No More Prison

Thought of the Day

2011-01-06T06:00:00.001Z

" There was a proposition in a township there to discontinue public schools because they were too expensive. An old farmer spoke up and said if they stopped the schools they would not save anything, because every time a school was closed a jail had to be built. It's like feeding a dog on his own tail. He'll never get fat. I believe it is better to support schools than jails."

Mark Twain

Thought of the Day

2011-01-05T06:00:00.001Z

"To assert in any case that a man must be absolutely cut off from society because he is absolutely evil amounts to saying that society is absolutely good, and no-one in his right mind will believe this today."

Albert Camus (1913-60)

Men's Justice for Women

2011-01-04T12:00:00.002Z

I am not sure of the source of this article orginally published on the No More Prison website. I suspect it may have come from Justice for Women.

My name is Donna Tinker. I am a 30-year-old woman currently serving a life sentence for taking the life of the man I loved. Sadly my story is a very familiar one. After years of being in this abusive relationship, on the 13th June 1999, he became a victim of this relationship too. The depth of pain and remorse I feel for my husband dying by my hand is something I am incapable of putting into words. I never wanted or meant for this to happen. It started as just another argument that moved as it always did on to him hitting me. This night in particular he'd kicked me in the face and punched me. But then he picked a hot iron up, and I panicked. I was just trying to stop him hurting me anymore. I couldn't and still can't make sense of my trial. No witnesses were called for my defence. I trusted my legal team, as in a situation like this you have no choice but to put your trust in them. Shouldn't I have been advised that witnesses were needed so they could establish the nature of the relationship between my husband and myself? Wouldn't this have been crucial information the jury should have heard?
Donna Tinker

The Commission on Women and the Criminal Justice System, set up by the charitable Fawcett Society a couple of years ago made the case that women are increasingly turning to serious and violent crimes because they have been brutalised by violence against them, and that they turn to crime for different reasons from men, and that the criminal justice system is failing to tackle this. A trend was revealed of women being forced into drug dealing by abusive partners they feared, while for others offending was closely linked to a history of violence against them. Murder, the intentional and unlawful killing of another human, carries a mandatory life sentence. In some cases the killing of another human is 'justified' in which case the charge of murder is dropped and the defendant set free. In other cases the killing is 'excused' but not totally justified. In these cases the charge of murder is reduced to manslaughter and the judge decides the sentence. The sentence can range from life imprisonment to a community service order. However, the law concerning murder in the UK is inherently gendered. By looking at the legal defences to murder we see how they represent a male understanding of the crime and men's experiences of killing.

There are three main defences to a charge of murder: Self defence is a full defence and results in an acquittal. Self defence can be argued if the defendant can show that their life was in imminent danger. However, in claiming self defence it must also be shown that 'proportional force' was used. So, if the person killed were attacking with their bare fists the use of a knife would be disproportionate. This defence ignores the physical discrepancies between men and women. It also ignores the fact that many women are in fear because of their past experiences of violence from the man.

Diminished responsibility is a partial defence and reduces a murder charge to manslaughter. To argue diminished responsibility the defendant must prove that their mind was impaired by an abnormality at the time of the killing. This defence shifts the focus from a man's violence to the woman's state of mind. Diminished responsibility medicalises women's actions and implies that had their mental faculties not been impaired they would have continued to be a willing punch bag. It can include the argument that the woman was suffering from 'Battered Woman's Syndrome' which is based on two fundamental premises: a cycle model of violence and 'learned helplessness'. For BWS to apply a woman must have been through this cycle at least once, and a cluster of symptoms develop through which the syndrome can be diagnosed. These include: low self-esteem, self-blame, anxiety, depression, fear, suspiciousness and loss of belief in the possibility of change. BWS is recognised as a formal clinical syndrome within post traumatic stress disorder. Lawyers frequently ask if there is a 'syndrome' or very specialised research evidence which will demonstrate a particular point. Both rest on medicalising and particularising what is an extremely common social event; the use of physical and sexual violence by men against women and children. The language in many of the US cases shows that courts understand BWS as a new and excusable form of female irrationality. Alarmingly BWS is increasingly being used in criminal and civil cases to establish what constitutes a battered woman. If women do not fit the model then it is being argued that they were not in fact abused. It has been argued that BWS should not be considered a medical abnormality, but a mental state which is normal in particular circumstances, relevant to all defences including self-defence and duress.

Provocation is also a partial defence. To use the defence it has to be shown that the provoking act was such that a 'reasonable man' would have responded as the defendant did under the same circumstances. Further, it must also be shown that the killing was the result of a sudden and temporary loss of self-control. The defence of provocation ignores the history of violence experienced by women by focusing only on the events immediately prior to the killing. There is no consistency in the application and understanding of the defence when it is used by women. This is because it is based on the idea of a man being provoked when another man insults his 'honour'. The immediate retaliation expected of the offended man ignores the particular experiences of women subjected to male violence.

As male violence against women continues to be a phenomenon in itself, infidelity remains the most frequent excuse for killing of wives and girlfriends. Men who kill their wives or girlfriends or ex partners and plead diminished responsibility or provocation nearly always walk free or get short sentences for manslaughter.

In 1991 Joseph McGrail was tried in Birmingham for the murder of his wife. He pleaded provocation on the basis that his wife was an alcoholic and swore at him. He killed her by repeatedly kicking her in the stomach. At the trial the judge commented ..."this lady would have tried the patience of a saint", he gave him a two year suspended sentence.
In 1995 Brian Steadman was jailed for three years after he hit her 13 times with a hammer, he pleaded diminished responsibility due the his wife's constant nagging.
In 1997 Joseph Swinburne killed his wife by stabbing her eleven times when she told him she was leaving him for another man. He was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 200 hours community service.
In 1992 Judge Dennison gave Bisla Rajinder Singh, an 18 month sentence suspended for one year for the manslaughter of his wife on the grounds of provocation. The judge told him "you have suffered through no fault of your own....your wife was a domineering lady with a sharp and persistent tongue".
Lucy Kellet was preparing to leave Oliver Kellet after years of abuse. As she as waiting for the removal van to take her to her new home he stabbed her repeatedly with a bowie knife. He pleaded manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility and was given 3 year probation.

Compare these with the following women

In 1989 after 10 years of severe violence against her Kiranjit Aluwhalia threw petrol over her husbands feet and set it alight whilst he was sleeping, he died some days later. She was arrested and charged with murder, she was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment.
In 1992 Zoora Shah snapped after 12 years of physical and sexual violence when her partner turned his attention to her eldest daughter. She poisoned him and was convicted of murder, sentenced to life with a minimum of 20 years, she is still in prison.
In 1993 Josephine Smith shot her husband after many years of violence when he threatened to track her down and kill her and their three children if she left him. She was convicted of murder and sentenced to life with a minimum of 12 years.
In 1989 Malcolm Thornton, an alcoholic, threatened to kill his wife Sara and her daughter in their sleep, he taunted her with a knife. The police had been called to the home on numerous occasion throughout their relationship by Sara because of his attacks on her and he was in fact due to appear in court on an assault charge 10 days after he died. Sara feared for her own and for her daughter's life. She stabbed him once and called an ambulance. She pleaded guilty on grounds of diminished responsibility, she was found guilty of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment.
For four years Peter Iles persecuted Janet Gardner using violence, threats and harassment. On one occasion he tried to cut her throat, he beat and kicked her and burnt her with cigarettes. During the attack which led to his death he grabbed her round the neck and started beating her head against the kitchen doorway. Janet grabbed a knife and stabbed him seven times. She was cleared of murder but found guilty of manslaughter, and sentenced to five years in prison.

Margo Wilson and Martin Daly's work on domestic homicide has used data sets from a number of industrialised countries. One of the most important findings from their research is that leaving an abusive partner is actually the most dangerous thing women can do. Women have always known this, it is professionals who have taken an extremely long time to understand that well-founded fear is one of the most potent reasons why women do not leave violent men. Wilson and Daly also calculated that on the basis of recent figures the sex ratio for spouse killing is that for every 100 men who kill wives 23 women kill husbands. Women who kill have often experienced repeated and life threatening violence, with a greater frequency of coerced sex. Almost all the women had also attempted to leave and elicit the support of other agencies in their struggles to end violence. Many talk of reaching a point where they believe only one of them can survive. The basic question which should be addressed in such cases is: was the woman's use of violence in this particular circumstance reasonable given her size, strength and perception of danger. In terms of battered women who kill more appropriate reforms would be extending remit of self-defence.

The failure of murder defences to adequately reflect women's actual experiences is the reason why some feminists and women's rights activists are campaigning for a new defence to murder - self-preservation. Self-preservation is intended as a partial defence, and although not gender specific it is revolutionary in that it takes the circumstances which women commonly find themselves in (as opposed to those of men) as its point of departure. The proposed defence is a partial defence, reducing a charge of murder to manslaughter. It reflects the experiences of anyone subjected to repeated assaults or sexual abuse and acknowledges their responses as rational within an intolerable situation.

The proposed self - preservation defence:

It shall be a defence to a charge of murder, reducing the charge to manslaughter, if:

the deceased person had subjected the defendant or another person, with whom the defendant was at the time of the deceased person's death in a familial relationship, to continuing sexual or physical violence and
the deceased person was at the time of their death or had at any time been in a familial or intimate relationship with the defendant or with the person as described in (a) above and
the defendant believed that, but for their action, the deceased person would repeat the violence as stated above, so that their life or that of the person as described in (a) above was in danger.

In Section 1 above: 'Familial' means related, cohabiting or living in the same household 'Continuing' means any act of violence as defined below on more than one occasion 'Violence' means any act that would constitute an offence under the Offences Against the Person Act 1861, the Sexual Offences Act 1975 (as amended), or the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 'Intimate' means any sexual relationship not included in the definition of 'familial' 'Belief' must be reasonable in the context of ongoing abuse and violence.

It shall be for the defence to raise the issue where the circumstances are as outlined in Section1 above, and it will then be for the prosecution to prove that Section 1 does not apply.

The response of the Home Affairs Select Committee in rejecting the proposal as a useful way forward was that such a concept was unknown in English law, and that it suggested that such actions by abused women might be rational implying that mad women can be understood, bad women punished, but women as rational and creative survivors don?t exist. BWS plays into this invisibility by only allowing women to occupy the position of depressed and despairing victim. A couple of successes have been made on certain points in the cases of women appealing against their convictions for assaults on abusive partners:

Cumulative provocation at the hands of abusive partners can be considered with the final act of provocation; the judiciary has moved over the last few years in its interpretation of "provocation", influenced by feminist campaigners.

The characteristics of the "reasonable man" concerns the aspect of the defence of provocation, where the jury are directed to consider the characteristics of the "reasonable man". This is an area of law that has expanded over the last twenty years. The "reasonable man" is the yardstick by which the jury is supposed to consider what is reasonable behaviour, as opposed to an unreasonable reaction to an act of provocation.

The courts are also indirectly recognising the relevance of a long term history of abuse back to childhood through looking at so-called reasonable reactions to abusive partners where the act of provocation is somehow connected with such characteristics. The judiciary are finally accepting the argument that domestic violence and abuse are sufficient grounds for provocation. However, it is no where near convincing that even with the creation of new precedents the law will really work for women or be in any way "fair". Present defences largely ignore male violence.

Thought of the Day

2011-01-04T06:00:00.001Z

"I think we need to create productive conversations and develop activism among different groups. We need activists, of course, but also intellectuals and scholars, people from the labor movement, women's movement, prisoners, former prisoners. We need to learn how to talk to and with each other. We need to develop new vocabularies.......we have to recognize our own potential power"

Angela Davis (1998)

Prison Decayed: How Prison Films Support the Expansion of the Penal Estate

2011-01-02T10:30:00.002Z

This article was published on the NMP website in 2006

by Paul Mason, Cardiff University

Introduction

Ten years ago, Michael Howard, then British Home Secretary delivered his speech to the Conservative party faithful at their annual conference:

Prison works. It ensures we are protected from murderers, muggers and rapists - and it makes many who are tempted to commit crime think twice...This may mean that more people will go to prison. I do not flinch from that. We shall no longer judge the success of our justice by a fall in our prison population. (Michael Howard, Conservative Party Conference, October 1995.)

Two years previously, his counterpart in the Labour Party and then Shadow Home Secretary Tony Blair, was writing in The New Statesman that Labour should become 'tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime'(1993: 100). The increased politicisation of British criminal justice policy, over the last ten years in particular, has been matched with a correlative hardening of penal sanctions, a development mirrored in the United States (Garland 2001; Mathiesen 2000; Wacquant 2005; 2006), to the extent that now 'a failure to talk tough on crime is akin to political suicide' (Newburn and Jones 2005). Such a stance has meant that in November 2005, the prison population in England and Wales was 77,421, the second highest imprisonment rate in Western Europe (Prison Reform Trust 2005).

However, the contention that high prison rates mean lower crime is fundamentally flawed and remains a myth (Christie 2000; Dyer 2000; Jacobson 2005; Parenti 1999). This, coupled with the injustice and inhumanity of a system which locks up the socially excluded (Prison Reform Trust, 2005), a disproportionate number of ethnic minorities (Home Office, 2004) and those with mental health problems (Prison Reform Trust, 2005) clearly demonstrates the pressing need for alternatives to and the abolition of the prison system.

Many see the increased punitiveness in criminal justice policy as a populist reaction to the problems of crime (Garland 2001; Hutton 2005; Johnstone 2000; Loader 2005; Pratt 2000; Roberts et al. 2002; Ryan 2006). That pressure from an angry public, mediated through tabloid headlines, demands more displays of repressive punishment such as longer prison sentences, boot camps, tighter controls on sex offenders, anti-social behaviour orders and so on. Punishment becomes crueller, more emotive and ostentatious (Pratt 2000) as public insecurities about crime and the criminal intensify.

However, what has been lacking in this analysis is any engagement with media representations of prison and punishment, how and why they may contribute to the punitive in the public sphere. Only Mathiesen (Mathiesen 2000; 2001; 2003) has offered any meaningful thoughts on how media discourses around prison may intervene in the penal debate, and these are relatively brief. Adopting a similar position to those writing on penal populism, he posits that changes in government discourse around criminal justice policy have shifted from legal and moral values to opportunistic and media/public driven ones. The nature of public debate around crime and punishment has consequently altered, no longer predicated upon 'principled legitimation' (Mathiesen 2003: 3). He further suggests that media reporting magnifies violent and serious crime such that prison is constructed as the only solution:

In the newspapers, on television, in the whole range of media, the prison is simply not recognised as a fiasco, but as a necessary if not always fully successful method of reaching its purported goals. The prison solution is taken as paradigmatic, so that a rising crime rate is viewed as still another sign showing that prison is needed.'
(Mathiesen 2000: 144)

While Mathiesen's argument is a surely correct, it would be strengthen by an examination of the media coverage of prisons to which he refers. I offer here an examination of one prison discourse in popular culture: the prison film. I will argue that, over the last ten years the prison film has represented incarceration around two elements, both of which significantly impact upon debates around penal reform and abolition. Firstly, the graphic exploitation of violence and sexual assault in prison films is predominantly depicted voyeuristically and remains severed from any abolitionist or reformist context. While scenes of explicit brutality may present opportunities for the prison film to challenge the very existence of the penal estate, any oppositional discourse is subjugated to the lurid mise en scene of violence and sexual assault. Secondly, the representation of inmates as dehumanised other and deserving of harsh treatment, coupled with an avoidance of abolitionist narratives in death row films reaffirms the prison as the cornerstone of criminal justice sanctions. My analysis looks at English language prison films given a cinematic release between 1st January 1995 and 31st December 2005. This amounts to 28 films which are listed at the end.

1. EXPLOTING VIOLENCE, AVOIDING CONDEMNATION

Many of the films in the sample represent prison as a brutal, uncivilised place which punishes, degrades and humiliates. Potentially, such a construction of the penal system suggests a discourse of reform. Namely, an exploration of the futility and inhumanity of incarceration, made visible by such texts, presents an opportunity to raise the profile in public debate and mobilise opinion towards reform and abolition of the prison industrial complex.

However, a closer reading of the sample reveals not only a reluctance to challenge the existing penal system, but a scoptophilic treatment of violence, rape and death. Such acts are frequently presented in narratives across the sample, rarely framed within any considered or developed critique of prison. Instead, these elements offer are located within an exploitative agenda, in which vivid violence, rape and other sexual assaults are foregrounded. These are constructed in two principle ways, through pre-emptive talk and iconography; and in graphic displays.

PRE-EMPTIVE TALK, FEAR AND PRISON ICONOGRAPHY

In the sample analysed, prison is habitually and, crucially, immediately constructed within a discourse of violence and fear. The films define prison through its capacity for brutality and to instill terror. It is constructed in this way from the outset and, as I discuss later, rarely shifts or challenges this initial construction. Such a discourse is frequently built visually and aurally through the early scenes of prison. This often occurs via long shots of the prison façade accompanied by aggressive rap or rock music (Down Time, dir. Sean Wilson, 2001; A Letter From Death Row, dir. Marvin Baker & Bret Michaels 1998; Slam, 1998; Prison Song, dir. Darnel Martin, 2003) or the doom-laden orchestral score (Brokedown Palace or Just Cause, dir. Arne Glimcher, 1995). Alternatively, the viewer experiences the first steps inside the prison from the point of view of the newly-convicted inmate as they are processed through the system.

In The Mean Machine (dir. Barry Skolnick, 2001) for example, Danny Meehan, the film's protagonist, is shot walking towards the camera, along a corridor. When the scene cuts, the camera has switched behind him as he walks up the steps and into the main prison where he, and consequently the audience, is greeted by a cacophony of noise and abuse from other inmates shouting directly into the camera. This scene is very similar to the entrance into the main prison of newly convicted Slim in Down Time, and variations on this scene are to be found in Slam, Prison Song, A Letter From Death Row and Animal Factory. In the latter, the entry of new inmate Ron Decker to prison is again shot from his point of view, as the camera pans round the prison exercise yard, inmates are framed in close-up, mostly in vests, heavily tattooed, muscular and lifting weights, or prowling round the yard, staring. The correlation between prison and violence (as well as masculinity) is clearly expounded in these initial constructions of prison.

In other films in the sample, frequently those dealing with death row, the audience is positioned with, and as, the outsider: as a lawyer defending the convicted inmate (Just Cause, The Chamber (dir. James Foley, 1996), Last Dance (dir. Bruce Beresford, 1996)), a friend (Dead Man Walking (dir. Tim Robbins, 1996)) or a journalist (Life of David Gale (dir. Alan Parker, 2003)) but still within the fear/violence discourse. This is accomplished primarily through a focus on security, threat and danger. In all these texts, the visitor is repeatedly seen passing through wire gates, steel doors, metal detectors and other scanning equipment. Aural cues of incarceration are prominent in these scenes: doors slam, buzzers sound, keys jangle, gates creak and footsteps of prison officers echo, all mixed with the foreboding drone of the film's soundtrack. In Just Cause, retired and visible uneasy lawyer Paul Armstrong is asked by a laughing prison guard 'This your first time, Mr Armstrong?' In The Life of David Gale, journalists Bitsey Bloom and Zack Stemmons are taken through a maze of gates, doors and corridors on their way to meet Gale. There are several close-ups of razor wire and a sign which reads "No Hostages Will Exit". Their (and our) guide to the prison then says: 'We have three concerns here - safety, safety and safety. The visitation area is entirely secure, we just ask that you don't touch the glass".
It is not only through these opening scenes that the discourse of prison is formed. Threat and fear are consistently communicated through talk. But like the opening prison scenes, this occurs pre-emptively through inmate exchanges around fears of being beaten or raped; while guards and governors are at pains to remind inmates of the dangers of life inside:

Every day someone gets shanked in here. Every day someone gets beaten up in here. We got predators in here, son. We got people who will cut your throat for nothing at all but a packet of cigarette. You mind your business in here, son - do you understand where you are?
(Prison guard to new inmate, Ray in Slam)

I run a prison full of murderers and rapists. It's my job to discipline them anyway I can. Most of these guys have broken every rule in the book. It's my job to teach them respect. People like you better pray to God that people like me doing my job while they're in there. Because one of these days these scumbags are going to be out on the streets and then you better pray you're not walking down the street - you or one of your self-righteous, liberal friends - or one of these good ol' boys decides he's gonna put a bullet in that pretty head of yours. (Warden Felcher to Prison Board visitor in A Letter From Death Row)

The dramatic and colloquial language borrowed from prison slang - "shanked" (stabbed) and the reduction of the prison population to "murderers and rapists" and "scumbags" serves to situate the prison firmly within a discourse where prison means constant threat of attacks and fear. These warnings to inmates also act as notifications to the audience of what they can expect to see during the film - explicit and graphic violence contextualised by nothing more than its location: a prison. This is concisely expressed in Prison Song, 'you're gonna have to fight - make no mistake about it - this is jail'.

Rape and sexual assault talk is also prevalent in the sample. In several films, new inmates are referred to as "fresh meat" (Life (dir. Ted Demme, 1999); Down Time, Prison Song). In Animal Factory, the older experienced Earl offers advice to new inmate Ron:

Young man - there are a lot of animals in here - sexual deviants, inverts who might try and pressure you....a young man looking the way you do without a great deal of penitentiary experience might find himself compromised: might find himself in need of a friend.

This advice is echoed by long-standing friend, Frank, to the soon-to-be incarcerated Monty in 25th Hour (dir. Spike Lee, 2002):

This is my advice to you - first figure out who's who. Find the man nobody's protecting and beat him until his eyes bleed. Let them think you're a little bit crazy but respectful too. Respectful of the right man - you're a good looking boy Monty - it won't be easy for you.....We do what we do to survive.

25th Hour is undoubtedly the clearest example of the pre-emptive talk of violence and sexual assault in the sample. The narrative traces the last 24 hours of freedom for Monty Brogan, a man about to begin a seven year sentence for drug dealing. One of the key narratives concerns Monty's anxiety over what awaits him when he reaches prison. Hours before he is due to begin his sentence, he confides his trepidation to Frank, and visualises his first night in prison:

The place is overcrowded - they got bunk beds lined up in the gymnasium to handle the overflow. I'm going in a room with 200 other guys.....So picture his. First night, lights out. The guards are moving out of the space, looking back over their shoulders laughing at me. You are miles from home. Door closes - boom: I'm on the floor; I've got some big guy's knee in my back. I'll give it a little go but they'll be too many of them. Somebody takes a pipe out from under a mattress, starts beating me in the face - not to hurt me, just to knock all my teeth out so I can give him head all out and they don't have to worry about me biting,

Without showing any of this, 25th Hour contributes to the discourse of prison constructed in previous cinematic narratives, where jail is synonymous with sexual assault and interpersonal violence.

These initial scenes, and in the case of 25th Hour the entire film, help to fix the meaning of imprisonment, to frame the discourse of incarceration as cruel and sadistic. However, while such scenes could form part of a critique of prison as a criminal justice sanction - the vindictive and pointlessness of custody - the dominant discourse remains entrenched in the violence itself rather than in denunciation of it.

Many of the 'tag lines' - the soundbites which appears on posters and in trailers further exemplify this: 'On The Inside The Rules Are Brutal And The Stakes Are High' (Animal Factory, dir. Steve Buscemi, 2000); 'Their Graduation Present Was A Trip To Paradise, But They Never Thought They Would Land In Hell' (Brokedown Palace, dir. Jonathan Kaplan, 1999; 'All in Line for a Slice of Devil Pie' (Slam, dir. Marc Levin, 1999).

