In Civilization and Barbarism, Graeme R. Newman argues this impasse has arisen from a refusal to confront the original essence of punishment, namely, that in some sense it must be painful. He begins with an exposition of the traditional philosophical justifications for punishment and then provides a history of criminal punishment. He shows how, over time, the West abandoned short-term corporal punishment in favor of longer-term incarceration, justifying a massive bureaucratic prison complex as scientific and civilized. Newman compels the reader to confront the biases embedded in this model and the impossibility of defending prisons as a civilized form of punishment. A groundbreaking work that challenges the received wisdom of "corrections," Civilization and Barbarism asks readers to reconsider moderate corporal punishment as an alternative to prison and, for the most serious offenders, forms of incapacitation without prison.

The book also features two helpful appendixes: a list of debating points, with common criticisms and their rebuttals, and a chronology of civilized punishments.
Acknowledgment

Introduction: A Humane Solution to a Barbaric Situation

1. From Barbaric to Civilized: The Replacement of Corporal Punishment with Prison

2. From Civilized to Barbaric: Prison, the Civilized Punishment, Violates both Body and Mind

3. Rethinking Corporal Punishment: Corporal Punishment Is Not Torture, nor Is It Barbaric

4. The Retribution of Mass Incarceration: How the Ideology of Retribution Caused a Committee to Fuel Mass Incarceration

5. The Successful Failure of Deterrence: How the Fake Science of Deterrence Justified Mass Incarceration

6. The Promise of Incapacitation: Redemption and Control of the Body in an Open Society

7. A New Way to Punish: Moderate Corporal Punishment Is the Least Imperfect of All Criminal Punishments

8. Punishing without Bias: The True Pain of Punishment Is the Great Equalizer

9. Civilizing Barbarism: Mass Incarceration Violates More Rights Than Moderate Corporal and Shari'a Punishments

10. The End of Punishment (as We Know It): Punishment Redistributed in a Century of Surveillance

Appendix A. Debating Points: Common Criticisms and Their Rebuttal

Appendix B. A Chronology of Civilized Punishments

Notes
Works Cited
Index

Informations

Publié par	State University of New York Press
Date de parution	01 mars 2020
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781438478135
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,1648€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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CIVILIZATION AND BARBARISM
CIVILIZATION AND BARBARISM
Punishing Criminals in the Twenty-First Century
Graeme R. Newman
Published by State University of New York Press, Albany
© 2020 State University of New York
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.
For information, contact State University of New York Press, Albany, NY
www.sunypress.edu
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Newman, Graeme R., author.
Title: Civilization and barbarism : punishing criminals in the twenty-first century / Graeme R. Newman.
Description: Albany : State University of New York Press, [2020] | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019027837 | ISBN 9781438478111 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781438478135 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Punishment. | Imprisonment. | Alternatives to imprisonment. | Corporal punishment. | Criminal justice, Administration of.
Classification: LCC HV8693 .N479 2020 | DDC 364.6/7—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019027837
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
A CKNOWLEDGMENT
I NTRODUCTION
A Humane Solution to a Barbaric Situation
C HAPTER O NE
From Barbaric to Civilized: The Replacement of Corporal Punishment with Prison
C HAPTER T WO
From Civilized to Barbaric: Prison, the Civilized Punishment, Violates both Body and Mind
C HAPTER T HREE
Rethinking Corporal Punishment: Corporal Punishment Is Not Torture, nor Is It Barbaric
C HAPTER F OUR
The Retribution of Mass Incarceration: How the Ideology of Retribution Caused a Committee to Fuel Mass Incarceration
C HAPTER F IVE
The Successful Failure of Deterrence: How the Fake Science of Deterrence Justified Mass Incarceration
C HAPTER S IX
The Promise of Incapacitation: Redemption and Control of the Body in an Open Society
C HAPTER S EVEN
A New Way to Punish: Moderate Corporal Punishment Is the Least Imperfect of All Criminal Punishments
C HAPTER E IGHT
Punishing without Bias: The True Pain of Punishment Is the Great Equalizer
C HAPTER N INE
Civilizing Barbarism: Mass Incarceration Violates More Rights Than Moderate Corporal and Shari’a Punishments
C HAPTER T EN
The End of Punishment (as We Know It): Punishment Redistributed in a Century of Surveillance
A PPENDIX A
Debating Points: Common Criticisms and Their Rebuttal
A PPENDIX B
A Chronology of Civilized Punishments
N OTES
W ORKS C ITED
I NDEX
Acknowledgment
F or several decades I have enjoyed the wonderful service and resources of the University at Albany Libraries. There has never been a book, article, or other item they could not find. It’s like having my own personal library. This book, more than any other, would probably never have been written without this amazing resource. My sincere thanks to the many library professionals who have helped me over several decades. I have always said that their work is mostly unseen and too often unappreciated. But to me, they are the heart of the University.
Introduction
A Humane Solution to a Barbaric Situation