GRAPHIC VIOLENCE

I do not wish to dwell on detailed accounts of the graphic violence portrayed in virtually all the sample, but its nature and treatment by the texts requires some exploration. I have suggested that the discourse of prison as violent and inhumane not only fixes the meaning of prison at an early stage, but importantly that it is rarely used to critique the role of penality in society. The persistent violence in Animal Factory, Down Time, Fortress II: Re-Entry (dir. Geoff Murphy, 1999), Mean Machine, Prison Song, Under Lock and Key (dir. Henri Charr, 1995) and Undisputed (dir. Walter Hill, 2002) reduces 'the reality of violence into spectacle' (Jarvis 2006: 159). Both the explicit nature of the violence, and its scoptophilic treatment by films in the sample are well illustrated by the first scenes of prison in Mean Machine. After three minutes depicting the arrest of ex-England football star Danny Meehan, the radio announces the news while Meehan is shot. Lit by a red light lying in a police cell:

Newsreader: "Meehan will serve his sentence at Longmarsh high security Prison"

cut to close up of violent fight between two inmates sat at a table, others cheering, then back to close up of Meehan in his cell

Newsreader: "Famous for its rehabilitation programme"

cut back to fight, then back to Meehan

Newsreader: "reformed characters"

cut back to fight and inmates exchanging money, all shown on a CCTV screen in a room where prison officers look on. Cut back to Meehan in cell

Newsreader: "and modern conditions"

Cut to bloodied face and vest of inmate

In addition to set piece brutality - sexual attacks in showers (American History X, Animal Factory, Undisputed and spoken of in The Hurricane (dir. Norman Jewison, 1999)); fights in the dining hall (Brokedown Palace, Fortress II: Re-Entry and Sleepers, for example) and exercise yard (Life, Prison Song, Slam) - violence is represented as casual and frequent. Stabbings, scaldings and slashings occur with such regularity that they become normalised, what Baumann has termed 'the production of moral indifference' (cited in Jarvis 2006: 159).

This indifference towards the brutality in, and indeed of, prison - the silence and absence of challenges to the very existence of prison within the discourse - is replaced, substituted and shrouded by incessant depictions of such violence. This construction of the penal estate is tied in with the second key component of the discourse of incarceration in the sample: the reinforcing of prison as an essential element of the criminal justice.

2. REINFORCING PRISON, SUPPORTING EXECUTION

OTHERING INMATES

The prison film narrative in the sample is centred round the inmate , usually one recently convicted. Prison is experienced through the eyes of this individual, such as their entry into the penal system discussed previously. Frequently, the new inmate is constructed sympathetically from the outset. This is achieved in one of three ways. Firstly, and most evidently through their innocence and consequent wrongful conviction (Under Lock and Key, A Letter From Death Row, Brokedown Palace, A Map of the World, The Hurricane). Secondly, where the inmate has committed the crime, the film offers mitigating circumstances such as a crime of passion in Undisputed and Tomorrow La Scala; or self defence / provocation in Prison Song and Chicago (dir. Rob Marshall, 2002). Thirdly, where there are no mitigating circumstances and the individual is guilty, the sentence appears unnecessarily harsh, often delivered by an inscrutable judge shot in close up. For example, Cindy Liggett is given the death penalty for aiding and abetting a botched robbery in Last Dance; and after stealing $5 from a post office and being sent to Alcatraz, Henry Young spends three years in solitary confinement after trying to escape in Murder In The First. The marginal nature of innocence, guilt and its underlying morality is further explored by 25th Hour in which the convicted Monty Brogan's two friends are revealed as a crooked Wall Street stockbroker and a guilty college teacher, seduced by one of his students. These events and revelations occur in the danger-red hue of a packed nightclub to the sounds of the hottest new talent DJ Dusk: the equivocal time between night and day, light and shade, good and evil.

This sympathetic portrayal of inmate protagonists once again offers the possibility for prison film narratives to explore the injustice and cruelty of incarceration. Through the eyes of an innocent, harshly treated woman or man, the penal system could be exposed. Although ostensibly this appears to be present in the discourse of prison constructed in the sample, it is achieved through a process of representing the rest of the prison population as dehumanised monsters and animals, and consequently as "other" (Greer and Jewkes 2005; Hall 1997). While the prison hero/ine is afforded character, emotional development and agency, the rump of the jail is mere cardboard cut-out and cliché. Consequently, prison is constructed as necessary, to keep these psychotic deviants caged and incapacitated. Despite its empathetic portrayal of, on occasion, several inmates, the meaning of prison is once again framed around danger and fear, thus underscoring the apparent necessity for prison's very existence.

Echoing the presence of violence in the sample discussed above, the othering of the inmate population occurs both explicitly and implicitly, and again, early in the exposition of the prison. This occurs in voice-over in Sleepers accompanying a panning shot of the exercise yard:

It was not a group of innocent boys at Wilkinson. Most, if not all, the inmates belonged there, and a number of them were riding out their second and third convictions. All were violent offenders. Few seemed sorry for what they had done. And as for rehabilitation - forget it.

In Tomorrow La Scala, prison officer Kevin stands in front of a metal door and addresses the theatre group who are visiting:

We're going to meet the lifers. These are an entirely different breed to the rest of the prison population. They're in here an average of 12 years, some as long as 20 years and all have committed pretty serious crimes. Point of paramount importance - no fraternising, be friendly but don't be their friend.

There are frequent references to, and reduction of the prison populations to "rapists", "murderers", "animals" and so on. Visually, there is an emphasis on physical form, strength and the potential for violence with inmates regularly depicted with shaved heads in tight vests, tattooed, pushing weights (Animal Factory, Down Time, Slam, Prison Song, Undisputed, American History X and A Letter From Death Row). These often wide, panning shots establish the prison population as an homogenous other. This is complemented by individual, superficial cameos of psychotic monsters, who are defined by the brutality of their crimes, such as The Monk in Mean Machine, Sullivan in Just Cause and John Toombes in Lucky Break. Con Air (dir. Simon West, 1997) offers a pertinent example of all of these elements. The protagonist, Cameron Poe, a highly decorated soldier who, having been convicted of manslaughter after protecting his wife in a fight, is put on a transport plane home with an array of long term inmates being transferred to a maximum security prison. In a scene lasting more than nine minutes, each inmate is shown in slow motion as they are escorted onto the plane accompanied by two helicopters and a phalanx of ten armed guards. For each one, the scene cuts to a CCTV screen with computer graphics detailing their crimes, sentence and life history, this is complemented by an explanation:

US Marshall Larkin: 'This one's done it all - kidnapping, robbery, murder, extortion"

Cut to overhead shot of guards. Cut to close up of bus door opening, cut to close up from ground upwards of Cyrus with helicopter in background.

US Marshall Larkin: 'His name is Cyrus Grissom, aka Cyrus The Virus - 39 years old, 25 of them spent in our institutions'

Cut to close up of his feet with chains in slow motion at ground level

US Marshall Larkin: 'But he bettered himself inside - earned two degrees including his Juris Doctorate. He also killed 11 fellow inmates, incited three riots and escaped twice. Likes to brag that he killed more men than cancer. Cyrus is a poster child for the criminally insane. He is a product of the system.'

This last comment, of prison being to blame for the dehumanising process, does offer an alternative reading of the construction of inmates in the discourse. It could be suggested that the portrayal of the prison population in the sample represents precisely the barbaric nature of prison, and thus this depiction of inmates offers a challenge to the existence of the penal estate. However, for such a discourse to exist, one would need to witness the progression of dehumanization, the mechanistic process of imprisonment which turns a free wo/man into a monster (Mason 2003; 2006b). This counter discourse, a reappropriation of meaning (Hall 1997) does occur in Animal Factory. As the name suggests, the film, written by an ex-inmate is concerned with this very process. New inmate Ron Decker is portrayed as increasingly corrupted by prison drawn into the violence and power structure between inmates, until he eventually escapes. Even if one accepts that the backdrop of superficial characterisation and othering of the prison population is used to reinforce Ron's demise - that all inmates have become like they are because of the system - this counter-strategy is conspicuous by its absence the rest of the sample.

The othering of inmates, through fixing them to their crimes, appearance and difference to the prison hero/ine leads to the construction of a pro-prison discourse. With a prison population constructed as predominantly highly dangerous, morally bereft and beyond redemption, the prison becomes the only institution capable of offering a solution. Further, the representation of the heroic, often innocent inmate appears to offer the possibility of a reformist or abolitionist discourse, but like the depiction of violence, this opportunity is used for the reverse. That process is also present in the final element of the discourse I wish to discuss, the support for the death penalty.

SUPPORTING THE DEATH PENALTY

The sample analysed contained six films set on death row and although space precludes any detailed exploration of this element of the discourse, I want to offer some brief points about the representation of execution in these films and how this too is located within a discourse of imprisonment which ultimately supports the institutions of prison and the death penalty. Further, that the discourse here is similarly double-edged to that concerning violence and the representation of inmates. Namely, that while it posits abolition of state killing, its construction of meaning centres around the justification of it.

The discourse analysis of these particular films supports Sarat's argument, that despite the attempt to demonstrate that the death penalty is wrong, the discourse in these films is not one of abolition, nor does it challenge its rationale within the criminal justice system (Sarat 2002). This occurs in two ways in these films. The first is to limit the exploration of the use of the death penalty to whether or not the protagonist is deserving of it. This is explored either through a did-they-didn't-they commit the crime (The Chamber, Dead Man Walking, The Green Mile, The Life of David Gale) or an examination of what Sarat calls 'the calculus of desert (sic)' (Sarat 2002: 213), namely whether the death penalty is the appropriate penalty for the crime committed (Last Dance, A Letter From Death Row). Thus, what appears to be a discursive challenge to state killing, through a sympathetic portrayal of the condemned, is fundamentally a narrow representation which avoids broader questions about the use of executions in contemporary societies. Furthermore, the death penalty is used in the majority of these films to enable the redemption of the protagonist: John Coffey's messianic sacrifice in The Green Mile; David Gale's death to prove the fallibility of the justice system in The Life of David Gale; the redemption of Matthew Poncelet, Sam Cayhall and Arlen Bitterbuck in Dead Man Walking, The Chamber and The Green Mile, respectively.

Secondly, and in contrast with the incessant violence of the other prison films, the executions are fixed at a denotative level. Thus the scenes immediately before the moment of death are concerned with process, administration and system. In echoing Sarat's memorable phrase, 'fetishizing the technology of death' (Sarat 2002: 237), straps, buckles and probes are attached, death warrants are read out and switches are flicked. The stark white rooms in The Chamber, Dead Man Walking, Last Dance and The Life of David Gale communicate the sterile, clinical nature of state executions. The absence of the horror of an execution is replaced by ritual, procedure and bureaucracy which once again, locates the discourse of the death penalty within a framework of legitimacy and necessity.

Discussion

I began by discussing the increased use of prison as a penal sanction in the UK and how many have seen the punitive turn in criminal justice in recent years as a populist measure. Mathiesen is right to highlight the important role the media plays in this process and it is surprising that so little analysis has been undertaken given the invisibility of prison, the consequent reliance on the media for information about it (Levenson 2001; Mason 2003) and the complex meshing between political and media culture and in particular crime and punishment. The US presidential election defeat of Michael Dukakis to George Bush in 1988, for example, has consistently been linked to the case of William Horton, an inmate serving life imprisonment for murder in Massachusetts, where Dukakis was State Governor (Estrich 1998; Jamieson 1992; Loader 2005; Newburn and Jones 2005). Horton was released for a weekend visit during which he stabbed a man and raped the man's girlfriend. Bush's campaign team launched a negative television campaign against Dukakis in two adverts. The first, contrasting Dukakis' support for the furloughing of inmates with Bush's support for the death penalty; the other suggesting that Dukakis offered a revolving door prison policy, fuelling public fears about crime and their perception of a liberal prison policy.

In the last two British elections, the Conservatives ran similar campaigns. In 2001, their election broadcast portrayed inmates being let out of jail early and committing crimes and suggested this had led to at least two rapes (BBC Online, 15th May 2001) and in 2005 they ran a poster campaign with the slogan 'How would you feel if a bloke on early release attacked your daughter? Are you thinking what we're thinking?' (Mason 2006a).

The discourse analysis of prison films over the last ten years reveals several discursive practices which bolster the support for prison, and arguably its increased use. The graphic and frequent violence and sexual assaults depicted and/or spoken about serve to fix the meaning of imprisonment to such brutality. However, rather than providing a condemnation of the penal system, the brutality remains scoptophilically represented, revelling in the stabbings, rapes and beatings between, and of, inmates. Inmate violence is part of a representational practice which constructs the prison population as inhuman other. Where the inmate hero/ine is depicted sympathetically through their innocence or harsh treatment, this is played out against a backdrop of a prison populated by psychotic, violent and brutal inmates. Such a construction contributes to a cinematic discourse representing prison as the only effective means of incapacitation and punishment. Finally and similarly, films which appear to offer a challenge to the death penalty side step the abolitionist argument and choose instead to concentration upon the suitability of the punishment and its technological aspects, framed within a discourse of bureaucracy.

While this analysis does not attempt to draw any firm conclusions about how such a cinematic discourse of prison may directly impact upon public opinion, it suggests that cultural constructions of prison are an important component of in populist punitiveness of current criminal justice policy. Prison films, as discursive practices, continue to bolster the existence of the prison industrial complex and remain silent on questions of reform and/or abolition of prison. Meanwhile, administrations such as those in the UK and the US remain wedded to an unjust, cruel, inefficient and dysfunctional penal system and consider punitiveness useful political capital.

References

Blair, T. (1993) 'Why Crime Is A Socialist Issue ', New Statesman & Society 29: 27-28.

Christie, N. (2000) Crime Control as Industry: Towards Gulags, Western Style? London: Routledge.

Dyer, J. (2000) The Perpetual Prisoner Machine: How America Profits from Crime, Boulder, Cl.: Westview Press.

Estrich, S. (1998) Getting Away With Murder: How Politics is Destroying the Criminal Justice System. Cambridge: MA: Harvard University Press.

Garland, D. (2001) The Culture of Control. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Greer, C., & Jewkes, Y. (2005) 'Extremes of Otherness: Media Images of Social Exclusion ', Social Justice 32: 20-31.

Hall, S. (1997) 'The Spectacle of the Other', in S. Hall (ed.), Representation: Cultural Representation and Signifying Practices. London: Sage.

Hutton, N. (2005) 'Beyond Populist Punitiveness?' Punishment and Society 7: 243-258.

Jacobson, M. (2005) Downsizing Prisons: How to Reduce Crime and End Mass Incarceration. New York: New York University Press.

Jamieson, K. H. (1992) Dirty Politics: Deception, Distraction and Democracy. New York: Oxford University Press.

Jarvis, B. (2006) 'The Violence of Images: Inside the Prison TV Drama Oz', in P. Mason (ed.), Captured By The Media: Prison Discourse in Popular Culture. Cullompton: Willan Publishing.

Johnstone, G. (2000) 'Penal Policy Making: Elitist, Populist or Participatory', Punishment and Society 2: 161-180.

Levenson, J. (2001) 'Inside Information: Prisons and the Media', Criminal Justice Matters: 14-15.

Loader, I. (2005) 'The Affects of Punishment: Emotions, Democracy and Penal Politics', Criminal Justice Matters 60: 12-13.

Mason, P. (2003) 'The Screen Machine: Cinematic Representations of Prisons', in P. Mason (ed.), Criminal Visions: Media Representations of Crime and Justice. Cullompton: Willan Publishing.

- (2006a) 'Turn On, Tune In, Slop Out', in P. Mason (ed.), Captured By The Media: Prison Discourse in Popular Culture. Cullompton: Willan Publishing.

- (2006b) 'Hollywood's Prison Film: Towards a Discursive Regime of Imprisonment', in T. Serassis, H. Kania & H.-J. Albrecht (eds.), Images of Crime III: Representations of Crime in Politics, Society, Science, the Arts and the Media. Freiburg: Max Planck Institute.

Mathiesen, T. (2000) Prisons on Trial. Winchester: Waterside Press.

- (2001) 'Television, Public Space and Prison Population: A Commentary on Mauer and Simon', Punishment and Society 3: 35-42.

- (2003) Contemporary Penal Policy - A Study in Moral Panics, European Committee on Crime Problems: 22nd Criminological Research Conference. Strasbourg.

Newburn, T., & Jones, T. (2005) 'Symbolic Politics and Penal Populism: The Long Shadow of Willie Horton', Crime Media Culture 1: 72-87.

Parenti, C. (1999) Lockdown America and the Rise of America's Prison Population. New York: Verso.

Pratt, J. (2000) 'Emotive and Ostentatious Punishment: Its Decline and Resurgence in Modern Society', Punishment and Society 2: 417-439.

Roberts, J., Stalans, L., Indermaur, D., & Hough, M. (2002) Penal Populism and Public Opinion. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Ryan, M. (2006) 'Red Tops, Populists and the Irresistible Rise of the Public Voice', in P. Mason (ed.), Captured By The Media: Prison Discourse in Popular Culture. Cullompton: Willan Publishing.

Sarat, A. (2002) When the State Kills: Capital Punishment and the American Condition. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Prison Reform Trust. (2005) Bromley Briefings: Prison Factfile, October 2005 London: Prison Reform Trust

Wacquant, L. (2005) 'The Great Penal Leap Backward: Incarceration in America From Nixon to Clinton', in J. Pratt, D. Brown, M. Brown, S. Hallsworth & W. Morrison (eds.), The New Punitiveness: Trends, Theories and Perspectives. Cullompton: Willan Publishing.

- (2006) Deadly Symbiosis: The Rise of Neoliberal Penalty. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Notes

1. The one exception in the sample was The Green Mile (dir. Frank Darabont, 1999) in which the central character is Paul Edgecomb, a head prison guard on death row.

2. There is a graphic death in The Green Mile, where a deliberately botched procedure leads to the condemned Eduard Delacroix burning to death in the electric chair. However, Sarat has suggested that this merely suggests that 'there is nothing that decent people should find offensive or gruesome about a "normal" execution' (Sarat 2002: 239).

Film List

Just Cause (1995, dir. Arne Glimcher)

Murder in the First (1995, dir. Marc Rocco)

Under Lock And Key (1995, dir. Henri Charr)

The Chamber (1996, dir. James Foley)

Dead Man Walking (1996, dir. Tim Robbins)

Last Dance (1996, dir. Bruce Beresford)

Sleepers (1996, dir. Barry Levinson)

Con Air (1997, dir. Simon West)

American History X (1998, dir. Tony Kaye)

A Letter From Death Row (1998, dir. Marvin Baker & Bret Michaels)

Slam (1998, Marc Levin)

Brokedown Palace (1999, dir. Jonathan Kaplan)

Fortress 2 (1999, Geoff Murphy)

The Green Mile (1999 , dir. Frank Darabont)

The Hurricane (1999, dir. Norman Jewison)

Life (1999, dir. Ted Demme)

A Map of the World (1999, dir. Scott Elliott)

Animal Factory (2000, dir. Steve Buscemi)

Down Time (2001, dir. Sean Wilson)

Lucky Break (2001, dir. Peter Cattaneo)

Mean Machine (2001, dir. Barry Skolnick)

Prison Song (2001, dir. Darnell Martin)

The 25th Hour (2002, dir. Spike Lee)

Chicago (2002, dir. Rob Marshall)

Tomorrow La Scala! (2002, dir. Francesca Joseph)

Undisputed (2002, Walter Hill)

The Life of David Gale (2003, dir. Alan Parker)

The Longest Yard (2005, dir. Peter Segal)

From the Inside - Reception

2010-12-30T17:04:00.000Z

These quotes from former prisoners were originally published on the No More Prison Website

"I had been in institutions all my life and I knew that for self-survival, it paid to be deferential. Peter was new to the whole regime and held his head up high, nonchalantly acknowledging the officer's commands. His resistance was not to last long.

'Oi, you, Paki! You're in detention now,' screamed one of the screws and whacked him around the ear. Another grabbed him by the collar and threw him to the ground. The other screws closed in and began laying into the poor bastard, who was only a fragile lad. At the same time, they shouted obscenities and racist names at him.......

Peter was probably thinking that this was a tough way to start detention but, in fact, the reception ritual had barely started. We were bundled from one room to another, all the time being told what little scumbags we were and how we were going to be sorted out. In one room I was told to look at a poster of the Firearms Act on the wall. A screw told me to look at it more closely so I leaned nearer the wall.

'Even closer' he ordered, so I pushed my face an inch away from the wall. I'd gone totally boz-eyed and couldn't read a thing but pretended to, all the same. Suddenly, he punched the back of my head, smashing it against the wall and busting my nose. Blood was pouring everywhere and he just looked at me and laughed"

Frank Cook (1998) Hard Cell Page19/20

"Well it was nothing I had ever expected, I didn't know anything about prison. I had never read anything about prison. I was sitting there in total amazement, watching this happen to me. I wasn't actually participating in it. It was total isolation from it. I was in shock, sitting in a room with chairs, in dressing gowns, so called, with your clothes folded up beside you, with women who appeared to know each other and didn't know you."

Judith cited in Mary Eaton, (1993) Women after Prison, Page 23

"I put on this act that I was hard, prison was nothing to me, I wasn't scared and I was going to get through. I went to prison in one of the little cubicle vans, like a van but inside its got lots of cubicles. You were locked in. You sit there in a cage until you get to the prison and file out. Although I'd pulled myself together to a certain extent, it was like a dream, it wasn't like it was really happening, it was like I was taking precautions in case it really was happening. I was chatting away with the other girls like it was a normal thing, an everyday thing to go to prison. And when we were going through reception we had to take all our clothes off and do a twirl in front of the officers. I'd never experienced anything like that before in my life - absolutely stripped naked with nothing, nothing at all, not a ring, nothing. And you had to stick your arms out and twirl. You do it because there's all these people in uniform there and you're frightened that they'll pounce on you if you don't and they probably would if you didn't anyway. I think that woke me up a little bit, after that I was really frightened."

Cara cited in Mary Eaton, (1993) Women after Prison, Page 24

"Reception! A word that can conjure up a variety of functions. The wedding celebration; the formal party; the ovation that may greet the appearance of any public figure. The average person would never connect it with prison. To me, now, it can never mean anything else. Even those who have been inside for ten years or more the first hours of imprisonment are as indelibly printed on their minds as though they had happened only the day before."

Joan Henry (1954) Who lie in Gaol Page 17

"They shone a torch down my gob, made me strip naked, checked my hair for lice and handed me a prison uniform"

Ricky Tomlinson (2003) Ricky Page 134

"the prison officer at reception checked and logged my belongings......I had the first of many strip-searches to come. This was a terror for me. I thought they would poke around inside my private orifices. To my enormous relief they did not. I got looked up and down and turned around, but was allowed to keep the top or bottom half of my body covered at any one time - an embarrassment nonetheless but a lot better than I had feared.

Then I got locked in a room with six fellow prisoners being booked in with me. Five of them were heroin users and the sixth was on remand for stabbing her violent boyfriend when they had both been drunk."

Ruth Wyner (2003) From the inside Page 17

Dear Santa

2010-12-24T09:50:00.001Z

This was originally published on the No More Prison Website in December 2007

By Alison Henderson

Dedicated to Sandra currently residing in HMP Styal.

Dear Santa,

Me and Mum would always write

dear Santa Claus a note,

but this year Mum won't be around

so this is what I wrote:

Dear Santa if I had one wish

to make all on my own,

it would be to release my Mum

and let her please come home.

Grandma makes the Christmas roast

with lots of food to eat,

but this year in the dining room

there'll be an empty seat.

I know it's far too much to ask

so this year there's no wish,

but Santa could I ask you to

deliver my Mum this.................

Trust me Mum you will get through

don't cry or shed a tear,

we'll celebrate our Christmas day

when you come home next year.

You told us to enjoy ourselves

but I can't promise that,

I'll miss you telling Christmas jokes

wearing your party hat.

I love you Mum with all my heart

be strong and please don't cry,

Christmas day will come and go

and time will soon fly by.

I know you made a big mistake

but what is done is done,

prison's stole our Christmas but....

they'll never steal my Mum.

To Mum With Love.

Abolition and Crime Control - Willem De Haan

2010-12-23T16:36:00.002Z

Abolition and Crime Control

by Willem De Haan

An abolitionist perspective on crime control might seem like a contradiction in terms not unlike a peace research approach to waging a war. Abolitionism is based on the moral conviction that social life should not and, in tact, cannot he regulated effectively by criminal law and that, therefore, the role of the criminal justice system should be drastically reduced while other ways of dealing with problematic situations, behaviours and events are being developed and put into practice. Abolitionists regard crime primarily as the result of the social order and are convinced that punishment is not the appropriate reaction. Instead a minimum of coercion and interference with the personal lives of those involved and a maximum amount of care and sci vice for all members of society is advocated.

The term 'abolitionism' stands for a social movement, a theoretical perspective and a political strategy. As a social movement committed to the abolition of the prison or even the entire penal system, abolitionism originated in campaigns for prisoners' rights and penal reform. Subsequently, it developed into a critical theory and praxis concerning crime, punishment and penal reform. As a theoretical perspective, abolitionism takes on the two-fold task of providing a radical critique of the criminal justice system while showing that there are other, more rational ways of dealing with crime. As a political strategy, abolitionism is based on an analysis of penal reform and restricted to negative reforms, such as abolishing parts of the prison system, rather than providing concrete alternatives.

The abolitionist perspective will be discussed along the lines of this distinction. 1irt. we will deal with abolitionism as a penal reform movement, then as a theoretical perspective on crime and punishment and, more specifically, the prison. et. a conceptualisation of the notions of crime and punishment will be offered in the form of the concept of redress. At the same time, strategies for penal reform will be examined. Finally, the implications of the abolitionist perspective for crime control will be discussed. In conclusion, it will be argued that what is needed is a wide variety of social responses rather than a uniform state reaction to the problem of crime. In policy terms it is claimed that social policy instead of crime policy is needed in dealing with the social problems and conflicts that are currently singled out as the problem of crime.

ABOLITIONISM AS A SOCIAL MOVEMENT

Abolitionism emerged as an anti-prison movement when, at the end of the 1960s, a destructuring impulse took hold of thinking about the social control of deviance and crime among other areas (Cohen, 1985). In Western Europe, anti-prison groups aiming at prison abolition were founded in Sweden and Denmark (1967) Finland and Norway (I968), (Great Britain (1970), France (1970), and the Netherlands (1971). Their main objective was to soften the suffering which society inflicts on its prisoners. This implied a change in general thinking concerning punishment, humanization of the various forms of imprisonment in the short run and, m the long rim, the replacement of the prison system by more adequate and up-to-date measures of crime control.

It has been suggested that abolitionism typically emerged in small countries or countries with little crime and 'would never have been "invented" in a count r like the United States of America with its enormous crime rate, violence, ami criminal justice apparatus' (Scheerer, 1986: 18). However, in Canada and the United States family members of (ex-)convicts, church groups and individuals were also engaged in prisoners' support work and actively struggling for prison reform. More specifically, these prison abolitionists in the United States considered their struggle for abolition of prisons to be a historical mission, a continuation and fulfilment of the struggle against slavery waged by their forebears. Imprisonment is seen as a form of blasphemy, as morally objectionable and indefensible and, therefore, to be abolished (Morris, 1976: II). To this aim, a long-term strategy in the form of a three-step 'attrition model' is proposed, consisting of a total tree/e on the planning and building of prisons, excarceration of certain categories of lawbreakers by diverting them from the prison system and decarceration, or the release of as many inmates as possible.

Originating in prison reform movements in the 1960s and 1970s in both Western Europe and North America, abolitionism developed as a new paradigm in (critical) criminology and as an alternative approach to crime control. As academic involvement increased and abolitionism became a theoretical perspective, its focus widened from the prison system to the penal system, thereby engaging in critical analyses of penal discourse and, in particular, the concepts of crime and punishment, penal practices, and the penal or criminal justice system.
ABOLITIONISM AS A THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVE

As a theoretical perspective abolitionism has a negative and a positive sale. Negatively, abolitionism is deeply rooted in a criticism of the criminal justice system and its 'prison solution' to the problem of crime. Positively, on the basis of this criticism an alternative approach to crime and punishment is offered both in theory and in practice. Thus, the abolitionist approach is essentially reflexive and (de)constructivist. We will first take a look at the negative side of abolitionism which will be followed by a brief expose of its positive side.

From the abolitionist point of view, the criminal justice system's claim to protect people from being victimized by preventing and controlling crime, seems grossly exaggerated. Moreover, the notion of controlling crime by penal intervention is ethically problematic as people are used for the purpose of 'deterrence', by demonstrating power and domination. Punishment is seen as a self-reproducing form of violence. The penal practice of blaming people for their supposed intentions (for being bad and then punishing and degrading them accordingly) is dangerous because the social conditions for recidivism are thus reproduced. Morally degrading and segregating people is especially risky when the logic of exclusion is reinforced along the lines of differences in sex, race, class, culture or religion.

For the abolitionist, current crime policies are irrational in their assumptions that: crime is caused by individuals who for some reason go wrong; that crime is a problem for the state and its criminal justice system to control; and that criminal law and punishment or treatment of individual wrongdoers are appropriate means of crime control (Steinert, 1986). Crime control is based on the fallacy of taking pars pro toto or, as Wilkins (I984) has put it, crime control policy is typically made by reference to the dramatic incident, thereby assuming that all that is necessary is to get the micro-model right in order for the macro-model to follow without further ado. According to Wilkins, we must consider nor only the specific criminal act but also the environment in which it is embedded. It could be added that the same argument holds for punishment and, more specifically, for imprisonment as an alleged solution to the problem of crime.

ABOLITIONISM ABOUT PRISON

For abolitionists, the United States is a prime example of a country suffering from the consequences of a punitive obsession. In the course of a 'get tough' policy of crime control, increasing numbers of people are being sent to prison for longer periods of time. As a result, the prison population in the United States has increased dramatically from roughly 350,000 in the 1970s to 850,000 at the end of the 1980s. Almost 80 per cent of the recent increase in prison admissions is accounted for by drugs offenders. By September 1988 about 44 per cent of all federal prisoners were incarcerated for drug law violations. According to the 1989 National Council of Crime and Delinquency Prison Population Forecast the impact of the 'war on drugs' will be yet another increase of the prison population 1989-1994 by over 68 per cent to a total of 1,1 53,000 prisoners among whom people of colour will remain strongly over-represented. With an incarceration rate of 440 prisoners per 100,000 population, the United States will more than consolidate its top rank position in the world. Even with its incarceration rate increasing from about 30 in 1980 to about 50 'n the mid-1990s, the Netherlands will remain at the bottom end of the scale. At the same time, the crime problem in the Netherlands can hardly be considered worse than in the United States.

As in the United States, 'street crime' is also considered a major social problem in the Netherlands. In fact, the first International Crime Survey (van Dijk et al., 1990) showed that overall victimization rates 1983-1988 in the United States and the Netherlands were higher than in any other country in the survey. However, there were considerable differences both in the seriousness of the crime problem and the effectiveness of its control. Whereas overall victimisation rates in the Netherlands and the United States were similarly high, in the Dutch case this was strongly influenced by the extraordinarily high prevalence of bicycle theft, whereas victimisation rates for homicide, robbery and (sexual) assault were particularly high in the United States.

If anything, this proves that the relationship between crime and crime control by imprisonment is much more complex than proponents of the prison solution seem to assume. In terms of protection the 'get tough' approach to crime control has little to offer, and the 'war on drugs' can never be won but has serious repercussions.

Taken together, the prison system is counter-productive, difficult to control, and itself a major social problem. Therefore, abolitionists have given up entirely on the idea that the criminal justice system has anything to offer m terms of protection. They are also pessimistic about the criminal law's potential for conflict resolution. It is felt that the present penal system is making things worse, not better.

In the course of the 'war against drugs' which is currently being waged in the United States and many other countries around the world, the use ol ethically problematic techniques for apprehending suspects is being condoned if not required. As a result various forms of organisational complicity undermine the already waning legitimacy of the criminal justice system even further. According to Roshier (1989), the 'war against drugs' must be seen as a forced attempt to reach efficiency in the held of law enforcement or, at least, the appearance of it by using purely technical or even military means of surveillance and policing. It is the criminal justice system that defines, selects, documents and disposes of crime. As a result, legal definitions of suspicion, criminal offence etc., are being stretched. Thus, the criminal justice system itself increasingly specifies both the nature of the crime problem and what is to be done about it (Roshier, I989: I28).

Thus, the criminal justice system is part of the crime problem rather than its solution. Not only does it tail to work in terms of its own stated goals and not only are the negative consequences of the infliction of suffering by the state threatening to get out of hand but, more importantly, it is based on a fundamentally flawed way of understanding. Therefore, there is no point in trying to make the criminal justice system more effective or more just. The abolitionist critique of the criminal justice system and its approach to crime control may be summarised by saying that it this is the solution, what is the problem? Or, put differently, crime as a social problem and object of social analysis needs to be rethought.

ABOLITIONISM ABOUT 'CRIME'

The current approach to crime control, the definition of crime and the justification of punishment is 'systemic', that is, based on an instrumentalist point of view and confined within the limits of the criminal justice system. From an abolitionist point of view, these issues require a fundamental reconceptualization in a broader social context. This is where the alternative, positive side of abolitionism starts from. Abolitionists argue that there is no such thing as 'crime'. In fact, 'the very form of criminal law, with its conception of "crime" (not just the contents of what is at a given time and place defined into that category, but the category itself) and the ideas on what is to be done about it, are historical "inventions'" (Steinert, ll'S6: 26).

'Crime' is a social construction, to be analysed as a myth of everyday life (Hess, 1986). As a myth, crime serves to maintain political power relations and lends legitimacy to the expansion of the crime control apparatus and the intensification of surveillance and control. It justifies inequality and relative deprivation. Public attention is distracted from more serious problems and injustices. Thus, the bigger the social problems are, the greater the need for the crime myth (Hess, 1986: 24-5).

However, not only should the concept of crime be discarded (Hulsman, 1986), but we need to get rid of the theories of crime as well. As Quensel (1987) has pointed out, theories about 'crime' acquire their plausibility largely by virtue of their building on and, at the same time, reinforcing an already-present 'deep structure'. One element of this 'deep structure' is the notion that 'crime' is inherently dangerous and wicked; another is that crime control is a 'value-inspired' call for action against that evil (p. 129).

Abolitionists argue that the crucial problem is not explaining but rather understanding crime as a social event. Thus, what we need is not a better theory of crime, hut a more powerful critique of crime. This is not to deny that there are all sorts of unfortunate events, more or less serious troubles or conflicts which can result in suffering, harm, or damage to a greater or lesser degree. These troubles are to he taken seriously, of course, but not as 'crimes' and, in any case, they should not be dealt with by means of criminal law. When we fully appreciate the complexity of a 'crime' as a socially constructed phenomenon any simplified reaction to crime in the form of punishment becomes problematic.

Spector (1981) has argued that when a person offends, disturbs, or injures other people, various forms of social disapproval exist to remedy the situation. The matter may be treated as a disease, a sin, or, indeed, as a crime. However, other responses are also feasible, like considering the case as a private conflict between the offender and the victim or defining the situation in an administrative way and responding, for example by denial of a licence, permit, benefit or compensation. Our images, language, categories, knowledge, beliefs and fears of troublemakers are subject to constant changes. Nevertheless, crime continues to occupy a central place in our thinking about troublesome people ( I ^S I: I S4). Spector suggests that, perhaps, 'we pay too much attention to crime because the disciplines that study trouble and disapprove - sociology and criminology - were born precisely in the era when crime was at its zenith? (Quenscl, 1987; Spector, 1981).

The concept of 'crime' figures prominently in common sense and has definite effects on it. By focusing public attention on a definite class of events, these 'crimes' can then be almost automatically seen as meriting punitive control. 'Punishment' is thereby regarded as the obvious and proper reaction to 'crime'.

ABOLITIONISM ABOUT PUNISHMENT

Abolitionists do not share the current belief in the criminal law's capacity for crime control. They radically deny the utility of punishment and claim that there can be no valid justification for it, particularly since other options are available for law enforcement. They discard criminal justice as an absurd idea. It is ridiculous to claim that one pain can or, indeed, ought to be compensated by another state-inflicted one. According to them, the 'prison solution' affects the moral quality of life in society at large. Therefore, the criminal justice perspective needs to be replaced by an orientation towards all avoidance of harm and pain (Steinert, 1986: 25). Christie (1982), particularly, has attacked the traditional justifications for punishment. He criticizes deterrence theory for its sloppy definitions of concepts, its immunity to challenge, and for the fact that it gives the routine process of punishment a false legitimacy in an epoch where the infliction of pain might otherwise have appeared problematic. The neo-classicism of the justice model is also criticized: punishment is justified and objectified, the criminal is blamed, the victim is ignored, a broad conception of justice is lacking, and a 'hidden message' is transmitted which denies legitimacy to a whole series of alternatives which should, in fact, be taken into consideration. However, Christie not only criticizes the 'supposed justifications' for punishment, but also claims a decidedly moral position with regard to punishment, which is the intentional infliction of pain which he calls 'moral rigorism'. He deliberately co-opts the terms 'moralism' and 'rigorism' associated primarily with protagonists of 'law and order' and more severe penal sanctions. His 'rigorist' position, however, is that there is no reason to believe that the recent level of pain infliction is the right or natural one and that there is no other defensible position than to strive for a reduction of man-inflicted pain on earth. Since punishment is defined as pain, limiting pain means an automatic reduction of punishment.

More recently, Christie and Mathiesen have both suggested that the expansion of the prison system involves general ethical and political questions such as what could be the effects of all the punishments taken together? What would constitute an acceptable level of punishment in society? What would be the right prison population within a country? 1 low should we treat fellow human beings? And. last but not least, how do we want to meet the crime problem (Christie, 1986; Mathiesen, 1986)?

However, in common-sense and legal discourse alike, 'crime' and 'punishment' continue to be seen 'as independent species - without reference to their sameness or how continuity of both depends on the character ot dominating institutions' (Kennedy, 1974: 107). It should be kept in mind, however, that crime comprises but one of several kinds of all norm violations, that punishment is but one of many kinds of reprisals against such violations, that criteria for separating them refer to phenomena external to actual behaviours classed by legal procedure as crime versus punishment, and that even within the criminal law itself, the criteria by which crime is identified procedural!)- apply with equal validity to punishment (Kennedy. I974: 108).

Criminology needs to rid itself of those theories of punishment which assume there are universal qualities in forms of punishment or assume a straightforward connection between crime and punishment. Given the perseverance of this conventional notion of 'punishment' as essentially a 'good' against an 'evil', any effort at changing common-sense notions of 'crime' and 'crime control' requires a reconceptualization of both concepts: 'crime' and 'punishment'.

REDRESS

We need to concern ourselves with the interrelationship and combined effects of crime and punishment. Crime and punishment are closely related with 'social negativity' (Baratta, 1986), destructive developments within contemporary society, in particular, as they affect its already most vulnerable members. In order to formulate a convincing politics of penal reform, crime and punishment should not be seen as action and reaction, but as spiralling cycles of harm (Pepinsky, 1986).

Elsewhere, I have introduced the concept of 'redress' as an alternative to both the concepts of 'punishment' and 'crime' (de Haan, 1990). This seemingly 'obsolete' concept carries an elaborate set of different meanings. The Concise Oxford Dictionary offers a wide variety of meanings for 'redress': for instance, to put right or in good order again, to remedy or remove trouble of any kind, to set right, repair, rectify something suffered or complained of like a wrong, to correct, amend, reform or do away with a bad or faulty state of things, to repair an action, to atone a misdeed or offence, to save, deliver from misery, to restore or bring back a person to a proper state, to happiness or prosperity, to the right course, to set a person right by obtaining or (more rarely) giving satisfaction or compensation for the wrong or loss sustained, teaching, instructing and redressing the erroneous by reason (Sixth Edition. 1976: 937).

To claim redress is merely to assert that an undesirable event has taken place and that something needs to be done about it. It carries no implications concerning what sort of reaction would be appropriate; nor does it define reflexively the nature of the initial event. Since claiming redress invites an open discussion about how an unfortunate event should be viewed and what the appropriate response ought to be, it can be viewed as a rational response par excellence. It puts forth the claim for a procedure rather than for a specific result. Punitive claims already implied in defining an event as a 'crime' are opened up to rational debate. Thus, to advocate 'redress' is to call for 'real dialogue' (Christie, 1982). Christie has suggested that social systems be constructed in ways that 'crimes' are more easily seen as expressions of conflicting interests, therein- becoming a starting-point for a 'real dialogue' (1982: 11).

The conceptual innovation suggested here offers a perspective for a politics of redress, aimed at the construction and implementation of procedures along the lines of an ethic of practical discourse. As we have seen, the handling of normative conflicts by rational discourse presupposes other procedures than the present criminal ones. In order to increase chances for participation for those involved, procedures based on the rules and preconditions of rational discourse would, therefore, need to be established outside the realm of criminal law; that is in civil law or even in the life world itself. Instead of the panacea which the criminal justice system pretends to provide for problems of crime control, abolitionism seeks to remedy social problems, conflicts, or troubles within the context of the real world, taking seriously the experiences of those directly involved and taking into account too the diversity which is inherent [in] the social world. The aim of a politics of redress would be to 'arrange it so that the conflict settling mechanisms themselves, through their organization reflect the type of society we should like to see reflected and help this type of society come into being' (Christie, 1982: 1 13). Social problems °r conflicts might be absorbed in order to use them as valuable aids to the social integration of real life and the prevention of social harm.

Abolitionism assumes that social problems or conflicts are unavoidable as they are inherent to social life as such. Therefore, they will have to be dealt with in one way or another. Rather than delegating them to professional specialists, however, they should be dealt with under conditions of mutuality and solidarity. These very conditions will have to be created by social and political action.

The urgent question that remains, of course, is how this might be done. To begin with, no single solution to the problem should be expected. Taking into account the diversity of relevant social phenomena requires the development of a wide variety of forms of social regulation which are not located in or defined by the state but operate (semi-)autonomously as alternative, progressive and emancipatory forms of dispute settlement and conflict resolution.

In reaction to the deeply felt dissatisfaction with the present penal system and, more generally, with the legal system, we see an increasing interest in 'autonomous' forms of conflict resolution and dispute settlement. Other "styles of social control' (Black, 1976: 4-5) are seen as attractive, promising to provide the parties involved with more chances for participation in settling a dispute or problem. The aim is compensation rather than retaliation; reconciliation rather than blame allocation. To this end, the criminal justice system needs to be decentralised and neighbourhood courts established as a complement or substitute.

The development of alternative procedures for conflict resolution and dispute settlement faces some rather ticklish questions which have proved intractable in current debates, questions concerning voluntarism versus determinism, 'accountability', 'responsibility' and 'guilt', that is, the moral evaluation of behaviour, the fair allocation of blame and the proper dissemination ot consequences. Emphasis on participatory processes of definition or the contcxtuality of conflicts may be welcome, but it can also lead to problematic outcomes. Among the wide variety of reactions the notion of redress entails there might be sanctions which need to be subjected to legal principles and restraints. For these reasons, legal form is still required to ensure fairness. Just as we need sociological imagination to ensure an open discussion, we need legal imagination to be able to put an end to potentially endless debates as well as allow (or the possibility of appeal.

However, by allowing for more complexity in the interpretation of social behaviour, social situations and events, the simplistic image' of human beings and their activities currently employed in criminal law and reproduced m criminal justice could be avoided. Through contcxtualisation, the dichotomised character of criminal justice (Christie, 1986: 96) could be replaced with a continuum. Participants would be urged to confront and grapple with complexities around notions of human 'agency', 'intentionahty', 'responsibility' and 'guilt' rather than reducing them to manageable proportions by applying the binary logic of criminal law. By dropping the simplistic dichotomies of the criminal law and allowing for differential meanings, justice might finally be done to the complexity of human actions and social events. Such a discourse would feature a concept of 'social responsibility' allowing for interpretations which primarily blame social systems rather than individuals (Christie, 1986: 97).

ABOLITIONISM AS A POLITICAL STRATEGY

Initially, a political strategy had been developed on the bases of the experiences of prison reform groups in their political struggle for penal and social reform. This 'politics of abolition' (Mathiesen, 1974, 1986) consistently refuses to offer 'positive alternatives or solutions. It restricts itself to advancing open-ended, 'unfinished?, 'negative' reforms, such as abolishing parts of the prison system. This requires that the}1 be conceptualized in terms alien to current criminal justice discourse.

More recently, positive alternatives to punishment are also being considered. Various proposals have been made by abolitionists and others to decentralize or even completely dismantle the present penal system in order to create forms of 'informal justice' as an addition to or replacement of the present criminal justice system.

Their implementation also raises many questions, however, concerning allegations about widening the net of social control and, at the same time, thinning the mesh, extending and blurring the boundaries between formal penal intervention and other, informal forms of social control, thereby masking the coercive character of alternative interventions (Abel, 1982: Cohen, 1985).

Fundamental reform of the penal system requires not only imaginative alternatives but, at the same time, a radical change in the power structure. Thus a 'politics of abolition' aims at a negative strategy for changing the politics of punishment by abolishing not only the criminal justice system but also the repressive capitalist system part by part or step by step (Mathiescn, 1986).

A fundamental reform of the penal system presupposes not only a radical change of the existing power structure hut also of the dominant culture. However, currently there is no appropriate social agency for any radical reform of the politics of punishment. There seems no immediate social basis upon which a progressive, let alone an abolitionist, strategy of crime control might be spontaneously constructed (Matthews, 1987: 389). Abolitionists tend to refer to the re-emergence of the subcultures of the new social movements with their own infrastructure of interaction and communication and their new ethics of solidarity, social responsibility, and care (Stcinert, I986: 28-9; see also Christie, 1982: 7.S-80). As Harris argues, the inadequacy of virtually all existing reform proposals lies in the failure to step outside the traditional and dominant ways of framing the issues. To explore alternative visions of justice we need to consider 'philosophies, paradigms, or models that transcend not only conventional criminological and political lines, hut also natural and cultural boundaries and other limiting habits of the mind' (Harris. 1987: 11). According to Harris a wide range of visions ot a better world and a better future offer a rich resource for a fundamental rethinking of our approach to crime and justice. The new social movements, in particular the women's movement, have pointed out fundamental weaknesses or biases in criminology's background assumptions, conceptual frameworks, methodology and tacit morality (Gelsthorpe and Morris, I990). However, the relationship between abolitionism and, for example, feminism is not without stress (van Swaaningen, 1989).

ABOLITIONISM ON CRIME CONTROL

Abolitionism argues for a structural approach to the prevention of 'social negativity', or redressing problematic situations by taking social problems, conflicts and troubles seriously but not as 'crime'. Therefore, abolitionism argues for social policy rather than crime control policy. Examples of this structural approach would be dealing vith drug problems in terms of mental health, with violence in terms of social Pathology, and with property crime in terms of economy.