T his book challenges the nature, justice, and morality of criminal punishment in Western civilization. It questions the received history of criminal punishment; so, of necessity, it focuses on corporal punishment, because the history of criminal punishment is largely a history of corporal punishment (and its extreme form, the death penalty), its transformation into prison, and eventually the transformation of prison into mass incarceration. It uncovers the barbaric effects and practices of mass incarceration, and identifies credible, humane alternatives to the often violent punishments inflicted on today’s offenders. The overall aim is to bring back a sense of moderation to criminal punishment, to eliminate punishments of excess (mass incarceration and the extensive penal and societal harm that it inflicts) and replace them with moderate and limited punishments.
Trying to reform criminal punishment is nothing new. For the last hundred years many reformers have advocated alternatives to incarceration: rehabilitation, probation, parole, fines, restorative justice, community service, and on and on. But as these alternatives have been introduced, the more incarceration has increased. So, regardless of their claimed success or beneficial effects, none of these can be taken seriously as having served as an alternative to prison. In fact, they may have even contributed to mass incarceration, since the idea of rehabilitating offenders through prison offers a ready justification for its existence, and more of it.
I offer two alternatives as a way to rid us of mass incarceration: (1) for the majority of offenders moderate corporal punishment (MCP), that is, the precise, limited, temporary, application of pain to the body, carefully controlled and administered according to specific guidelines; and (2) for the very serious and worst of the worst offenders, open incapacitation (OI), carefully monitored physical incapacitation without incarceration .
Now, before you slam this book shut or switch off your Kindle, bear with me. I have come to these alternatives with much trepidation. But I have concluded that the immediate and long-term penal harm of prison (even a tiny bit of prison) is so destructive of individual, family, and community life that we must try something new, even if at first blush it seems distasteful, cruel, or even immoral. I have come to these two punishment alternatives to prison after comparing the outcomes of all alternative punishments according to available scientific data, cutting through the bias against corporal punishment that pervades the research and penal policy.
It might be argued that if a punishment is even a little bit immoral (or if you prefer, evil) it should be rejected and surely that is why we discarded the horrendous corporal and capital punishments of the past. But if that were the case, we could not punish at all, especially with prison, for as I will show, all punishment has an evil side to it, and that includes very well-meaning punishments such as rehabilitation.
The fact is that punishment is a very complicated concept, idea, or practice. All punishment, even the mildest, is a destructive act, always violent or surreptitiously aggressive. At its extreme, it destroys people’s lives so that it can restore them. It may create remorse in the punisher as much as, or more than, in the punished. It is irresistible, always searching for ways to spread its evil wings.
Three Justifications
Punishment is universally resented, but universally applied. Though it takes on different forms in different cultures, there are basically three justifications for its use.
The first is obedience, better known in the criminal justice world as deterrence—a forward looking justification that seeks to ensure that the infraction will not happen again.
Little Johnny, a four-year-old, lives in center city Philadelphia. On his way to day care, he breaks away from his mommy and runs across Lombard Street without looking. A car screeches to a halt, almost running him over. His mom rushes to him and gives him a sharp slap on the legs. In tears, she cries, “Don’t you ever do that again! You could have been killed!” Johnny winces, and cries.
If little Johnny repeats his offense, he will get a harder slap. One must be cruel to be kind, which is why mommies everywhere sometimes cry after they punish their child, though “Tiger moms” are said to develop a steely disposition. This natural response by a parent to her child’s infraction, a practice as old as families have existed, gives credence to what is called the utilitarian philosophy, a wide-ranging approach to understanding society and human behavior, popularized and systematized by the English thinkers of the eighteenth century, Jeremy Bentham its greatest proponent. The hope that Johnny will not repeat his disobedience is called in the criminal justice world, individual deterrence. However, not only is it for his own good, it is for ours too. Had his siblings or friends been watching the slap, his punishment would also be called general deterrence, based on the hope that those witnessing the punishment will also be deterred. The moral basis of this philosophy is summed up simply: the end justifies the means. 1 That is, we want a secure, ordered society (family or community), and a punishment for disobedience is a means to get it.
The second is deserts, payback, “it serves you right,” or “he asked for it.” This view of punishment is commonly referred to in criminal justice as retribution, its more primitive version, revenge or vengeance.
In Singapore Anuar, a nine-year-old, uses an f-bomb at the dinner table. His father takes him firmly by the hand to the bathroom. “Give me your toothbrush,” he demands. Anuar does as he is told. Dad wets it, rubs it on a bar of soap and says, “You used a very dirty word. Wash your mouth out with soap and water!” Anuar does as he is told. He has done this before. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I didn’t mean it, I couldn’t help it!” he cries.
This is a backward looking justificati