Abolitionism calls for decriminalization, depcnalization, destigmatization, decentralization and deprofessionalization, as well as the establishment of other, informal, participatory, (semi-)autonomous ways of dealing with social problems.

Problematic events may just as well be defined as social troubles, problems or conflicts due to negligence or caused by 'accident' rather than by purpose or criminal intent. What is needed is a wide variety of possible responses without a priori assuming criminal intent and responsibility.

As we have seen, prison abolition, let alone penal abolition, requires an imaginative rethinking of possible ways of handling problematic situations as social problems, conflicts, troubles, accidents etc., as well as reconceptualizing punishment and developing new ways of managing 'deviance' on the basis of, at least partial, suspension of the logic of guilt and punishment. Without fixation on individual guilt, responsibility and punishment, 'crimes' would appear as 'conflicts', 'accidents' or 'problematic events' to be dealt with in a more reasonable and caring way by using forms of conflict management which are not exclusively geared towards individuals and confined to the limitations of criminal law in the books as well as in action (Steinert, 1986: 30). Therefore, abolitionists focus instead on extra-legal, autonomous ways for dealing with social problems and conflicts involving offences. The abolitionist challenge to abolish the present prison system now is to construct more participatory, popular or socialist forms of penality ((Garland and Young, 1983).

This way of looking at crime and crime control is, of course, controversial. The abolitionist perspective is sometimes critized for being naive and idealistic. In practice, however, the abolitionist approach turns out to be realistic in that social problems and conflicts are seen as inherent to social life. Since it is illusory that the criminal justice system can protect us effectively against such unfortunate events, it seems more reasonable to deal with troubles pragmatically rather than by approaching them in terms of guilt and punishment. Effectively to prevent and control unacceptable situations and behaviours requires a variety of social responses, one and only one of which is the criminal justice system. Its interventions are more of symbolic importance than ot practical value. With some social, technical and organizational imagination 'crime' could be coped with in ways much more caring for those immediately involved. A variety ot procedures could be established and institutionalized where social problems or conflicts, problematic events or behaviours could be dealt with through negotiation, mediation, arbitration, at intermediate levels. For dealing with the most common or garden varieties of crime, which is in any case the vast bulk ot all recorded criminality, criminal prosecutions are simply redundant.

Certainly for those who are most directly concerned there is little or no benefit. Also in such cases as state or corporate crime where a kill abolitionist agenda of dispute settlement - like the criminal justice approach - has profound limitations, it does make sense to look for more workable alternatives to the criminal justice system's mechanisms of apprehension, judgment and punishment. Most of these problems could be dealt with by means of economic, administrative, environmental, health or labour law, rather than by criminal law. Even in cases where a person has become an unacceptable burden to his or her relatives or community, imprisonment could be avoided. Agreements might be reached or orders might be given about temporary or permanent limitations in access to certain people, places or situations. The problems of the really bad and the really mad remain. In these relatively few cases and by way of last resort it might be unavoidable to deprive someone of their liberty, at least for the time being. This exceptional decision should be simply in order to incapacitate and be carried out in a humane way, that is as a morally problematic decision in a dilemma. However, even in these cases it would make sense to look for more just and humane alternatives based on mutual aid, good neighbourliness and real community rather than continue to rely on the solutions of bureaucracies, professionals and the centralized state. Criticism of the inhumanity and irrationality of the prison solution is as valid today as it was twenty or seventy years ago. Therefore, Cohen suggests that three interrelated strategies be followed: first, cultivating an experimental and inductive attitude to the actual historical record of alternatives, innovations and experiments; secondly, being sensitive, not just to failures, co-options and con-tricks, but to success stories - the criterion for success should be, and can be nothing other than, an approximation to preferred values; and thirdly, escaping the clutches of criminology (radical or realistic) by expanding the subject of social control way beyond the scope of the criminal justice system (for example, to systems of informal justice, Utopian communes and experiments in self-help) (Cohen, I 988: 131).

In countries with an elaborate welfare system like the Scandinavian countries or the Netherlands, these strategies may seem more reasonable given that their crime problem is less dramatic and, traditionally, their crime control policy is already more cautions. In the context of a relatively mild penal climate with a pragmatic and reductionist penal policy already being implemented, even penal abolition may seem realistic as a long-term goal. However, in those countries where prison populations are enormous and penal institutions are simply 'warehousing' people in order to incapacitate them from reoffendmg, prison abolition is more acute. When in the early 1970s several commissions and task forces concluded that the American prison system is beyond reform and, therefore, other ways of dealing with criminal offenders need to be developed, the prison population was about one-third of the current one. These criticisms hold true even more under the present conditions of overcrowding in the prisons. Prisons are places where a lot more harm is done than is necessary or legitimate. Moreover, these institutions contribute to a further brutal-ization of social conditions. Hven in the United States where average prison sentences are much longer than tor example in the Netherlands, 99 per cent of the prison population will sooner or later hit the streets again. Therefore, there is a definite need not only tor prison reform but also for penal reform. Current crime control policy boils down to doing more of the same. In the long run, however, the resulting spiral of harm needs to be reversed in a downward direction. This can only be achieved by doing more rather than less, albeit not more of the same but more of what generally might be called care.

A PRODUCT OF THE SYSTEM

2010-12-06T15:03:00.001Z

I hate this fuckin system and what it's done to me
It put me in a prison cell and it's taken my "liberty"
The bastards never try to see, they never take the time
To see why people, like you and me, take up a life of crime

They say we do it for a laugh, they say we think it's funny
But we only do it cause we're poor and cause we need the money
We get a giro from the broo, that should get you by
If they think that'll keep you going, why don't they fuckin try

They say it's no excuse for stealing things and taking drink and drugs
They say we're just a bunch of hooligans, a gang of evil thugs
We search every day in vain for work, but jobs are now so rare
And taking drink and drugs shows the depth of our despair

Your police are legal terrorists as far as I can see
Cause every time they get a chance they kick the fuck out of me
And when they've had their bit of fun, they throw me in a cell
One day we'll round them up and blow them all to hell

A white car with flashing lights and red stripes on the side
They're out to give us trouble, but this time I will not hide
Why do they always hound us and never give us peace
I think they must love violence, its legal for the police

To clear their books they'll charge you with any unsolved crime
Don't say it doesn't happen cause it happens all the time
A lot of us have done time for things we didn't do
Then the system kicks up fuck when someone chibs a screw

A screw is not a superman no matter what you read
If you go up and slash his jaw the bastards bound to bleed
If I saw a screw all stabbed to fuck, I wouldn't just walk by
I'd find myself a comfy seat and watch the bastard die

So to the bastard who arrested me I thought I'd let you know
I won't be here forever, one day they'll have to let me go
I'll get a blade that's razor sharp, I hope you're taking note
Because I'll see you in the street one day and cut your fuckin throat

Oct. 1996 HMP Glenochil, Tullibody, Clacks, FK10 3AD, Scotland

Report - HMP Send: prison-death demonstration held on 20 September 2007

2010-12-01T20:37:00.000Z

As originally report on NMP Website in September 2007

Pauline Campbell writes:

Prison-death demonstration - Thursday 20 September 2007 to protest against the tragic death of the young mother Lisa Doe, aged 25 who died on 11 September 2007 while in the care of HMP Send, Surrey

The protest on 20 September 2007 was the 26th demonstration to be held since protests began in April 2004.
Lisa Doe is the seventh woman to die in prison so far this year.
The appalling death toll: 39 women prisoners * (including Lisa Doe) have died since Sarah Campbell's death in 2003. Lessons are not being learned.

( * 12 women died after Sarah Campbell in 2003; 13 died in 2004; 4 died in 2005; 3 died in 2006; 7 deaths so far this year = 39)

[Figures refer to apparently self-inflicted deaths; England and Wales]

REPORT

A small group of protesters held a peaceful 3-hour demonstration outside HMP Send and, for part of the afternoon, were joined by two relatives of Ms Lisa Doe, who laid flowers in memory of their loved one.

At 2 pm, Mr Andy Peacock, Head of Reducing Reoffending (Duty Governor for the day) emerged from the jail, and spoke to protesters, but said he was unable to comment on Ms Doe's death.

At 3.45 pm, a Serco prison van (BW04 VZH) was stopped as it attempted to enter the jail. The driver was informed that protesters considered the jail to be unsafe, in view of the recent death, and he was asked to take the women to a place of safety.

Surrey Police were summoned to the prison. Officers 1905 and 2751 attended; sergeant 1905 indicated that Section 14, Public Order Act 1986, would be invoked if the prisoner transport van was not allowed to proceed into the jail. The Serco vehicle was eventually allowed to enter the prison, and no arrests were made.

A number of visitors to the jail spoke to protesters, and expressed concern about the physical and mental wellbeing of their loved ones held in HMP Send.

The Conservative MP for Mole Valley, Sir Paul Beresford, was invited to attend the demonstration, but did not respond to the invitation.

The protest was attended by Sky Television; local reporters and photographers, and was also covered by local radio.

At the end of the afternoon, protesters left bouquets of flowers and a memorial placard at the prison entrance, in memory of Ms Doe.

COMMENT

"Another woman has died, and another family is left to grieve."

"This latest death at HMP Send brings into sharp focus the prison's custodial care record. Two young mothers have lost their lives at Send Prison this year: Emma Kelly on 19 April 2007, and Lisa Doe on 11 September 2007. It is particularly worrying that both women were on 'suicide watch' when they died."

"Courts must act responsibly and stop sending women, many with psychiatric and drug-dependency problems, to the punitive regime of a prison, when they are in need of treatment and care. Unless and until this inhuman practice stops, more families will have to deal with the tremendous pain and anger resulting from the death of their loved ones."

John Bowden - Return to Resistance

2010-11-26T18:01:00.000Z

Reposted from the No More Prison Website

In a time when prison are so overcrowded why don't prisoners rise up and challenge the treatment and conditions imposed on them? This article, written by John Bowden a prisoner who has been involved in prison struggle, gives his insight.

Return to Resistance

What has become of prison revolts in the British prison system? Where now are the open expressions of collective anger and solidarity that fueled the uprisings and jail riots of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s and created the iconic images of Hull 1976 and Strangeways 1990? What happened to the spirit of revolt that used to periodically shake the British long-term prison system and engender a philosophy of prisoner empowerment and solidarity, a philosophy that situated the struggle of prisoners at the very forefront of the universal struggle for human rights and even social revolution?

Has the British prison system now become so responsive to and accommodating of the rights of prisoners that revolt and protest has been rendered unnecessary and redundant? I think not. In fact British jails are now more chronically overcrowded than ever before and inmates virtually warehoused in conditions and under regimes probably worst than they were twenty years ago. The despair and misery created by such conditions is reflected in rates of self-harm and suicide that are inexorably growing, along with the length of sentences now dished out. And like never before the treatment of prisoners is increasingly influenced by a political climate and manipulated public mood supportive of even greater repression and revenge. Yet nowhere, apparently, is there the spirit of solidarity and organised resistance amongst prisoners that was so evident twenty years ago, no-where the readiness to fight back and literally raise the roof in protest. Instead of defiance there seems now only passive acquiescence and an acceptance of conditions and forms of treatment that previously would have mobilized disobedience and revolt.

Silence in the face of intolerable oppression is a disturbing phenomenon; in conditions of extreme cruelty the will to resist is inherently human and wholly characteristic of a healthy and intact human spirit possessing an integrity unique to our species.

Why then has the militancy that seemed to characterize the behavior of long-term prisoners, especially, towards the prison system been replaced by conformity and submission?

Organizationally, the prison system in terms of methods of control, prison architecture and design, etc, has developed significantly since the last major prison uprising at Strangeways in 1990. Before the Strangeways revolt the physical space of most large prisons was more or less controlled by the prisoners themselves and scrutiny and close supervision of that space by the jailers was difficult and haphazard. Apart from punishment/segregat ion units, most prisoners were housed in large wings where they were allowed to circulate freely and create a certain degree of autonomy of physical space; complete oversight and surveillance was impossible and control often tenuous, and where incidents of protest were sparked off they tended to spread without containment, developing a momentum that reached into most areas of the prison. Large group solidarity was a common feature of life in the long-term prisons and was reflected in the balance of institutional power which dictated that the co-operation and good will of prisoners was a vital and necessary prerequisite of relative control.

Changing the physical architecture of prisons was to become a key component in the state's strategy of eradicating large scale protest and seizing back control of physical space. The new-generation of prison architecture and the extensive re-design of prison space started in the early 1990s purpose-built small group control into wing lay-outs and won back completely the control of space from prisoners.

In Scotland where bloody revolts had convulsed the prison system during the 1970s and 1980s a massive building programme transformed the old open-plan halls and galleries into new “super wings”, enormous structures where space is divided and sub-divided into small self-contained units holding under 50 prisoners, all closely monitored and observed in small manageable groups. This separation and concentration of prisoners into small groups under almost microscopic surveillance effectively prevents and undermines the potential for large-scale disturbances by quickly identifying and weeding out “ringleaders” and containing and isolating conflict when it occurs. By transforming the physical space and design of jails institutional power has shifted back in favour of guards and removed the spectre of mass prison uprisings.

In and of itself building methods of control into the physical fabric of prisons does not eradicate completely the possibility and existence off rebellion, and when trying to understand the reasons for such a radical downturn in the prison struggle the wider social and cultural context is equally relevant.

The term “millennium prisoner” is now often used as a derogatory label by prisoners themselves for the current generation of prisoners who seem on the whole to have reconciled themselves with the institutional interests of the prison system and possess absolutely no memory of a time when prisoner culture was imbued with a spirit and attitude of resistance. This is not just a generational phenomenon but a social and political one also and reflects a fundamental change in the nature of the wider working class community from which most prisoners are drawn. On the whole the prisoners who revolted and fought the system during the most turbulent decades of prison protest, the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, were products of close knit industrial working class communities with strong traditions of trade union organization and militancy; solidarity and mutual support were the lifeblood of these communities and informed the instincts of even those on the wrong side of the law. The generation of prisoners who riot and fought at Pankhurst in 1969, Hull in 1976 and Strangeways in 1990 were from communities still nourished by class consciousness and a “them and us” attitude, as well as an understanding that sticking together and showing solidarity was the most effective way of securing collective benefits and rights.

During the 1980s and 1990s the Thatcherite onslaught tore the heart and soul out of working class communities and transformed them into wastelands of depression, hopelessness and defeat, and bred a generation of young people saturated with cynicism, alienation and absolutely no memory of a time when principles like solidarity, community and mutual support defined working class identity. Even the more proletariat forms of property-related crime, which in a way represented a sort of elemental form of class warfare, gave way to a more viciously entrepreneurial drug crime based on crude capitalist principles and a contempt for poor communities and those who inhabit them. Drug dealing is a uniquely capitalist from of crime involving massive profit for the few and immense misery for the many, and is informed by a rejection of the sort of values or codes of the old criminal fraternity – never grass, resist authority and never hurt “one's own”. Modern drug dealers in attitude and mentality are the absolute antithesis of what were working class villains and their way or strategy of doing prison time is also radically different; collusion and co-operation with prison regimes has replaced defiance and resistance, and the fighting spirit that sometimes gave rise to a noble vision of positive change and reform; from the flames of revolts like Strangeways came manifestos of radical reform and an understanding and imperative that prisoners are as deserving of full human rights as any other human being. Today those sort of noble aspirations seem to have given way to a mood of defeat and conformity.

As microcosms of society prisons, in an often brutally exaggerated way, reflect the social condition and reality of life of the poor generally, and also the level of political activity and struggle of that group. When the poor are subdued and disorganized and kept under the heel so are those in prison; the reproduction of a junkie culture amongst prisoners accurately reflects what has taken hold in most poor and working class communities and districts on the outside.

What then are the chances of defiance and militancy re-emerging amongst large groups of prisoners and re-defining their current relationship with prison authority? The inexorable drive towards greater incarceration and the construction of virtual penal cities in the form of massive “Titan jails”, will eventually result in whole chunks of the poor and disadvantaged population being walled into factories of repression; sooner or later that repression, no matter how sophisticated and well-organised, will meet with resistance. There has always been a cyclical quality about protest, revolt and resistance, both in prison or outside in the wider world, and periods of quiescence and absolute social control are always fragile and essentially dependent on people co-operating in their own subjugation as opposed to control being imposed by force and coercion alone. As the South African Black Consciousness activist Steve Biko once said, “The greatest weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the minds of the oppressed themselves”. Those who administer the prison system equate a good prison with a well-controlled prison; the prime function of prison is to imprison efficiently and maintain absolute control over the imprisoned. Issues of human rights and respecting the inherent human dignity of the prisoner do not register in the mentality of the penal operator and ground has never been conceded on these issues unless prisoners themselves have forced them onto the agenda.

There is a direct relationship between the limited liberalization of prison regimes in the British long-term jails during the 1970s and 1980s and the protests and demonstrations of that period that forced the system to concede ground. No significant reform of the prison system has ever been achieved by anyone other than prisoners themselves, usually as a result of collective direct action, and the progressive erosion of those reforms over the last 20 years is as a direct result and consequence of the change in prisoner culture and the diminution of collective struggle amongst prisoners. Unless the spirit of struggle is re-discovered, therefore, nothing will prevent a nightmarish vision of the prison world coming to pass; the mass imprisonment of social problem and poor people in huge privately-controlle d jails where human rights are abandoned completely in the interests of profit and the total and absolute control over the imprisoned. It's maybe in all our interests ultimately that we see the return of a militant and unmanageable prison population.

John Bowden
6729
HM Prison Glenochil
King O'Muir Road
Tullibody
Clackmannanshire
FK10 3AD

Loving the Unloved - some reflections on the lives and struggles of prisoner's families.

2010-11-19T14:13:00.000Z

This was orginally published on the No More Prison Website

By Beth - the partner of a prisoner reflects of the harsh reality of prisons on partners and loved ones as well as prisoners

Before prisons became places where people were isolated from society they were semi-open, chaotic environments where whole families lived within the walls of the jail and people came and went selling goods, alcohol and sex. The song "Here we go round the mulberry bush" originates in Wakefield prison where the children use to dance around the mulberry bush which still stands there.

Pain Inside and Outside

The reforms of the nineteenth century partly came about because of concern about the supposed immorality of these environments, the sex and drunkenness, the corruption and mess in which people were seen to be living. So it was deemed that in prisons needed to be orderly places where people contemplated the error of their ways and received correction without the distractions of sex, family, relationships, drink, gambling and so on. Although rules around silence were eventually ended in the early twentieth century, much of the nineteenth century ethos of separation and moral living still prevail. Today in prisons the language used to justify such restrictions and deprivations may have changed to talk of security, risk, safety, rehabilitation and so on but the basic principle that removing wrong-doers from society and separating them from their loved ones is the right way to deal with crime remains in place and almost universally unchallenged.

The current reformist attitude towards the separation of prisoners from their loved ones and the treatment of prisoner's families mostly focuses upon the difficulties families face in visiting prisons and the hardships of travelling long distances and the lack of provision for children and so on. In six years of contact with organisations that support prisoners' families I have yet to hear any direct challenge to the monumental failure of this policy of separating and caging human beings. It is also extremely rare for anyone connected with reform to acknowledge that one of the main reasons why this situation is such a failure and causes more harm than good is because people are systematically brutalised and humiliated in the name of public protection. Reformists are so busy trying to get on the right side of the almighty prison service in order to extract some crumbs from the table to have a family visit or buy some toys that they fail to truly confront the prison service about the totally unacceptable levels of cruelty that thousands of people are subjected to because the love someone who they have caged.

Prisoners Families are powerless

Lets be completely clear about this, most prisoners' families have very little power, status, money or support. The imprisonment of a loved one is not something that people tend to protest about, except in some cases of miscarriages of justice, because the simple truth of the matter is that if you had any power before your were in that situation, it is certainly almost none existent once you are. You effectively have no rights to privacy in your relationship with your caged family member and getting information, support and your voice heard becomes almost impossible because you are forever worrying that if you object or make too much of a fuss it will simply mean that you don't get a visit or you will be targeted or your loved one will be punished in some way. You become grateful for any crumbs on offer and relieved when at the new prison the screws are reasonably pleasant, rather than actively hostile.

Prison is destructive not reformative

How come reformists so rarely acknowledge that prison is mostly about pain and punishment and it brutalises everyone connected with it. I really don't accept the view that prison staff simply need to be more aware of our problems and the role we play in rehabilitation. Prison has nothing to do with rehabilitation. If it happens at all it happens despite what is being done to prisoners not because of it. If we are the single biggest factor in determining re-offending rates then how come we are treated, for the most part, like dirt? I think that it is mostly because the Criminal Justice System is not primarily concerned with what actually helps people to change and lead a more fulfilling and constructive life. If it was it would have acknowledged a long time ago that prison, by and large harms us all. It fails monumentally at the one thing it is supposedly there to do, "protect the public". Huge warehouses of suffering and humiliation protect no one.

One of the worst aspects of being the partner of a prisoner is reading about or hearing people talk about aspects of prison life that are the opposite of the true situation. One example of this is the recent nonsense in the tabloid press about prisoners being paid to play scrabble. We talked about this on the Prison Chat UK site and people feel crazy with hurt when they read stuff like that because the truth is that thousands of us are making big sacrifices to send money to our loved ones so that they can have some basic comforts or buy food to compensate for the rubbish so many of them are expected to eat in jail.

Many of us face stigma and prejudice from family, friends and co-workers. People in this situation frequently find that they are socially isolated and unable to share their experiences with people close to them. Even when we can share with others it is often difficult to convey even a small part of the misery of this experience. Eventually you find yourself protecting other people from the truth because it is impossible to tell others how bad this system is. We become like exiles, people who live in this society but do not belong here, who do not belong anywhere accept maybe with each another.

I think the greatest lie about the prison system is that its function is to anything but harm people. Even liberal reformists, like Ramsbottom, speak of prison BEING the punishment rather being punished in prison. The punishment is the removal of the person from society and from those who that person loves. In what way can that form of torture benefit anyone? It is torture, not only for the prisoner but for their children and other family members. After years of no privacy you begin to realse that THIS is what hurts most and as a family member you are doing the same sentence. You do it in the community, alongside other people who have no idea what that experience is like.

I have lost count of the number of times people have asked me about conjugal visits and whether we will be entitled to them if we marry or later in the sentence and it is extremely difficult to keep explaining to people that within prison itself there are no official periods of privacy ever at any stage under any circumstances.

Likewise I have lost count of the number of times I have had to explain that complaining about harassment from prison staff on visits is impossible because you are powerless to stop them abusing you. I call it the "but surely......" response, as in "But surely there is someone you could complain to about this" and I say "This is not like taking something back to a shop. This is a dictatorship" But for those who live in a supposedly liberal democracy these things are very hard to understand.

My belief is that the aspect of prisoners families that clashes most with the Prison Service and the society it supposedly serves is the fact that we love and care for people who are generally deemed to be unlovable and not worthy of respect.

Love

By "love" I am not talking here about romance, although that may be part of our relationships. I am talking about spending years and years telling your caged relative that you see them as a human being worthy of love, compassion and understanding. I am talking about love as an active agent of change in which there is challenge and questioning as well as acceptance and trust. What prison does is diminish and humiliate people. My own experience has led me to question that response to law-breaking because from everything I have seen and read I know that does not work and if we are to find alternatives then we need to listen to those who are already actively involved in that alternative response to people this society locks up.

The other day we were talking on the Prison Chat site about what we loved about our partner, son, brother, father etc in jail and there was this great outpouring of stories about the strength, gentleness, wisdom and kindness of these men we are close to and it was incredibly moving to hear about these relationships that exist despite the walls and wire. It saddened me too because we are all diminished when a society divides people in to good and bad and does not examine its attitudes and the humanity it inflicts on those who have often suffered more deprivation and cruelty than most.

There is something particularly poignant about the end of a visit. You are standing there, hugging your loved one and you are both hoping that this hug will stay with the other until the next time and you look across the room and everyone is holding one another and the screws are trying to hurry you up and you think "This is madness".

Links

Click here to visit Prison Chat UK

Demo protesting the death of Karen Ann Fletcher in Holloway Prison

2010-08-18T08:00:00.042+01:00

This was originally published on No more Prison's website in 2005.

HMP HOLLOWAY

Report on Prison death demonstration held on Wednesday 09.11.05 to protest against the death of Karen Ann Fletcher, 30, who died on 28.10.05

By Pauline Campbell

16th demonstration since protests began in April 2004;
two-hour demonstration was attended by 25 protesters (including two ex-prisoners).
Prison van halted at 2.55 pm, as it attempted to take prisoners into the jail.
While the van was stopped, Duty Governor Mr McCaighy, and his colleague Mr Ryan, came out of the prison, and requested that the vehicle be allowed to enter the jail.
Request refused on the grounds that it was unsafe to allow prisoners to be taken into Holloway, following the recent death.
Police were called, and approx 15 officers attended the incident.
3.15 pm: I was arrested (my 10th arrest since last year) for an "alleged obstruction of the highway", and taken to Islington Police Station.
Handcuffs were not used at this arrest.
After two and a half hours, I was released without charge. Custody Sgt White and his Inspector made the decision that it was "not in the public interest to continue with a prosecution".
I was held in the custody suite but not, on this occasion, locked in a police cell.

Comment:

"It is believed that Karen Fletcher was recently transferred to Holloway from Styal Prison, Cheshire. Her death, the fourth at HMP Holloway since April 2004, again raises questions about the legal duty of care owed to prisoners. In addition, a Holloway inmate remains on a life support machine, after being cut down from a makeshift noose at the jail in May 2004. The Chief Inspector of Prisons' report, published earlier this year, highlighted problems of dirt and vermin at HMP Holloway."

Demonstration was attended by local photographers and reporters.
Prison Governor did not respond to a note sent into the prison.

Pauline Campbell

Further failure documented - the only answer for Styal Prison is closure

2010-08-14T08:00:00.000+01:00

This was published on the No More Prison Website in 2006

The publication this week of the Inspectorate of Prisons report on Styal Prison confirms that it is still a desperate and failing institution. It contains many recommendations but fails to identify the one simple solution - close Styal Prison.

The reality of Styal - humiliation, abuse, pain and lack of care

Key findings of the inspection team include:

The use of violent force by Prison Officers on prisoners had doubled in the last two years
An increase in prisoners being assulted and in levels of bullying
Serious self harming is "prolific" and is responded to by prison staff using force and confinement in punishment cells.
Women who self harmed were being routinely stripped as punishment.
The use of "unfurnished" cells has increased by 250% in two years
No support was given to many self harming women
The mother and baby unit failed to meet child protection standards
The Prison is not reviewing "near-death" incidents to learn lessons
The Food in the prison remains very bad and unhealthy in content and in preparation.
Many of the toilets were unscreened
All day child visits had been stopped
Many new prisoners were not being issued with even a single bra.

The "Segregation unit" had been renamed the "Care, support and reintegration unit"

Who we lock up - the powerless and abused

The report also included details of the women that we lock up in Styal:

The majority of women caged have been victims of rape or other serious assults
There are high levels of mental illness and acute mental distress
80% had serious and longstanding substance misuse problems
60% are mothers
The vast majority are "low risk" and with no histories of violence

Lies exposed

The Report challenges the Prison's own account of the regime experienced by women effectively accusing the Governor and his staff of lying about the time women spend out of the cells. They point out that despite the Prison claiming women are allowed out of their cells for 11 hours a day the reality is that the most vulnerable are locked up for 19 hours or more a day. Such evidence suggests the reality of Styal is likely to be far more painful, brutal and abusive than is claimed by the Governor.

Recommendations - keep trying!!
Despite all the good work done by the Inspectorate in exposing some of the reality of Britain's prisons they tend to disappoint when it comes to recommendations of what is to be done. The Inspectorate never forget that there belief in Prison and the suggested "improvements" they ask for reflect this belief. They make hundreds of recommendations when only one was really necessary.

Styal has failed it should be closed.

To maintain this ludicrous perspective that Styal could be a "healthy place" requires great naivety and many of the recommendations reflect this. On race relations after failing to make a recommendation in the last report they this time boldly request that:

Managers should discuss with the prisoner race relations committee the reasons that black and minority ethnic women prisoners have a different perception of their treatment than white women prisoners, and aim to address those differences.

Was it too much for them to consider the reason was racism?

Styal must close

The report fails to mention the Government's plans to double the size of Styal increasing dramatically the abuse, hard and pain this evil place inflicts on powerless and abused women. No More Prison is committed to resisting this expansion and instead calling for the immediate closure of Styal.

Styal has no future. It is unreformable. It is a place of abuse, pain and death. Close it now

Remember Caroline Powell

2010-08-10T08:00:00.002+01:00

This report was originally published on the No More Prison Website in January 2007

Mother-of-five, Caroline Powell, died on 5 January 2007 while on remand at Eastwood Park Prison, Gloucestershire. In response Pauline Campbell held a demonstration on Wednesday 24 January 2007 outside the prison. It was the 20th such demo organised by Pauline following a death.

During the demo Pauline Campbell was arrested (Its her 14th arrest on prison death demos), and charged (for the fourth time)

Pauline Reports:

Following the tragic death of Caroline Powell on 5 January 2007, a demonstration was held outside the prison on the afternoon of Wednesday 24 January 2007. Around 10-15 people attended the protest, including reporters and photographers. Protesters had travelled from London, Shropshire, and Cheshire, to protest against the death of this vulnerable young woman, aged 26, who died in the 'care' of Her Majesty's Prison Eastwood Park. Caroline leaves behind five motherless children, the youngest aged 18 months. Ms Powell was on remand, and legally innocent, when she died.

At 2.55 pm, Reliance prison van FX04 BUP, was stopped as it attempted to take prisoners into the jail. The driver was informed that (a) protesters regarded the jail as unsafe in view of the recent death; (b) the vehicle would not be allowed into the prison; and (c) he should take the women to a place of safety. Officers from Avon & Somerset Constabulary were called to the prison. Six officers arrived, and one began filming the demonstration. The sergeant read aloud a printed notice, then handed the copy to me. Dated 24.01.07, it reads: "To whom it may concern: I am the senior police officer here. I believe that you are committing, have committed, or intend to commit an offence of trespassing with the common purpose of deterring, obstructing or disrupting lawful activity and I require you to leave immediately. Failure to obey my direction may render you liable to arrest. If you return to the land as a trespasser within 3 months you will also commit an offence for which you may be arrested. Sergeant 1958 Ogborne." At 4.20 pm I was arrested for "aggravated trespass and obstruction of the highway", and taken to Staple Hill Police Station, South Gloucestershire. Handcuffs were not used.

We arrived at the police station at 5 pm; detention was authorised at 5.30 pm.

Photographs, fingerprints, and DNA were taken. I objected (as I have done on a previous occasion) to mouth swabs being taken by a police officer, and expressed the view that taking body samples from any orifice should be done by a nurse or doctor, not a police officer. I refused to sign the form which acknowledged that my prints had been taken and that the officer had informed me the prints would be kept on file for I.D. and crime investigation purposes. It was explained to me that it was within my rights not to sign.

I was locked in a cell; allowed to contact the duty solicitor while detained; then subsequently charged ("aggravated trespass - fail to leave land"). My reply to the charge, logged in police records, was: "Caroline Powell died on 5 January 2007 at Eastwood Park Prison; she has left behind five motherless children, and that explains the demonstration and my arrest today." Reporters and photographers from local newspapers attended the protest, which was also covered by local radio. BBC Points West attended the demonstration, and a news report was included on regional television at 6.30 pm. The news item, broadcast into about five counties, included footage showing the arrest. I have been granted unconditional bail to appear in North Avon Magistrates' Court, Kennedy Way, Yate, Bristol, BS27 4PY, on Thursday 1 February 2007 at 9.45 a.m. At 7.45 pm, I was released from custody. A police car returned me to Falfield, to enable me to collect my car.

Additional information

(1) Caroline Powell's grieving family are receiving support and advice from INQUEST, London: www.inquest.org.uk Caroline's father asked to be put in touch with me, and we spoke on the telephone on 23 January 2007, the day before the demonstration. He expressed wholehearted support for the protest, and said he was "100% behind the demonstration". Family members are grieving deeply, and preparing for the funeral, and therefore were unable to join us outside the prison.

(2) An invitation was sent to Steve Webb, MP (Lib Dem), inviting him to attend the demonstration. In his e-mail reply to me, dated 22.01.07, he said: "Thank you for letting me know of your forthcoming demonstration. I will be at Westminster on Wednesday and will be unable to attend, but I am grateful to you for letting me know of the demonstration and certainly agree that the issue which you are highlighting is an important one."

(3) On the afternoon of the demonstration, a letter was sent into the prison (via a visitor), addressed to Governor Tim Beeston, asking if he would meet protesters at the prison gates. The letter was returned to me, unopened, at the end of visiting. The prison had apparently refused to accept the letter as it did not quote the prison's full postal address.

Comments

"The deaths of two women prisoners this month (Caroline Powell at Eastwood Park Prison, and Lucy Wood at HMP Peterborough on 15.01.07) again bring into sharp focus the fatal consequences of sending vulnerable women to prisons that cannot meet their human needs.

"Thirty-four women have now died in the 'care' of women's jails since my daughter died in 2003. All were owed a legal duty of care. Courts must stop sending women to their deaths.

"Caroline Powell was on remand at Eastwood Park Prison and was legally innocent when she died. Her father told me it was her first time in jail. I am still struggling to understand what useful purpose is served by herding so many vulnerable women into institutions that are not equipped to deal with their complex needs. The harsh and punitive treatment of women offenders is a disgrace."

(Figures refer to self-inflicted deaths; England and Wales)

Photographs

Six print size colour photos are available

(No's 1, 2 and 3: taken before the arrest; No. 4: the arrest; No's 5 and 6: immediately following the arrest)

Freelance photographer: Guy Smallman
Tel 07956 429059

E-mail: guy@guysmallman.com
Web: http://www.guysmallman.com/

Note:

Photos can be used for free by progressive and campaigning groups (Guy Smallman must be notified of their use).

Local papers (usually free) must notify Guy Smallman of use.

National papers pay going rate and notify Guy Smallman of use.

Anti Social Behaviour Orders

2010-08-09T08:00:00.010+01:00

This was originally published on No More Prison's Website in 2005

What is an ASBO?

Anti-Social Behaviour Orders were introduced by the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 and came into force on 1 April 1999. ASBO's ban individuals from entering certain areas or carrying out specific acts for a minimum period of two years. The acts are not normally acts that are otherwise illegal or criminal. However once an ASBO has been served these acts become criminal offences (only for the person the ASBO was served) that can attract up to 5 years imprisonment.

An application for an ASBO can be made to a magistrate by police forces, local authorities, housing action trusts and registered social landlords and imposed on the individual deemed guilty of "anti-social behaviour". The Government defines this as

behaviour which causes or is likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress to one or more people who are not in the same household as the perpetrator

ASBOs also take the form of interim orders (made by the magistrates' court or the county court ahead of a full hearing), county court orders (obtained when other proceedings against an individual are underway such as possession of tenancy) and "orders made on conviction in criminal proceedings" (where the criminal courts can serve an order on an individual convicted of a criminal offence).

An ASBO is a civil order, this means that the burden of proof is lower than in criminal cases, and hearsay evidence is admissible. This lower rate of proof has made application very difficult to resist. The courts refuse less than 1 in 60 applications. If breached, the individual has committed a criminal offence which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison.

The Serious Organised Crime and Police Bill, currently before Parliament, is proposing to remove the anonymity of children involved in criminal proceedings for breaching the terms of their ASBO to facilitate their "naming and shaming". In January 2005 the Joint Committee on Human Rights expressed concern at clauses 127 and 128.

Some examples of the use of ASBO's

In October 2004 a profoundly deaf girl was served an ASBO for spitting in public. She was subsequently imprisoned.
In July 2003 an 87 year old was served an order which, among other things, banned him from being sarcastic to his neighbours.
Manchester - female prostitute banned from carrying condoms in an area which included her drug clinic which, as part of its harm reduction work, provides clients with free condoms.
Leonard Hockey, a homeless man issued with an ASBO banning him from begging. He was later breached and imprisoned. He died in prison.
A 74 year old woman is facing prison if she insults her neighbours or makes any form of complaint to public bodies.
In October 2004, two brothers aged 10 and 11 were among other things banned from congregating in a group of more than two people or entering any domestic or commercial property without the prior consent of the owner.
Birmingham, a 26 homeless man given an ASBO banning begging. He continued begging and got a two year sentence. On his release he started begging again and was sentenced to a further 3 year prison. In total to date he has been sentenced to 5 years imprisonment for an offence that is not in itself imprisonable.
A 17-year-old sentenced to four months' youth detention after he broke his order in a 3am fracas with police at his home. However, his lawyer revealed that in the previous 14 months he had been charged with an offence on 19 separate occasions and all of which had resulted in his favour. His lawyer claimed this to be "a pretty outrageous statistic" and that "he's been targeted and I am quite sure the conduct of the police was entirely unacceptable"
A 47 year old man was banned from buying or consuming any alcohol. He breached it and was imprisoned.
A 13 year old boy has been banned from using the word "grass" anywhere in England and Wales.
A 16 year old boy ordered, at the threat of up to 5 years imprisonment, not to behave in an anti social manner at school. His crime, disrupting a science class.
Manchester - 18 year old man banned from congregating with three or more other "youths" arrested for attending a successful youth club that was running a session on "how to deal with anti-social behaviour"
In August 2004 a homeless alcoholic was banned from consuming alcohol in a public place and entering licenced premises. He breached this order within two weeks.
Manchester City Council obtained an ASBO against mobile soup vans providing assistance to homeless people in the city centre.
A 20 year old long term prisoner was on the day before his release served an ASBO banning him from entering the estate he lived on with his Grandmother. He had been her carer since he was 12 years old.

ASBO Concern

2010-08-08T08:00:00.002+01:00

This was orginally puiblished on the No More Prison Website in 2005

Asbo Concern, a new campaigning organisation, is to be launched next month. Coordinator Matt Foot, a criminal defence solicitor, explains: "The government is irresponsible promoting Asbos - which often criminalise people for behaviour that is not criminal - when there is no evidence that they work. We have serious concerns about the way they are used and want to organise the broadest possible coalition to put pressure on the government for a full review."

The New Group's Launch meeting takes place at 7.00pm on Thursday 7th April at Friends Meeting House opposite Euston Station.

ASBO CONCERN'S STATEMENT

We are an alliance of organisations and individuals who wish to campaign about serious concerns with the use of ASBOs.

OUR BELIEFS

1. Anti-social behaviour can cause distress and misery but the response to it must be appropriate, just, proportionate, positive and effective.

2. Asbos are a punitive measure that can criminalise people for behaviour that is not criminal, and often imposed only on the basis of hearsay evidence.

3. They do nothing to deal with the causes of anti-social behaviour and can distort the work that is being done to build stronger communities.

4. The government is increasing the use of Asbos, despite the fact that there is no evidence that they work. Home Office figures show that at least one third of Asbos are breached.

5. Asbos can result in eviction of whole families and are increasing the prison population, with people being jailed for breaches of Asbos even for offences that would not otherwise be imprisonable. Around 10 young people a week are imprisoned this way.

6. We want properly funded community and youth services and support for people with mental health, drug and alcohol or other social problems to build an inclusive society.

AIMS

1. To bring together those concerned about the way asbos are used - charities, professionals, trade unions, community groups, young people and others - in a joint campaign.

2. To publicly highlight the problems with asbos and the need for alternative ways of tackling anti-social behaviour that does not criminalise people for actions that are not criminal.

3. To counteract the scapegoating and stigmatising of children and young people and vulnerable groups and campaign for properly funded youth services and support for those who need it.

4. To campaign for a full public government review of asbos and the way they are used.

Signatories:

Organisations:

NAPO, CYWU, Inquest, British Association of Social Workers, Childrens Rights Alliance, Action on Rights for Children, Fair Play for Children, Brent Youth Company, Holborn GMB, Legal Action for Women, International Prostitutes Collective, The Green Party, Respect, activistnetwork.org.uk, Red Pepper, Scottish Prostitutes Education Project.

Individuals:

Janet Batsleer, Louise Christian, Bernard Davies, Pam Eland, Matt Foot, Helen Gregory, Gavin Shelton, Iain Taylor, Elizabeth Harding, Liz Richmond, Rev Ray Gaston, Jen Malcolm, Tim Farrell, Dave Edwards, Sue Spilling, Dr Jane Ferrie, Adah Kay, Mike MacNair, Caroline Lucas MEP, Manuela Sykes, Richard Hoyle, Martina Habeck, Marie Xenophontos, Jon Davis, Hilary Wainwright.

External Links

ASBOwatch
National Association of Probation Officers - Analysis of the first 6 years of ASBO's (Link Broken)
The National Association for Youth Justice: ANTI-SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR BILL -Initial appraisal of youth justice aspects (Link Broken)
When home's a prison
Daisy is 17 years old, profoundly deaf and has been in prison for more than a month. Her crime was spitting in public, an offence which earned her an anti-social behaviour order - or Asbo - and subsequently a jail term. (Link Broken)
January 2005 Report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights (which examines every Bill presented to Parliament) expressing concern at clauses 127 and 128 of The Serious Organised Crime and Police Bill.

VIGIL TO MARK THE 4TH ANNIVERSARY OF SARAH CAMPBELL'S DEATH

2010-08-07T15:40:00.001+01:00

First published on the No More Prison Website in January 2007

A vigil to mark the 4th anniversary of the death of Sarah Campbell was held on Thursday 18 January 2007 outside HMP & YOI Styal, Cheshire

Flowers were laid in memory of Sarah, who died on 18 January 2003, aged 18. Banners displayed outside the prison included "SHAME ON THE HOME OFFICE" - very apt, considering their lack of apology over Sarah's death. The vigil was attended by friends and supporters from Cheshire, Shropshire, and Greater Manchester, including representatives from FRFI (Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism!), Manchester. A number of supporters were unable to attend due to very bad weather conditions. Visitors to the prison stopped to speak. Some family members expressed concern about the self-harming behaviour of their loved ones held at HMP Styal, including one mother who spoke of her daughter having tried to commit suicide.

Sarah's mother Pauline comments ""Sarah's death, on 18 January 2003, has left a deep void in my life. She was my only child, and I miss her terribly. Although the Home Office have accepted liability for her death, I despair at the lack of apology. A vigil will continue to be held every year as a way of remembering Sarah, whose young life was abruptly ended due to appalling failures on the part of the prison. Whatever a person has done wrong, no-one deserves to die in this way. Tragically, and on the same day that Sarah's vigil was being held, it was reported in the press that two women prisoners have killed themselves in the past ten days."

Child Abuse

2010-08-05T17:59:00.001+01:00

John Bowden writes from Perth Prison

In 2004 15 year old Gareth Myatt died whilst bring “restrained” by three members
of staff at a privatized children's prison called Rainsbrook Secure Training Centre in Warwickshire. In the same year 14 year old Adam Rickwood hanged himself in another privatized children's jail, Hassockfield Secure Training Centre in Co. Durham. A Judge later ruled that the guards who “restrained” Adam
shortly before his death had used unlawful force on him. Six years later and following a sustained campaign by parents of imprisoned children and groups like the Children's Rights Alliance for England (CRAE) a shocking government document detailing control methods used on children, some as young as 12, in custody has been revealed under the Freedom of Information Act.

Published by the Prison Service in 2005 and classified as a restricted government document, the manual provides staff in secure training centres with authorization to inflict physical pain on children with so-called “restraint and self-defence techniques”. The methods of physical force described in the manual are so legally questionable that the government was prepared to be taken to a tribunal to fight against disclosure of the document despite a ruling by the Information Commissioner that it should be publicly released. Previously government officials had even refused to provide a copy to the Parliamentary Human Rights Committee. Eventually the Ministry of Justice was forced to back down and release the document; it's contents made the reticence of the Justice Ministry to shame with the public, such information all too self-explanatory.

Some of the “restraint” methods used against children in custody approved by the Justice Ministry, currently headed by the liberal-thinking Ken Clark, include:

ramming knuckles into the ribs of children and raking shoes down the shins.
It also authorised staff to: “Drive straightened fingers into the young person's face, and then quickly drive the straightened fingers of the same hand downwards into the young person's groin area”.
“Use an inverted knuckle into the trainee's sternum and drive inward and upward”.
“Continue to carry alternate elbow strikes to the young person's ribs until a release is achieved”.
“Nose distraction techniques” - sharp blows to the children's nose – had already been found by the Court of Appeal to have been routinely and unlawfully used against children in at least one secure training centre.

The contracting out of such brutal methods of control and punishment to institutions run by private firms for profit raises an obvious moral question and issue.

Instructions issued to staff in the secure training centres reveal a calculated understanding that such “control techniques” could lead to serious injury to the child and even death; “the techniques could risk a fracture of the scull and temporary or permanent blindness caused by rupture of the eyeball or detached retina”. There is also an acknowledgement that some techniques could cause asphyxia; staff are told that while applying headlocks to children that “if breathing is compromised it could lead to a medical emergency”.

Carolyne Willow, national co-ordinator of CRAE, said: “The manual is deeply disturbing and stands as state authorisation of institutionalised child abuse. What made former ministers believe that children as young as 12 could get so out of control so often that staff should be taught how to ram their knuckles into their rib cages? Would we allow teachers. etc., to be trained in how to deliberately hurt and humiliate children?

Images of Abu Graib prison in Iraq are evoked by instructions instruction to force difficult children to “adopt a kneeling position while a second member takes control of the head by grabbing the back of the neck while cupping the chin”. Whilst in this position steel handcuffs are applied to the child. Ms Willow describes such methods as ”The ritualistic humiliation of children and a clear abuse of human rights”.

Phillip Noyes, director of strategy and development at the National Society for the prevention of cruelty to children said: “These shocking revelations graphically illustrate the cruel and degrading violence inflicted at times on children in custody. On occasions these restraint techniques have resulted in children suffering broken arms, noses, wrists and fingers. Painful restraint is a clear breach of children's human rights against some of the most vulnerable youngsters in society and has no place in a decent society”.

During the 12 months up to March 2009, restraint was used 1.776 times in the UK's four secure training centres.

In the Houses of Lords on 21 July 2010 Lord McNally in response to questions about the methods of control described in the manual said “we use the word “children” very casually to describe often very large and quite violent young people in these centres”, and “we also have a duty of care to the staff who deal with these often very violent young people”. Often disturbed and unruly children, some as young as 12 years of age, are metamorphosed in Lord McNally's mind into large and physically violent young adults as he tries to defend what Ms Swaine the legal director of CRAE, describes as “Guidance given in a staff authorised manual to violate human rights because is allows staff to deliberately hurt children outside cases of life-threatening necessity”.

What the manual actually reveals is an attitude and mindset that believes damaged and already brutalised children can be made to conform by the use of even more brutality and cruelty. In reality what such treatment creates is more severely disturbed young people seriously alienated from and actively hostile to society. What is being manufactured in these secure training centres are ticking time bombs that are then delivered into the wider community. A disproportionate number of seriously violent offenders and long-term prisoners are the product of a childhood spent in children's homes and youth custody institutions where physical abuse and violence formed a routine part of their treatment. When the lesson being taught to children in custody is that power is represented by the power to hurt and control then that lesson will eventually be learned and practised in their own lives. What is sown behind the walls of child prisons will eventually be reaped by the wider community. The campaign to stop the abuse of children in custody shouldn't be viewed as it is by tabloid newspapers and those responsible for that abuse as the prerogative of “wishy-washy liberals”; the wider society should realise that it has a vested interest in stopping the de-humanization of imprisoned children.

John Bowden
August 2010
HMP Perth

ICOPA - This week in Belfast

2010-06-22T08:00:00.000+01:00

ICOPA XIII is taking place this week in Belfast.

Further details from here

This video report is of ICOPA XII two years ago in London.

ANGELA Y. DAVIS

2010-06-21T08:00:00.005+01:00

This information was orginally published in 2004 and updated in 2007

Angela Davis is a professor of history of conciousness at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Over the last thirty years, she has been active in numerous organisations challenging prison-related repression.

Her activism on behalf of political prisoners resulting in her facing three capital charges. After 16 months in prison awaiting trial and a mass campaign in her support, she was acquitted in 1972.

In 1998 she was one of the organisers of the "Critical Resistance: Beyond the Prison Industrial Complex" Conference. Angela remains active today exposing the racism and brutality of prison and committed not to its reform buts its abolition.

In 2003 Angela Davis published Are Prisons Obsolete? an essential read and highly recomended.

Since the 1980s prison construction and incarceration rates in the U.S. have been rising exponentially, evoking huge public concern about their proliferation and their promise of enormous profits. But these prisons house hugely disproportionate numbers of people of colour, betraying the racism embedded in the system, while studies show that increasing prison sentences has had no effect on crime.

Other recomended Davis Books are:

The Prison-Industrial Complex
Women, Race and Class
Resisting State Violence: Radicalism,gender and race in US Culture

Online links to Angela's work

Speaking at the First Congregational Church of Oakland 26th July 2003 "Are Prisons Obsolete"
The Helen Rodgers Reid Lecture at Columbia University April 2004 "The Death Penalty: Dialectics of Innocence."
Abolish prisons, says Angela Davis at Harvard in March 2004 Questions the efficacy, morality of incarceration

Angela Davis - Mutation of racism

2010-06-20T10:31:00.000+01:00

The abolitionist approach: a British perspective (Part Two of Two)

2010-06-19T08:00:00.024+01:00

CRIMINOLOGY FROM BELOW

The theoretical debates outlined above were reflected in RAP's interventionist strategy in the 1980's. As in the previous decade, the organisation was involved in a series of campaigns, often with other mainstream groups, to lobby for "an agreed programme of reform' (Ryan and Ward, 1990, p. 9). This meant supporting those in the traditional lobby who argued for a reductionist strategy as a response to the prison crisis. At the same time, RAP also pointed to issues which until then had been neglected by traditional reformers. The scandal surrounding deaths in custody is a good example of this process. RAP was involved in the formation of the pressure group Inquest, established in 1980 to draw attention to those who had died 'suddenly, violently or inexplicably in police and prison custody' (Benn and Worpole, 1986, p. i). Twelve years on, the work of the group has become central to this debate. The issue has also become a cause for concern in the mainstream lobby and for the Chief Inspector of Prisons himself. It also inspired the formation of a similar group in Australia in 1984, which was concerned with the general question of deaths in custody and the disproportionate number of Aboriginal deaths in particular (Hogan, Brown and Hogg, 1988). Inquest's work extended across a range of areas throughout the igHos and can be seen as part of the hegemonic process mentioned earlier. Its members picketed police stations and coroner's courts, organised meetings, arranged legal support for the families of the deceased, who scandalously were and are denied legal aid, highlighted the unaccountable and often unacceptable practices of the coroner's courts and helped to sponsor a number of legislative changes, including the Administration of Justice Act 1982 and the Coroner's Juries Act 1983. This work also began to raise broader theoretical questions, particularly around the nature of state power and the processes of institutionalised violence (Sim, Scraton and Gordon, 1987, pp. 14-15). Both Inquest and RAP worked closely with a number of other radical prisoners' rights organisations, including Women in Prison, whose goal was 'to redress the injustices presently suffered bv Britain's hitherto neglected women prisoners'. In 1986 these organisations gave evidence to the House of Commons Social Services' Committee on the Prison Medical Service which was directly linked to the Committee's recommendation which 'called for the abolition and complete replacement of Hollo-way's C Wing' (Sim, Scraton and Gordon, 1987, pp. 15-16).

The ongoing campaign for the abolition of the Prison Medical Service (PMS) in England and Wales provides another example of this joint endeavour. As I noted above, it was RAP and the National Prisoners' Movement who, because of their close contact with the confined, first raised this issue in the 19705. Both groups pointed to the role of medicine inside, not as a neutral dispenser of medical care but as a set of interlocking, disciplinary discourses built on 'less eligibility', control and regulation (Sim, 1990). By the mid-ig8os the issues involved had become so contentious that they were taken up by a range of mainstream groups, including the Howard League for Penal Reform, The National Association for Mental Health, The Royal College of General Practitioners and The Royal College of Psychiatrists (Sim, 1990, pp. 122-3). ^n April 1991 the National Association of Probation Officers and Inquest introduced into the House of Commons the Health Care of Prisoners Bill, which contained provisions for the abolition of the PMS. As I have noted elsewhere, this Bill could be seen as a 'highly symbolic measure for achieving radical change . . . which if accepted will not solve all of the problems concerning the psychological and physical health of prisoners but is a realistic starting point for raising other, more fundamental questions regarding the treatment of the confined' (Sim, 1991, p. 38). Similar themes can be identified in relation to the campaign around the privatisation of prisons, where abolitionists have supported the moves by groups as diverse as The National Association of Probation Officers, The Civil and Public Servants' Association and The Prison Officers' Association to prevent further spread of the privatised network in Britain. The points raised by this campaign, which include the unethical nature of privatisation in relation to punishment and the non-accountability of those operating private prisons, directly parallel the issues raised by two of the leading members of the abolitionist movement in Britain in the book they published on the subject in 1989 (Ryan and Ward, 1989).

These campaigns, seen alongside those discussed earlier, indicate that abolitionism has not been the marginalised and irrelevant discourse claimed by its critics. Rather, it should be understood as a hegemonic force which has been generated by and responded to the 'contingent [and] fundamentally open-ended nature of polities'. In that sense it can be seen as part of the struggle to develop a radical discourse around penality, in Gramscian terms attempting to replace 'common sense' with 'good sense' in relation to crime and punishment (Hall, 1988, p. 109). In making this argument I am not positing a simple, uni-dimensional, causal relationship between abolitionist thinking and penal reform, particularly in terms of policy as 'the emergence of policy reforms from below (as with those from above) is the result of a complex and often fractious process' (Sim, 1991, p. 33). Nor am I idealising the impact of abolitionism on the increasing authoritarianism of state power. Rather I am pointing to the specificity of the abolitionist project in Britain, which in utilising a complex set of competing, contradictory and oppositional discourses, and providing support on the ground for the confined and their families, has challenged the hegemony around prison that historically and contemporaneously has united state servants, traditional referm groups and many academics on the same pragmatic and ideological terrain. In a nvimber of areas discussed in this paper, such as deaths in custody, prison conditions, medical power, visiting, censorship and sentencing, these groups have conceded key points in the abolitionist argument and have moved onto a more radical terrain where they too have contested the construction of state-defined truth around penal policy. What this process means for the future is the subject of the last section of this paper.

THE AGE OF IMPROVEMENT

The debate about the future of the prisons and the criminal justice system in general is now dominated by the issue of state-inspired reforms. It is important to recognise, however, that the movement for reform has been generated not by state benevolence but by the demands made by prisoners in different demonstrations, by grassroots organisations unwilling to accept the 'truth' surrounding the appalling miscarriages of justice that have occurred in the last twenty years, and by pro-feminist organisations demanding changes in the definitions of- and responses to - male brutality towards women. In the light of the major disruption in the prisons during the igSos two significant reports have been published, Opportunity and Responsibility (Scottish Prison Service, 1990) and the Woolf Report (1991). These documents appear to herald a new beginning for prisons in this country. In recognising that change is needed if the deeply damaging events of the 19808 are to be avoided, they propose a number of reforms, including establishing a framework of justice for prisoners, improved conditions, increased contact with the outside, better staff training and, crucially, making the confined responsible for their behaviour through introducing prisoners' contracts. Both documents have been almost uncritically endorsed in the media, and by academics and politicians as the panacea for alleviating the crisis inside.

From an abolitionist perspective there are some serious theoretical and political problems in utilising these proposals as the basis for future penal arrangements. Space does not permit me to provide an in-depth analysis, although I have done this elsewhere (Sim, 1991; 1993). However, I want briefly to point to four distinct areas which would form part of an abolitionist critique of the rhetoric of reform contained in these reports.

First, both documents either marginalise or heavily qualify the experiences of the confined. This means that alternative definitions of penal reality remain hidden and subservient to orthodox and state definitions of events. This is important because it allows both reports to transform questions of power, domination and institutionalised intimidation, which have been central to the abolitionist position, into more benign problems of administrative malpractices or individual deviance. There is a classic passage in the Woolf report which illustrates this point. Woolf points out that after the demonstration in Pucklechurch Remand Centre (near Bristol) in April 1990, surrendering prisoners were told that their arms and legs would be broken. The report notes:

There is no doubt that at the time the inmates were very frightened (I use that word advisedly) and even if the remarks made to them when waiting on the lawn were made in jest, they could, and did, cause considerable fear to the inmates. When considering these criticisms the long hours that management and staff had been on duty should be taken into account. Each member of staff must have been extremely tired and . . . close to exhaustion.
(Woolf and Tumim, 1991, p. 271)

The second problem also relates to the politics of marginalisation, in this case the failure to deal with or respond to a number of key prison issues that have arisen in the last twenty years: the unfettered discretion of staff, prisoners' rights, the accountability of prisons within a liberal democracy, the financing and cost of the service, women in prison and the sentencing process. For both documents the alleviation of the crisis lies not in confronting these issues but in the development of the responsible prisoner/customer, tied to each establishment by an agreed individual contract. Through this construction the debate is shifted onto the narrow ledge of individualism and social administration and away from wider structural questions concerning power, collective rights and democratic control (Sim, 1993)

Third, the increasing emphasis on coercion and militarisation as strategies for maintaining order means that the proposed reforms, even if they are accepted on their own terms, are unlikely to marginalise the ideological and material support within the state for these strategies. Prisoners will now receive an extra ten years for what is quaintly described as 'prison mutiny'. As Kenneth Baker has maintained, they must learn that rioting is not a 'cost-free option' (cited in Sim, 1993).

Finally, current reformist rhetoric misses a central issue raised by abolitionists and others in the last two decades, namely that unconditional support for limited change mystifies broader structural questions around the prevailing definitions of criminality that operate in this society, and vvno is punished as a result of these definitions. The first national survey published by the Prison Reform Trust in December 10,0,1 showed that unemployment, homelessness, lack of education and psychiatric disorders were prevalent in the prison population, that prisoners were overwhelmingly males aged 17?40, that 16 per cent of males and 26 per cent of females came from Afro-Caribbean backgrounds, and that this group was serving substantially longer sentences than white prisoners, in the case of the women over twice as long. The report concluded that imprisonment 'exacerbates those very disadvantages which . . . led the person into crime in the first ' place' (Prison Reform Trust, 1991, p. 6).

Historically and contemporaneously, the prison has overwhelmingly contained the detritus generated by this society's hierarchical arrangements. In making this point T am not denying the impact that crimes committed by many of the imprisoned can have, nor am I positing a model of behaviour in which human beings are propelled in a positivist sense by forces outside of their control. Clearly, there are important philosophical and social psychological questions to be discussed concerning free will, responsibility and personal accountability, although given the abject recidivism rate in prisons the institution's supporters can hardly defend its track record in encouraging responsible behaviour in the confined. Having said that, I do want to make the point that today's age of penal improvement is simply reinforcing conventional definitions of criminality, and that the prison of the twenty-first century is likely to operate at an ideological and symbolic level in the active construction and reconstruction of very precise and narrow definitions of criminality and social harm. As abolitionists like Mathiesen have maintained, the prison has to be understood both as a material place of confinement and as an ideological signifier. Not only does the institution encourage and reinforce bifurcation, powerlessness and stigmatisation, but it also establishes 'a structure which places members of one class in such a situation that the attention we might pay to the members of another is diverted' (Mathiesen 1990, p. 138). Distracting attention away from crimes of the powerful and aclively constructing particular images of criminality, however fragmentary and contradictor that process might be is, in Mathiesen's view, central to the continuation of the prison and to the reinforcement of a 'pervasive ideological mystification' around crime (Mathiesen, 1990, p. 141). This argument is particularly relevant to the debates around dangerousness. One of the most depressing elements in recent academic debates in criminology, which in my view can be directly linked to the reformist rhetoric of the state, is that in the rush to take crime seriously and to rediscover aetiology, the symbolic place of institutions like prisons as cultural signifiers has been neglected. This continually allows the debate on dangerousness (and crime in general) to take place on a conventional terrain clearly marked out in the discourses of state servants, government ministers, most media personnel and in the common sense of popular consciousness. Consider the brief passages below, describing two events separated by only eighteen months that occurred in the late 1960's

Tex's final thrusts were suddenly interrupted by a frantic shout from Katie. While Tex and Sadie had been focusing their attention on Frykow-ski, Folger had freed herself from the noose and was making an effort to escape. Katie caught her, but was losing the battle until Tex got there. He clubbed Folger with the pistol and then stabbed her until he thought she was dead. Between his dash from Frykowski to Katie, Tex saw Sebring moving, and paused long enough to make several knife thrusts into Sebring's body. Once Folger was down and apparently dead, Tex returned to finish the job on Frykowski. (Emmons, 1988, pp. 244-5)

When children came running to them for sweets, they scythed them down with automatic fire. They herded mothers and babies into bunkers and threw grenades in after them. They raped and sodomised Vietnamese girls and then sliced open their vaginas with bayonet or knife. They scalped old men and women, beheaded others, slit throats, cut out tongues, sliced off ears, and hacked off limbs . . . Some wanted the dubious honour of being a 'double veteran' -American army slang for raping a woman and then murdering her. (Knightley, 1992, p. 40)

The first passage describes the murders committed by the Manson family, the second those committed at My Lai in March 1968. Despite the appalling brutality of both actions, the response to them was (and is) very different: Charles Manson is still serving a life sentence, William Callcy, one of 'C' company's officers, served four-and-a-half months. There are a number of significant sociological questions to be raised here, not least of which relates to the culture of masculinity within which these actions can be contextualised and perhaps understood. For the purpose of my argument it is important to recognise that twenty years on, the Manson case reverberates symbolically as a chilling example of how serious crime and dangerousness continue to be denned in conventional and narrow positivist terms, while the Calley case is effectively closed. As Barbara Hudson has noted, 'serious crimes and crimes which are taken seriously are not necessarily the same . . . seriousness of law enforcement. . . does not relate to seriousness of crime if the latter is to be judged by any rational calculus of harm as suggested by the more liberal justice model theorists' (Hudson, 1987, p. 126). This argument can clearly be extended to other activities that remain effectively unpoliced and unpunished: large-stale commercial fraud (Levi, 1987), the criminality of the state in terms of espionage, assassination and conspiracy (Barak, 1991; Gill, 1994); and at more micro levels, violent male behaviour underpinned by power, militarisation and the culture of masculinity (Tift and Mark-ham, 1991). Even when fraud cases are prosecuted, poorer and powerless offenders 'are more likely to be imprisoned, pound for pound stolen, than is a fraudster' (Levi, 1989, p. 107).

Critics of this position will no doubt say (as they always do) that even if the definition of crimes of the powerful is extended and recognised, abolitionists and other radical critics still fail to confront the fact that there are some dangerous individuals, overwhelmingly men, who in the conventional sense need to be confined. This view can be challenged at two levels. First, as I have already noted, many of those involved in the abolitionist movement in Britain have been confronting the issue of violence at least since the early ig8os and have been pointing to the problems that those defined as conventionally dangerous, for example, male rapists, have brought to the lives of particular groups. Second, British abolitionists have never advocated simply 'tearing down the walls' of the penitentiary Rather they have maintained that incapacitating conventionally dangerous individuals such as rapists through detention does not necessarily guarantee an alleviation of violence, either at an individual or collective level. Imprisoned rapists are likely to be confronted by a prison culture which will do little to change their behaviour, heighten their consciousness or the consciousness of those in the wider society concerning the 'intimate intrusions' which face women on a daily basis (Stanko, 1985). The first major study of imprisoned rapists in the UK supports this argument. Tt showed that only 32 out of 142 men believed that raped women had been harmed, while less than half displayed any compassion for their victims (The Guardian, 5 March 1991). While some exemplary work has been done with sex offenders in institutions such as Grendon Underwood and Wormwood Scrubs, supported by individually well-motivated prison officers, which perhaps will be consolidated by the newly formed national system for the treatment of sex offenders, it could be argued that there is a danager that at an ideological level this work and reform simply reassert the 'therapeutic discourse', which conceptualises 'male violence as an irrational act of emotional ventilation' rather than as behaviour based on intentional motivation and the will to dominate (Dobash and Dobash, 1992, p. 248). A similar point has been made in relation to the most recent proposals for reforming police practices concerning domestic violence, which are based on the reassertion of traditional family values (Radford and Stanko, 1991).

My scepticism towards these reforms does not mean resorting to incarcerating the powerful as a way forward. Clearly that would defeat the politics and the objectives of abolitionism by implying that the phenomenon of a 'fair incarceration rate' exists (Thomas and Boehle-feld, 1991, p. 249). It does mean, however, recognising that the oper-adonalisation of power, its interpersonal and structural abuse and its mediation by social class, gender, race and sexuality needs to be responded to; it is how we respond that remains the key question for abolitionism. I believe that current reformist proposals, because of their marginalisation of the issue of power, do not come close to addressing the philosophical, sociological, psychological and political nuances generated by this question.

CONCLUSION

This paper has quite deliberately covered a lot of sociological ground, because I wanted to illustrate the importance of abolitionist thought in this country and the diverse range of concerns of its supporters. I do not therefore take the pessimistic view that abolitionism has offered nothing or continues to offer nothing towards the prison debate. As Jim Thomas and Sharon Boehlefeld have noted: 'struggle is as long as history . . . the outcomes of our resistance to unjust forms of social control are rarely immediately visible' (Thomas and Boehlefeld, 1991, p. 249). Indeed, the abolitionist argument remains a powerful one, as Willem de Haan's critical dissection of traditional forms of punishment has indicated (dc Haan, 1990). Similarly, Pat Carlen's cogent argument for the abolition of women's prisons as 'one small step towards giving the criminal justice and penal systems the thorough shake up they so desperately need' also provides a clear theoretical and pragmatic view of the way forward in this still neglected area (Carlen, 1990, p. 125). As Thomas and Boehlefeld point out, a theoretically refined abolitionism can offer a new way of thinking about the world and a vision of the future which contrasts sharply with traditional methods of penality based on incapacitation, deterrence, punishment and rehabilitation. It directly confronts the 'cynicism and anomie' of postmodernism, it reaffirms the argument that prisons don't work 'either as punishment or as a means of ensuring the safety and stability of the commonweal' and it recognises that predatory behaviour needs to be responded to and dealt with within the structural and interpersonal contexts of power and politics (Thomas and Bochlefeld, 1991, pp. 246-49). That vision can be compared with the present situation here and elsewhere, which is evoked in the words of George Jackson: 'The ultimate expression of law is not order - it's prison. There are hundreds upon hundreds of prisons, and thousands upon thousands of laws, yet there is no social order, no social peace' (Jackson, 1975, p95). Jackson's posthumous thoughts provide a fitting description of both the politics of British prisons and the increasingly factious and divided nation they help to legitimate and sustain in the late twentieth century.

Thanks to Anette Rallinger, Dave Brown, Jenny Rurke, Russell Dobash, Paul Gilroy, Paddy Hillyard, Tony Jefferson, Mirk Ryan and Tony Ward for discussing different aspects of this paper with me.

The abolitionist approach: a British perspective (Part One of Two)

2010-06-18T08:00:00.051+01:00

by Joe Sim

Among social scientists there seems to be considerable disillusionment, and, indeed, a turning away from the goal of abolition -more or less as if it were a youthful and confused prank from the late sixties which the middle aged and wise can hardly uphold. I have, however, never understood why a negative political trend -be it increased armaments or expanded prison systems - should lead one to conclude that the trend in question no longer constitutes a point of fundamental attack and final abolition from a radical position.
(Mathiesen, 1986, p. 84)

The title of this paper, 'The abolitionist approach: a British perspective',1 will probably seem like an anachronism to many. For those concerned with the daily grind of criminal justice and penal policy, abolitionism is likely to be regarded as an esoteric, academic luxury which is irrelevant to the delivery of penal services both to the confined and to the wider society. The British demand for 'facts' as opposed to historically, theoretically and philosophically grounded analysis, whether of an abolitionist nature or not, is as prominent in the prisons debate as it is in other social policy debates. A number of academics in the UK, no doubt, will have other, but no less critical views. Abolitionists are now regarded as sociological dinosaurs, unre-constituted hangovers from the profound but doomed schisms of the late 1960's, who are marginal to the 'real' intellectual questions of the 1990's. Like Marxism, abolitionism appears to have been left behind on the sandbank of history while the river of modernity - or as many intellectuals would have it, postmodernity - flows progressively forward producing wave after consumerist wave of choice, opportunity and desire. Social formations now need realistic economic and social policies in general, and penal policies in particular, to respond to the new times flooding the planet, which in turn require research that is relevant to the service orientation of the newly reformed state and its subject/customers both inside and outside the walls of the penitentiary.

Superficially, there appears to he strong sociological evidence to support this contention. Abolitionism, it seems, has failed to impact upon the direction of penal policy or the debate on crime and punishment. Indeed, the modern prison, despite 150 years of 'monotonous critique', as Michel Foucault put it, has not only endured but expanded to become materially and ideologically critical in the remorseless struggle to enforce law and maintain order. The institution's presence on the landscape of British society appears to be so deeply embedded that it has become almost naturalised in popular consciousness and state discourse as an immutable barrier, which despite crises and contradictions protects the law-abiding from the swamping encroachment of the desperate and degenerate in the same way that it was thought to protect the respectable from the ravages of first the parasitic delinquent, and then the dangerous classes in the nineteenth century (Garland, 1985). This conception of the prison has continued into the late twentieth century. Whatever social index is taken - the rate of imprisonment, numbers detained, expenditure, time served or judicial sentencing patterns - the prison, despite the occasional drop in the average daily population, is on a relentlessly expansionist course.

This perception was confirmed in 1991 by the former Home Secretary, Kenneth Baker. In an unwitting affirmation of Foucault's maxim that the prison 'is always offered as its own remedy' for its internal problems, Baker pointed to the steps involved in his government's 'programme of prison reform'. In England and Wales this included raising expenditure to £1.4 billion in 1992-93, recruiting an extra 4,100 prison officers and opening thirteen new prisons bv January 1994 at a cost of £900 million (Hansard, 1991, col. 168). Expenditure on law and order in general was expected to rise by 11 per cent in 1992-93 taking it up to £6 billion, still a clear exception to the prudent monetarist axe which successive Conservative governments have taken to public spending as the austere prerequisite for the economic, political and ideological resurrection of the nation. There has been a parallel growth in the range of alternatives to custody, which was supplemented in October 1992 by curfew orders and the cybernetic electronic tag (Muncie, 1990; Vass, 1990). By the year 2000 the number of prisoners will have increased by 25 per cent, reaching 57,500 in England and Wales. This figure includes a 44 per cent increase in the remand population (Home Office 1992, Table i)

Abolitionism also appears to have been further weakened by the state's strategy for reform, developed in the wake of the furious demonstrations by prisoners in the mid-1980's. Within this discourse the mistakes of the past have been recognised and prison regimes will be modified so that the disasters of the 1980's, such as those at Strange-ways (in Manchester, England) and Peterhead (in Scotland) will never be repeated. Even those on the left who might be broadly sympathetic to abolitionists have been highly critical, describing their 'anarcho-communist' position as 'preoccupied with abolishing or minimising state intervention rather than attempting to make it more effective, responsive and accountable' (Matthews, 1989, p. 5).

This paper will challenge this pessimistic reading of abolitionism by exploring three themes. First, I want to analyse the theoretical and political contribution of British abolitionists and to illustrate the hegemonic impact of this contribution on the traditional, more conservative reform lobby in this country. Second, the paper will explore the specificity of abolitionist thought in Britain and will illustrate the sociological influences on abolitionists here which took them along a different theoretical and political path to abolitionists in other countries. Finally, the paper will focus on the state of British prisons today and will discuss the reforms now being proposed to alleviate the perennial and debilitating crisis in the system. I will argue that these reforms will do little to alter 'the fiasco' that is the prison system (Mathiesen, 1990, p. 140). The paper concludes by reasserting the need for an abolitionist perspective in which the starting-point for changing prisons is changing the inequality in power, both at the micro and macro levels, in a society that is deeply and increasingly divided along the fault lines of class, gender, race and sexuality.

ORIGINS 1970-80

Willem de Haan's recent overview of abolitionism provides a useful starting-point for tracing its development in Europe and North America. It emerged at the end of the igGos as part of a destructuring movement whose main objective 'was to soften the suffering which society inflicts on its prisoners' (de Haan, 1991, p. 204). Since then abolitionism has developed along a number of different dimensions. Theoretically, it has rejected the claims made by defenders of the conventional criminal justice system that it protects people and controls crime. The prison is 'counter productive, difficult to control and [is] itself a major social problem', and crime should be understood as a complex, socially constructed phenomenon which 'serves to maintain political power relations and lends legitimacy to the expansion of the crrne control apparatus and the intensification of surveillance and control'. Strategies such as redress, compensation and reconciliation need to be introduced into a decentralised criminal justice system. Politically, abolitionism has called for the 'fundamental reform of the penal system [which] presupposes not only a radical change of the existing power structure but also of the dominant culture'. Finally, social problems, conflicts and troubles should be taken seriously bvit not as crime. This means arguing for 'social policy rather than crime control policy' within a framework of 'decriminalisation, depenalis-ation, destigmatisation, decentralisation and deprofessionalisation' (de Haan, 1991, pp. 205-14).

This general history of abolitionism's development is, I think, well known. However, there has been much less discussion about how-abolitionists have operated within the specific context of British politics, the issues they have confronted and perhaps most importantly, the nature of the interventions they and other radical prisoners' rights organisations have made in the last twenty years. Close examination of these issues highlights a number of significant theoretical, political and strategic differences between abolitionism in this country and elsewhere.

The first abolitionist group, Radical Alternatives to Prison (RAP), was established in Britain in 1970. As Mick Ryan has noted, RAP's initial position on prisons was straightforward: it was out to abolish them. For the group reform was highly problematic; 'by improving conditions prisons are made more acceptable, they are legitimised in the public mind' (Ryan, 1978, p. 138). It is important to recognise, however, that despite this hard-line position RAP was involved from (he beginning in a series of campaigns around specific issues. As I noted above, this point has rarely been discussed in the literature on abolitionism, yet it is critical for understanding the influence of British abolitionist thought and the nature of its political and humanitarian concerns.

In May 1971, RAP convened a conference on women in prison. From this meeting a campaign was organised against the rebuilding of Holloway women's prison as a secure hospital which would have minimal custodial facilities. There were demonstrations and exhibitions and a pamphlet, Alternatives to Holloway, was published in May 1972. The pamphlet pointed to the facts of female crime and argued that too many women were remanded unnecessarily in custody, that many offences could be dealt with by other means, and that women should not be imprisoned for offences such as alcoholism, child cruelty and petty theft. Instead, RAP suggested that community-based projects should be introduced which would 'make prison for women seem irrelevant'. The new Holloway was a £6 million 'folly' which would detain women 'unnecessarily labelled as criminal and then treat them in an institutional setting which was almost bound to fail' (Ryan, 1978, pp. 102-5).

What is interesting, I think, is the outcome of the campaign. At one level, it could be judged to have failed as the prison was rebuilt, though it is worth noting that it did nothing to alleviate the problems of confined women in the ensuing years. The repressive nature of the regime, particularly the notorious Ci wing, the 'Muppet House', resulted in a series of gruesome self-injuries as women responded to the particular pains of imprisonment they endured and the patriarchal discourses which underpinned diem (Padel and Stevenson, 1988, p. 72). At another level, 'there is very little doubt that the campaign made the problem of women in prison more visible that it had been in the past' (Ryan, 1978, p. 106). This visibility was to be reinforced and sustained over the next fifteen years, first in the proliferation of academic work in the area (Carlen, 1983; Dobash, Dobash and Gutteridgc, 1986); second, through the formation of the pressure group Women in Prison in 1983; and finally in the impact that these early campaigns had on the traditional reform groups, who had previously ignored this issue.

Ryan also points to a second early campaign which was mounted against the notorious psychiatric Control Units, secretly opened by the Home Office in July 1974 to discipline those labelled as subversive trouble-makers. Removed from the general population, they were kept in strict isolation twenty-three hours a day for ninety days, followed by a second ninety-day period when they were allowed to mix with; others in the Unit. If an individual prisoner broke any prison, rule, however minor, he went back to day one, stage one, to start again.

It is important to recognise that RAP campaigned for the closure of the Units alongside other, more traditional reform groups, including the government-sponsored National Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders and the Howard League for Penal Reform. In October 1975 it was announced that the Units were to be discontinued. In one sense, this could be seen as a victory both for interventionist politics and for RAP's uncompromising position. On the other hand, as Ryan notes, the extent to which the campaign's pressure moved government policy 'is genuinely difficult to say since what actually happens inside our prisons is surrounded by secrecy, a secrecy which is well-served by the ambiguity of official statements' (Ryan, 1978, p. 137).

These initial campaigns were followed by a number of others which took place against a background of an ever-deepening crisis in Britain's prisons (Fitzgerald and Sim, 1982). They included highlighting the use of drugs to control prisoners, pointing to the role of the Prison Medical Sendee in this control, defending the philosophy and practices of the Barlinnie Special Unit and establishing alternatives to custody such as the Newham Alternative Project, which showed 'the possibilities of achieving genuinely humane as well as potentially negating reforms with the most limited resources' (Cohen, 1980, p. 6). In January 1979 RAP began publishing its journal, The Abolitionist, which was to run until 1987. Its first editorial pointed out that while the organisation did not have a blueprint for the future, it did believe that its:

ideas about and approach towards antisocial behaviour (as opposed to 'crime') arc much more relevant and credible than the established logic which reflects and only serves to perpetuate an unequal and exploitative social system. It follows that we seek to remove such sentiments from the ephemeral regions they tend to inhabit and translate them into an effective force for social change.
(The Abolitionist, No. i, p. i)

This editorial position, which came very close to that of European abolitionism, was not to be sustained. By the beginning of the 1980s RAP, while still maintaining that radical structural change was the key to dealing with crime and punishment, nonetheless underwent some important changes both in personnel and in its theoretical position, which in turn had repercussions for its political strategy. If the 1980s was to be the decade of law and order, arguably it was also the decade in which a more theoretically sophisticated and politically astute organisation made a significant impact on many traditionalists involved in the debates around penal policy.

INTO THE LAW AND ORDER DECADE

The refinement in RAP's position took place against an intensification in the prison crisis which I mentioned earlier. The interlocking nature of the crisis was apparent in the overcrowded and appalling conditions in short-term prisons, in the challenges to the state's definition of penal truth mounted by radical prisoners' rights organisations, in the violent confrontations in long-term male prisons, and in the vociferous, widespread industrial action taken by prison officers. These, in turn, were underpinned by a more general crisis of penal legitimacy (Fitzgerald and Sim, 1982). More widely, the election of the new Conservative government in May 1979 underlined the collapse of the social democratic consensus, the emergence of a strong state and the consolidation of the new right as the hegemonic bloc in society, held there by the ideological cement of authoritarian populism (Hall, 1988). At the same time, those social movements which emerged at the end of the igGos and which stood outside of both organised left and state-defined political action had also consolidated their position, competing with and contradicting dominant discourses surrounding race, gender, sexuality and ecology (Gilroy, 1987).

RAP's response to these profound events was outlined in The Abolitionist by two members of its editorial collective. First, Tony Ward, the journal's editor, dealt with the perennial issue of reform and argued that the immediate priority was to 'gain support for reforms of the penal system which while making it more humane will also show up its inherent limitations and contradictions' (Ward, 1982, p. 22, emphasis in the original). Ward also wrote the editorial outlining the organisation's goals. He maintained that while many reforms amounted to 'a sugar coating on a toxic pill', it was nonetheless important to argue for the immediate reform and abolition of particular parts of the system, including the use of drugs as control mechanisms, solitary confinement, the system of security classification, secrecy and censorship. The Barlinnie Special Unit indicated, for WTard, what could be achieved by a 'less authoritative and restrictive approach'. He concluded by differentiating the politics of RAP from those in the traditional reform lobby, so that while many of RAP's medium term goals were shared by the traditionalists, they did not share 'our political outlook':

RAP's fundamental purpose is, through research and propaganda to educate the public about the true nature, as we see it, of imprisonment and the criminal law; to challenge the prevailing attitudes to crime and delinquency; and to counter the ideology of law-and-order which helps to legitimate an increasingly powerful State machine' (The Abolitionist, No.12, p2).

The second article, written by Jill Box-Grainger, critically evaluated RAP's first ten years, pointed to the recent sociological and political influences on the organisation and outlined RAP's developing strategy for changing prisons and the wider criminal justice process. This strategy included supporting 'negative' reforms such as disbanding the Prison Medical Service, prohibiting the use of drugs to control prisoners, removing the disciplinary role from prison Boards of Visitors, abolishing parole and introducing greater accountability through ending prison secrecy and the censorship of mail. These reforms were underpinned by the demand for a moratorium on prison building, a reduction in maximum sentences, curtailing the power of scntencers, decriminalisation of certain offences and the implementation of radical alternatives to prison. Finally, and contrary to the ill-informed assertion that radicals have not been concerned about victims of crime, she pointed to RAP's call for a re-evaluation of the 'significance of criminal restitution [and of] the relationship between the offender and the victim' (Box-Grainger, 1982, pp. 17-18).

The article then moved on to discuss the perennial and key issues of serious offenders and dangerousness. This debate had been fuelled by two developments. First, there was the apparent bifurcation in llrhish penal policy which was leading to an expansion in the numbers and rate of turnover in short-term prisons, and the simultaneous increase in the numbers and length of detention in long-term prisons. Second, (he deba(e was increasingly influenced by (he philosophical, epistemological and political questions raised by the women's movement, particularly the demand to be protected from 'oppressive and gratuitous street and domestic violence'. RAP therefore was '(quite healthily) ... forced to consider "what should be done" with the serious offender if it is to be at all responsible to popular demands (albeit that RAP continues to underline the fact that serious offenders constitute a very small proportion of all offenders)' (Box-Grainger, 1982, p. 21).

The organisation also began to reassess its position on radical alternatives, particularly the place of 'the community' within the framework of an alternative model of justice. Constructing the problem of prison abolition through community alternatives assumed a homogeneity of values within society in general and in working-class communities in particular. It was therefore important to distinguish between (he long-term interests of working-class people, where there 'may be enormous similarity', and short-term interests, which were 'frequently antagonistic'. This had serious implications for women: '[community] has always involved the re-assertion of the role of the family, the basic unit of the community and ultimately the containment of women in the home. That in the short term the interests of a son may be in conflict with a mother's own interests is not only a theoretical problem but potentially a barrier against "community" support for radical alternatives' (Box-Grainger, 1982, p. 16).

RAP's consideration of this issue was underlined by the formation of a Sex Offences Group within the organisation. The group maintained that it was hazardous to attempt to construct a definition of dangerous individuals. Rather it argued for a policy of exemplary or retributive punishment 'as an appropriate response to sow offences. The important thing then is the viciousness of the act not the actor . . .' (The Abolitionist, No. 10, p. 4, emphasis in the original). It also argued for a radical restructuring of both sentencing policy and wider social relationships. Again influenced by the impact of feminism, the group confronted the sentencing issue in its evidence to the Criminal Law Revision Committee's Working Paper on Sexual Offences. It asked 'how can the law emphasise the unacceptable nature of rape and indecent assault without resorting to excessively long prison sentences for rapists who are not representative of the majority of those who rape?' Additionally, could sentencing protect women from rape at all? The group made ten proposals to deal with sentencing and imprisoned rapists and concluded:

"RAP recognizes that the above proposals are only a brief outline of a possible sentencing practice for convicted rapists, where all custodial sentences are shorter and where custody is not so debasing and destructive as at present. And again we would stress that this type of sentencing can only be effective if it is used against a background of real equality of opportunity for women - an equality that offers women economic independence, political, ideological and sexual determination."
(The Abolitionist, No. 10, pp. 6?7)

THEORETICAL UNDERPINNINGS

It is important to recognise that the change in RAP's strategy and political orientation was mirrored in a series of more general theoretical debates that occurred at the beginning of the 1980s. In particular, the question of reform as initially discussed in Mathiesen's seminal Politics of Abolition (1974) was addressed as a theoretical and political problem. In 1982, Mike Fitzgerald and I, while arguing for an abolitionist position as the answer to the enduring crisis in British prisons, also maintained that the 'positive' and 'negative' distinction made by Mathiesen did not address the subtleties and ramifications of particular reforms. For us 'reform by its very nature contain both positive and negative possibilities' (Fitzgerald and Sim, 1982, p. 164, emphasis in the original). In 1985, Dave Brown and Russell Hogg developed a similar critique. Pointing to the issue of legal rights, they asked if introducing due process was a positive or negative reform. The answer was not straightforward:

"reform measures or lines of advance cannot necessarily be adequately specified or evaluated a priori by reference either to some positive/ negative calculus or to some general theory of law. . . state . . . capital . . . legitimation . . . legal right etc. Ii is not necessary to embrace (lie ambiguous assumptions of 'the justice model' . . . or 'rights' discourse ...to recognise that the introduction of legal representation, procedural and appeals rights into internal disciplinary hearings presents a possibility of 'bringing power to particular account' . . . On the other hand detailed practices of discipline and normalisation, surveillance, differentiation, classification, assessment, segregation, deprivation within the site of the prison are not adequately contested simply through attempts to 'legalise' the prison.
(Brown and Hogg, 1985, p.73)

Brown and Hogg developed this analysis in a number of other papers which raised a series of theoretical questions about abolitionism. They pointed out that abolitionism tended to posit common political interests, usually built on class affiliation, between the unpro-ductivc (prisoners) and radical fractions of the working class. There were problems with constructing a unified class subject in this way in (hat this construction underestimated power networks which divided, differentiated and classified populations on the 'basis of sexual differentiation or grids of normality, age, health, etc.' (Brown and Hogg, 10,0,2). This differentiation had real effects: 'the success of the prison and other agencies such as the police at constituting an "alien and dangerous" criminal class is real and cannot be reversed by a simple assertion of common class interests. It is always a question of co/M/n;r(-m^allianccs often in very specific, localised and short-term ways. There is no necessary underlying unity waiting to be recognised' (Brown and Hogg, 10,0,2, pp. 154-5, emphasis in the original).

Tony Ward has also argued that within the specific context of Britain, struggles around and resistance to penal power are better understood by reference to Foucault's 'oppositional model of action' rather than Mathiesen's concept of 'contradiction'. He points to the strategy of opposition developed in the probation service and maintains that the clear division within abolitionist thought between control and welfare agencies, while 'theoretically attractive', is 'politically untenable in Britain'. The largest support for abolitionism has come from the voluntary agencies, social workers and probation officers whose everyday activity 'inescapably involves mixing care and control. To present these people with a stark choice between providing "pure" control within the penal system or "pure" help outside it could simply play into the hands of those in authority who are eager to reassert the importance of control as the system's primary role" (Ward, 1991, p. 161).

Along with Mick Ryan, Ward has also highlighted other theoretical currents which influenced abolitionism in the 1980's, including feminist theory and the campaign around rape launched by Women Against Rape. It was from this 'difficult but productive debate' that a range of other questions arose concerning the role of the state, the relationship between capitalism and patriarchy and, following Foucault, the problem of denning the nature of power and crimes of the powerful:

No longer did the world appear to be neatly divided between the 'powerful' and the 'powerless', nor were 'crimes of the powerful' the sole prerogative of the ruling class, once the concept was extended (o take account of the power of men over women, of white people over black and of adults over children. (RAP was one of the first groups in the lobby to engage seriously with the issue of child sexual abuse).
(Ryan and Ward, 1990, p. 7)

No respect for the working class

2010-06-17T08:00:00.018+01:00

The following first appeared in the Newspaper "Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism!"

On 10 January, the government announced its much trailed, ' Respect Action Plan'. According to the official press release, police and local authorities are to be given 'tough new powers to deal with families who blight communities with unacceptable behaviour'.

These powers include 'a new house closure order temporarily sealing properties that are the constant focus of anti-social behaviour'- and 'parenting orders where a child's behaviour requires it'. These 'parenting orders' can be applied for either by schools or by local authority housing officers or community officers. There will be 'sanctions' for those who 'refuse help', including fines and withdrawal of benefits.

Once again Labour is trying to show how tough it is. One of the slogans that helped propel Blair into power was 'Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime.' He's certainly kept to his word on the first line; the prison population has almost doubled since Labour came to power in 1997 and now, by flexing their muscles in the direction of the under-privileged and their children, New Labour are again showing us just how tough they are.

For, make no mistake, although the action plan occasionally speaks of 'proposals' that will, 'provide help and support' for families and' and support for people 'struggling with the challenge of parenting'; by far the bulk of the text is concerned with the punitive measures that will be imposed if this 'help and support' is not accepted.

Not that we needed this new plan to tell us how fixated this government is with punishing the young dispossessed. Not when Anti-Social Behaviour Orders (ASBOs) are scattered among the poor like confetti at a wedding. In some cases these orders are issued to kids whose learning difficulties are so severe that they cannot understand the conditions they are supposed to comply with. In one recent case-exposed by a Panorama documentary a boy with such problems was arrested for breaching his ASBO because he took part in a five-a-side football match. His order forbade him from associating with more than three people.)

ASBOs are issued on the strength of evidence that would not be accepted in a court of law. Hearsay evidence, often from unknown sources, is read out by a council officer, and, in many cases the recipient is only aware of the order being issued when it is actually presented. In other words, people are being tried and sentenced in their absence. In some instances, particularly in Greater Manchester, where the council slavishly follows the New Labour doctrine by issuing more ASBOs than Greater London, the photographs of young children who have been given orders are printed on leaflets which are posted through neighbourhood letter-boxes. Shades of wanted notices in the Wild West.

As if this demonisation of the poor was not enough, we have the spectacle of 'problem families' being evicted because their children have been subject to ASBOs Let us imagine for a moment that, in such a case, the child has indeed behaved badly - does anyone really believe that the answer lies in putting the family on the streets? Clearly those responsible for home office policy do.

"Dispersal Zones' are now the order of the day in many cities, again with Greater Manchester leading the way. In these no-go areas, people can be forcibly dispersed because they are guilty of congregating on the streets. They do not have to be committing a crime, or even causing a nuisance, the fact that they are there clearly implies that they are up to no good.

What has been the response of the media towards this outright attack on the poor? Predictably, the right have welcomed the proposals, but so have parts of the so-called liberal press. Will Hutton, writing in The Observer, says that Blair's line on respect 'deserves better than the buckets of bile poured over him by left and right alike'. Hutton quotes the Chief Constable of Strathclyde, who says that he can identify the houses that will 'incubate the next generation of criminals 'He says that the combination of out-of-control children, desperate poverty cheek-by-jowl with great affluence, the impossibility of even rudimentary success at school and a delinquent peer group are toxic'. Amen to that, but why don't the Chief Constable-and Hutton suggest that we do something about the affluence instead of giving the poor even more problems?

Just in case there is anyone out there who doesn't believe that this respect agenda is class-based, consider this: during the reign of this government we have seen the children of the powerful and privileged clearly seen to be behaving badly. From the Prime Minister's son drunk and throwing up in the streets, to Jack Straw's lad procuring drugs and the next-in-line to the throne taking them, along with dressing up as a Nazi. Did anybody suggest slapping an ASBO on those three, or evicting their families from their homes?

Perhaps that question ought to be asked of the new 'Co-ordinator for Respect', the head of the taskforce which will supervise the whole agenda. Step forward, Louise Casey, who has been chosen for the role on a salary of between £75k and £159k. Not the first time that Ms Casey has been chosen as an overlord. In 1992, when she was the Deputy Director of the charity Shelter, she was appointed to head the government's Rough Sleepers' Unit and earned the nickname, 'homelessness tsar?. She immediately declared that handing out soup and sleeping bags to those living on the streets was merely perpetuating their misery and began a campaign to stop people giving to the homeless. The number of homeless people now stands at record levels, more than 101,000.

Again demonstrating that it is one law for the rich, in a widely leaked and reported after-dinner speech last year, Louise Casey said: 'I suppose you can't binge drink any more because lots of people have said you can't.... I don't know who made bloody made that up, it's nonsense...Doing things sober is no way to get things done.' The respect agenda is in good hands then.

Amidst all the spin words and phrases trotted out in this agenda, one line of sense stands out. 'Respect cannot be learned, purchased or acquired-it can only be earned' They might have added that respect cannot be 'punished into' people.

Eric Allison

Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism!
BCM BOX 5909
LONDON WC1N 3XX

Report - HMP Send: prison-death demonstration held on 20 September 2007

2010-06-16T08:00:00.002+01:00

This report orginally appeared on the NMP website in 2007

Pauline Campbell writes:

Prison-death demonstration - Thursday 20 September 2007 to protest against the tragic death of the young mother Lisa Doe, aged 25 who died on 11 September 2007 while in the care of HMP Send, Surrey

The protest on 20 September 2007 was the 26th demonstration to be held since protests began in April 2004.
Lisa Doe is the seventh woman to die in prison so far this year.
The appalling death toll: 39 women prisoners * (including Lisa Doe) have died since Sarah Campbell's death in 2003. Lessons are not being learned.

A small group of protesters held a peaceful 3-hour demonstration outside HMP Send and, for part of the afternoon, were joined by two relatives of Ms Lisa Doe, who laid flowers in memory of their loved one.
At 2 pm, Mr Andy Peacock, Head of Reducing Reoffending (Duty Governor for the day) emerged from the jail, and spoke to protesters, but said he was unable to comment on Ms Doe's death.
At 3.45 pm, a Serco prison van (BW04 VZH) was stopped as it attempted to enter the jail. The driver was informed that protesters considered the jail to be unsafe, in view of the recent death, and he was asked to take the women to a place of safety.
Surrey Police were summoned to the prison. Officers 1905 and 2751 attended; sergeant 1905 indicated that Section 14, Public Order Act 1986, would be invoked if the prisoner transport van was not allowed to proceed into the jail. The Serco vehicle was eventually allowed to enter the prison, and no arrests were made.
A number of visitors to the jail spoke to protesters, and expressed concern about the physical and mental wellbeing of their loved ones held in HMP Send.
The Conservative MP for Mole Valley, Sir Paul Beresford, was invited to attend the demonstration, but did not respond to the invitation.
The protest was attended by Sky Television; local reporters and photographers, and was also covered by local radio.
At the end of the afternoon, protesters left bouquets of flowers and a memorial placard at the prison entrance, in memory of Ms Doe.

COMMENT

"Another woman has died, and another family is left to grieve."

"This latest death at HMP Send brings into sharp focus the prison's custodial care record. Two young mothers have lost their lives at Send Prison this year: Emma Kelly on 19 April 2007, and Lisa Doe on 11 September 2007. It is particularly worrying that both women were on 'suicide watch' when they died."

"Courts must act responsibly and stop sending women, many with psychiatric and drug-dependency problems, to the punitive regime of a prison, when they are in need of treatment and care. Unless and until this inhuman practice stops, more families will have to deal with the tremendous pain and anger resulting from the death of their loved ones."

[Pauline Campbell]

Child Abuse - The British State's Continued Guilt

2010-06-15T08:00:00.012+01:00

Child Abuse - The British State's continued Guilt

By: John Bowden. (Noranside Prison. Scotland)

Britain has a long and pernicious history of abusing and brutalizing working class children confined to state institutions, so it was hardly surprising recently when a statutory instrument amending the rules governing the treatment of children in "secure training centres" legitimized the use of so-called "physical control in care restraint techniques", one of which authorized staff to inflict blows to the face of children, euphemistically called the "nose distraction technique".

Of course the use of overt physical violence to control socially marginalized and powerless children in penal-type institutions is nothing new and for decades Borstals and Detention Centres operated regimes that were intrinsically brutal and designed to teach a "tough lesson" based on fear and intimidation. The death of a child in the notorious Reading Detention Centre in the late sixties partially exposed the regime of terror that operated in such places, although the state was always careful to maintain the illusion that it neither sanctioned or created the violence routinely inflicted on children in such custodial settings. More recently the extraordinarily high incidence of suicides, self-harm and death in suspicious circumstances of children in Feltham Remand Centre suggest that intimidation and brutality remain the standard methods by which children in custody are treated and controlled.

Thirty children have died in penal custody since 1990, the youngest, Adam Rickwood, was just 14 years old. Just over a third of boys and girls in custody have felt unsafe at some time. One in ten boys and girls in prison say they have been hit, kicked or assaulted by a member of staff.

Traditionally the state has never publicly admitted or condoned the deliberate use of violence against children in custody, which is why the statute authorizing the use of overt brutality in subduing "disruptive" children inmates was so disquieting and shocking. In fact, so horrific was the scenario of state-sanctioned thugs physically brutalizing children in a prison setting that the more liberal elements in the government in the form of the Parliamentary Joint committee On Human Rights announced that it would be reviewing the use of such "restraint" methods in children's' prisons, claiming that such methods had been introduced without any reference to human rights legislation. Subsequently children's minister Beverley Hughes announced that she was suspending the methods pending a report by a panel of medical experts. Her concern was obviously not based on any moral reservations about beating up children in prison, but simply a worry about possible legal consequences.

In October of 2007 the Prison Officers Association offered it's own enlightened contribution to the issue of controlling disturbed and already brutalized children in jail by calling for a change in the rules that would allow prison staff to be able to use batons on children as young as 15.

The psychological damage inflicted on children in custody is well-researched and well known; 85 per cent of prisoners in youth custody institutions show signs of personality disorder, with 10 per cent exhibiting signs of severe psychotic illness such as schizophrenia. Into this mix of mental suffering and pain the state wants to throw some good old fashioned physical brutality. This by any definition is child abuse and it is systemic and organized, and thousands of working class children are irreparably damaged by it.

The state's assault on the rights and freedoms of working class children under New Labour has been sweeping and vicious, and the number of 15 to 17 years olds in prison custody has increased by 86 per cent since Labour took office. In tandem with this mass criminalization of already socially disadvantaged children is the creation of prison regimes openly designed to brutalize them even more.

The media and tabloid press, usually very keen to whip up hysteria and a climate of hatred against child abusers when campaigning for tougher laws, have remained consistently quiet about the abuse of children in closed institutions, creating a silence and invisibility around these children that increases their vulnerability and ill-treatment. Each year over 70,000 children are dealt with through the criminal justice system and around 12,000 of them are incarcerated in penal-type institutions that are no more than training grounds for the adult long-term prison system. This represents the wholesale destruction of young working class lives in the interests of a system that is itself inherently anti-social and predatory towards the poor and powerless.

The imprisonment of children is barbaric and one of the worst forms of state cruelty, and unless we speak out and campaign against it we are all in some way complicit in it.

Probation Officers - Social Workers Or Agents Of Control?

2010-06-14T08:00:00.026+01:00

By Charles Hanson,
HMP Cornhill
August 18th 2004

Today, like no other time in the history of the probation service, probation officers are increasingly being seen as taking on the role of agents of control with their remit as public protection officers as their function moves closer to that of a prosecutorial authority.

Gone are the days when the probation officer ethos was to befriend and assist offenders to lead a non-offending lifestyle and to encourage and intervene where necessary in promoting a sense of social justice.

The one time social work ethos of probation work has now been replaced by tough talk and policies that further increasingly marginalizes and isolates offenders with all the features of 'Big Brother' as extreme forms of monitoring - surveillance - supervision and control takes over from concerns about social equality and inclusion.

Those most concerned about social problems are not quite at one with themselves in their desire to change them. For solving problems would necessitate a change in the organisational mores from which they arise.

The liberal for all his or her allegiances to humanitarian mores remain members of our society and as such under its organisational mores.

They wish to improve the conditions of victims but not interfere with the structures which create them.

Until they abandon their attachment to those organisational mores and structures they must continue to be seen as the perpetrators of the social ills, injustices and inequalities and thus the causes they seek to remedy.

No one loses by giving verbal expression to humanitarianism and probation staff are perfectly adept at this but many would lose out by putting humanitarianism into practice and certainly someone would lose by any conceivable reform.

They must therefore continue to treat the symptoms without removing the causes.

Nowadays, released prisoners who are subject to parole licence and this accounts for a substantial number of prisoners re-entering the world outside of prison and more likely than not liable to be labelled as if they were still offenders. Thus seems to justify a total scrutiny of their lives in the community after the completion of their sentence.

I do not suggest that there are offenders who will not always pose a risk but to propose that all ex -offenders fall into that bracket which justifies blanket concerns and controls is misleading and alienist and closer to a Tory party conference agenda than social work practice.

Current probation practice is now characterised by the almost paranoid high level of attention it gives to the issue of risk. An interest more in keeping with Conservative 'moral panic' and exaggerations but unlike the conservative whose language is one of less government and less interference in the lives of people. The National Probation Service seeks an increase in the attention it gives to individuals thus aligning itself with the 'nanny state' of control from the cradle to the grave and always searching out those areas where people require the interference of 'experts' on how to live, love, work and play.

We now live in a world in which it appears that no place or situation is safe or risk free - the 'risk society' is now upon us with children being deprived of play activity because of some perceived danger, to the hysterical obsessions with diet, playing, loving, working even dying.

It seems that everything is a risk which probation officers have not been slow to adopt in dealing with ex-offenders and forever the world around us must be cocooned against those who are perceived as being a threat to it with the full might of the 'nanny state' being brought into play as a method of control.

This necessarily requires 'tough talk' by probation officers whose concerns are less to do with rehabilitation, reform, social justice and inclusion and more to do with policing and moral control. The service now largely directs its energies at the level of the individual offender, rather than the world around him or her. The idea that offenders should be helped has now but almost disappeared.

Gone also are the days of being 'tough on the causes of crime'.

By a disregard for the causes of crime and the encouragement it provides to probation officers to treat these as irrelevant. Social workers ill-equipped to argue on the basis of values, rather than of technical management, against the possibility of their being expected to take on a more overtly repressive, controlling role are being progressively excluded from meaningful participation in criminal justice.

An extreme example of the transformation comes from California where in the early 1990s probation officers had to choose sides - between being social workers attempting to stop offending and without jobs or crime-controllers with both jobs and guns.

They chose the Smith and Wesson Model 64 .38 calibre and ammunition that had the maximum stopping power.

The probation officer's vision statement then suddenly became rather desperately. 'Arming Probation Officers Doesn't Change the Agency's Mission'.

The point is not that British probation officers and social workers are imminently likely to be asked to choose their weapons, but that social workers who see their work in purely technical, systems management terms may not be able to argue coherently against changes which are plausibly presented as an aid to more efficient system management.

What is also emerging is the attack on both civil and human rights, by probation staff on those under their supervision, through the attachment of conditions to orders and licences. Which restrains offenders and in many instances prohibits the normal forms of rights and expectations which all other members of the community come to expect in a free and democratic society. Often based on no more than a perceived risk. a notion often arrived at on dubious criteria and suspect evidence that has no place in the order of natural justice or sentencing exercises, but sufficient to justify a revocation of a parole licence and further imprisonment.

With violent crime on the increase, the subculture of violence might continue to be seen by some offenders as being a more powerful response to societal injustices and inequalities than the controls like public protection which seeks to curb it thus promoting and producing more harm that it sets out to remedy.

For offenders to have any confidence in probation officers, there ought to be a closer relationship than currently exists, rather than the employment of coerced offending behaviour programmes, which are considerably closer to control and removes the necessity for any relationship between probation officers and those under their supervision.

Those most at risk of current probation practises are released life sentence prisoners whose sentence never expire and renders them liable to recall to prison at any time, based on a perception of risk arrived at, on no more more than a value judgement, but for the lifer it can amount to many years of further confinement from which he or she may never again emerge.

This in spite of the fact that lifers as a group have always had the lowest reoffending rate of all offender groups and is at presently at 2%.

Concerns of probation staff which might render a lifer to recall may involve prohibitions and restrictions which are now seriously open to challenges in the courts under the Human Rights Act and may yet render them as being incompatible with the Act.

The 1953 Royal Commission on Capital Punishment reported that lifers on release ought not to have blanket requirements attached to their licences and that such conditions were a retrograde step and that save for notifying a change of address to the Central Aftercare Association, released lifers should be able to make a fresh start without interference and this was allowed uncontroversially.

Today, lifers can be recalled at the whim of probation officers for behaviour construed as being 'a risk' of offending even if the likelihood of such offences can in no way be linked to or of the nature of the index offence or considered a risk to life or limb.

The Stafford judgement (ECHR 2002) went some way in challenging recall criteria when the applicant who had been on a mandatory life sentence licence had been reconvicted of offences of fraud and sentenced to a term of imprisonment which also revoked the life licence.

At the expiration of the fixed term. Stafford remained in prison under the terms of the life licence recall.

The ECHR took the view that as Stafford had originally exhausted the punishment part (tariff) of his life sentence. That it would be difficult to understand why he had been released in the first place from the life sentence, if he had still posed a risk and that further detention for the fraud could not be justified beyond the fixed term. Simply because the Home Secretary considered Stafford at risk of committing further non-violent crimes or the type of criminal conduct unrelated to the original offence of murder.

As the liberal elite fascists dig in deep with their visions of a society under continual surveillance, monitoring, assessments of individuals. The indeterminate incarceration of the mentally ill and psychologically disturbed there are now moves to bring the children of prisoners within the sphere of risk assessment.

On the 16 August 2004, it was announced that Home Office Minister Hazel Blears was proposing the introduction of legislation to monitor the activities and behaviour of children of prisoners and that such monitoring and supervision involving social services and public protection officers (probation staff) would continue until the child's 16th birthday.

It was estimated that at the present levels some 125,000 children are likely to become subject to fascist nannies.

There has already been some disquiet in 2004 with the Probation Service's role in the proposed administering of polygraph (lie detector) tests on convicted sex offenders.

Whilst the public would reasonably argue that children have a right to be protected from paedophiles and that we should endorse any measures to curb such offences taking place The reality is that there has already been condemnation of this proposed measure and none more so than from experts in the USA where the use of polygraph results have yet to be admissible in the American courts.

Yet, in the UK such a measure would give probation officers the clout they would require to order the recall to prison of a sex offender who appeared to render positive results without the protection of the courts. Put simply. an unacceptable form of surveillance would imprison a suspected offender.

The implications of the acceptance of polygraph testing is not that it might come to be seen as an acceptable form of monitoring for suspected sex offenders but begs the question. who next, the unemployed. the homeless. the socially excluded, the mentally ill or benefit claimants?

Also in 2004, we saw the introduction of two unelected bodies - The Multi Agency Public Protection Panel (MAPPs) and the Multi Agency Risk Assessment Panel (MARAPs).

These will comprise of police officers. probation officers, social workers and representatives from other bodies whose remit will be to monitor the activity initially of sex offenders but has now come to include all lifers.

Many offenders who now have less faith in probation staff than perhaps they once had might also believe that as long as they conform to the conditions of their parole licence that they should not engage probation staff in social problems or concerns for fear of them being misinterpreted as a 'risk' and of them being taken into custody, that probation staff no longer being social workers cannot be trusted to assist them in addressing their needs and might by being too open and honest unwittingly become victims, victims of arbitrary probation practice.

Charles Hanson
VV 1638
HMP Cornhill
Shepton Mallet
BA4 5LU

Statement of No More Prison's Aims

2010-06-13T08:00:00.007+01:00

This is the statement of aims for No More Prison which was agreed at the members meeting on the 1st April 2006

No More Prison

Prisons are failed institutions that do not work. They are places of pain and social control and are brutal, abusive and damaging to everyone who is incarcerated in them. Prisons are fundamentally flawed and all attempts to reform them have failed. We are committed to their abolition through:

Exposing the reality of imprisonment today;
Stopping the building of new prisons and the expansion of existing prisons;
Highlighting the fact that prisons not only fail prisoners but also have a negative impact on families and friends, victims and survivors and the whole community;
Campaigning to close existing prisons;
Opposing the criminalisation of young people, working class and minority ethnic communities;
Promoting radical alternatives to prison that focus on social and community welfare rather than punishment.

Children in jail - the numbers

2010-06-12T08:00:00.000+01:00

Originally published on NMP's website in 2003

Children in jail - the numbers

Home Office Statistics show that prison establishments have just under 1,000 admissions each months of children. (Home Office 2002a, 2002b, 2002c) The latest figures for Novemember 2002 show a population of 2,516 boys and 110 girls in prison. 454 of these are on remand and 2,172 sentenced. The numbers of children have been increasing and these figures represent a 11% increase on the previous year.(Home Office 2002c) Nacro (2003) has pointed out that there has been a rise in the number of children sentenced to detention over the last decade whilst recorded offending has reduced by 20%.

It is likely this increase will continue. As Bright (2003) has reported that since 1997 the Labour Government have created over 300 new crimes and that dozen more crimes will be created by bills currently before Parliament. It is not only the numbers but the nature of offences that Labour has changed. The anti social behaviour bill is seeking to make it an offence for two or more youths to gather on a street corner in an 'intimidating' manner. By intimidating it is meant a situation where a police officer believes a member of the public might be 'intimidated, harassed, alarmed or distressed' as a result of their presence. In such circumstances a failure to disperse when instructed by the police would leave the child liable to a 3 month prison sentence (Bright 2003) It also allows the police to 'order out' of an area a non resident for 24 hours. (CRAE 2003). It will be interesting to see to what extent this power is used against black children entering a white neighbourhood.

Demonstration to protest death of Kelly Hutchinson in New Hall Prison

2010-06-11T08:00:00.033+01:00

This report originally appeared on the No More Prison website in 2006

Report on a Demonstration held outside HMP New Hall, Nr Wakefield on Wednesday 10 May 2006 to protest against the death of Kelly Louise Hutchinson, aged 22, who died on 1 May 2006

3 hour demonstration, attended by ten protesters, including ex-prisoners, representatives from 'No More Prison', and FRFI (Fight Racism, Fight Imperialism).
Letter sent into the prison asked if the Governor would come out to meet the protesters. Governor did not emerge from the jail.
17th demonstration to be held since April 2004.
Prison van MV04 DZX (Global Solutions) was halted at 3 pm, as it attempted to take prisoners into the jail.
West Yorkshire Police attended the scene (two male officers); I was arrested at 3.25 pm for an alleged breach of the peace, taken to Wakefield Police Station, and released without charge after one and a half hours.
Photographs taken by one of the protesters show a "very brutal" arrest, during which one officer lost his set of keys, which he later found in a patch of grass in the prison grounds.
I was handcuffed - behind my back - by the two male police officers.
The two policemen arrived in separate cars. Following my arrest, our departure from the prison was delayed until the officer found his keys.
At the time of arrest, my 'rights' were not read out to me ("you have the right to remain silent", etc).
There were a number of disturbing features about this arrest [and my detention in the custody suite], which will be detailed in a separate report and circulated as appropriate.
Local press attended the demonstration.
I was allowed to contact a solicitor during my detention, and spoke on the telephone to Messrs Hickman & Rose, Human Rights specialists, London.

Comment:

"Since my daughter's death in 2003, a further THIRTY women have died apparently self-inflicted deaths] in the 'care' of prisons in England. Despite this being my 12th arrest since April 2004, I remain undeterred. Where there is injustice, there will be protest.

"There are certain principles on which there can be no compromise. The right to life is one of those. Kelly Hutchinson was owed a legal duty of care, and was sent to prison to lose her liberty, not her life. Eleven women have died in the 'care' of HMP New Hall since 2002. It is time, in my view, to consider the closure of this jail."

Pauline Campbell

[Mother of Sarah Elizabeth Campbell, 18, who died in the 'care' of HMP Styal, 2003]

British Prisons in Ireland: Some historical notes (Part Two)

2010-06-10T08:00:00.034+01:00

Part two of two (for part one click here)

By Mike Tomlinson and Patricia Heatley
This article orginally appeared in "The Abolitionist" The magazine of Radical Alternatives to Prison No 15 in 1983

In fact this problem with the final stage of the reforming process explains the appearance of the intermediate prisons. In Crofton's words, 'the object of the intermediate establishments was this: the Irish public were more hostile, if possible, to the ticket of leave than the public in England and one had to consider how this could be met. Employers would not take any man from an ordinary prison and we felt that if we showed some confidence in their training in the intermediate prisons, the public would be more likely to aid us'. In the 1860s there was a fierce argument between Jebb and Crofton over the intermediate prisons, sparked off by Crofton's suggestion that England had much to learn from the Irish system. Jebb responded by accusing Crofton of pandering to the Irish and failing to show confidence in the beneficial effects of separation and hard labour. The dispute went further than this and reflected not only different philosophies regarding the purpose of imprisonment but also different approaches to Ireland itself.
Progress through the Irish convict system was constantly monitored and measured by means of a marks system, the 'scientific' tool by which privileges or punishments were applied. If the carrot was graduation to the next stage, the stick was the ever present threat of regression reinforced by all the usual dietary deprivations and cellular punishments in the 'dark cells', and by the occasional flogging. Maconochie, who had developed the marks system on Norfolk Island, felt that Ireland, with its 'superior and centralised police' and general social conditions, more closely resembled the far-flung colonies than England. It therefore required novel institutions such as the intermediate prisons. Maconochie saw Jebb's approach as producing 'obedient and submissive prisoners' rather than 'active, efficient, industrious and well-disposed free men'; Jebb represented control as opposed to the remoralisation of the individual. This was an exaggerated dispute in many respects since the vast majority of convicts never came near the intermediate prisons, but Jebb's view prevailed with the closure of Smithfield in 1869 (supposedly for want of customers) and Lusk in 1886.

Prison Struggles and the Republican Movement

In criminal jurisprudence, as well as in many another thing, the nineteenth century is sadly retrogressive; and your Beccarias, and Howards, and Romillys are genuine apostles of barbarism - ultimately of cannibalism.

This seemingly radical dismissal of the tyrannies of the new prison discipline comes from an entry in John Mitchel's prison diary for 3rd February 1848. Mitchel, the son of an Ulster presbyterian minister, was in Bermuda at the time, awaiting shipment to South Africa and finally Australia. He was reflecting not only on his own fate but on the 'convict industry' as a whole. In rejecting the prison reformers, Mitchel was a hard-headed traditionalist and a fervent supporter of less-eligibility. He made a clear distinction between himself as an unjustly transported political activist and the mass of 'robbers, burglars and forgers' around him for whom he declared 'hang them, hang them'.

Mitchel represents the tail end of a Republican tradition tied to the presbyterian radicalism of 1798. In the intervening years it had become increasingly infused with conservatism and romanticism. The Young Irelanders of 1848, while holding to the belief in the need to oppose British rule through force, had few solid links with the Catholic peasantry. Over the next 30 years, the Republican movement was transformed. The formation of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (the fore-runners of the Irish Republican Army) and its Irish American support group, the Fenian Brotherhood, laid the basis of a mass secret organisation which eventually became firmly wedded to the social issues and struggles of the peasantry. The Fenians, as the whole movement became known in the 1860s provided a threatening accompaniment to the more constitutionalist campaigns for land reform and Home Rule. At one stage they claimed to have several thousand members serving in the British Army.

These developments were to make the nature of imprisonment a major political political issue. There had always been a degree of muted resistance to the new prison order, such as the symbolic defiance of tearing down notices of the prison rules. Beneath the formal regulation of daily life, the rule of silence was flouted or circumvented, and systems of smuggling developed. But this was all low level stuff. It seems that during the early years of the convict system, very few prisoners were prepared to risk insanity by protesting to any great extent. Insanity, suicide and death through illness were, after all, regular products of the prison regime. Anew challenge, however, emerged in the shape of Republican activists. When the producers of the Fenian journal, the Irish People, were imprisoned in 1865, the British government was aware that it had on its hands a group of highly committed "and politically determined militants enjoying popular support. The army and the Castle administration apparently felt it was too risky to confine such men in Ireland and so they were removed to Pentonville where the authorities could be relied on to administer an especially vindictive regime. It proved to be a wise precaution on the part of the government because two months later the founder of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, James Stephens, was able to escape from Richmond jail with the assistance of two warders.

It is evident from the accounts of Thomas Clarke and O'Donovan Rossa that the mental and physical destruction of the Fenian prisoners in English jails was a conscious policy. Clarke, confined in Chatham in the 1880s, records that the Irish prisoners were known as 'the Special Men' and treated accordingly. The exceptionally defiant Rossa, whose mind survived to tell the tale and who was elected as MP for Tipperary without his knowledge while in prison, was subjected to treatment which even the conservative Spectator described as 'barbaric', calling for a separate and more relaxed regime for political prisoners. Many of the Fenian prisoners died or were transferred to lunatic asylums. Their presence in the prisons had consequences for other prisoners. Regimes were stiffened and a special cage was introduced for visits. As Marx reported, 'the convicts say it was a bad day for them when the Fenians were sent to the prisons'.

Public outcry over the treatment of the Fenians led the government to set up the Devon Commission.This inquiry allowed the state to explore ways of dealing with Irish political protest which legitimated oppression as 'a lawful custom' in the full glare of English politics. Irrespective of their political motives, it was argued, the Fenians were still criminal lawbreakers and their incarceration was therefore beyond question. This logic prevented the opening up of wider issues concerning the nature of the judiciary and the rule of law in Ireland. Marx dryly noted, 'in England, the judges can be independent, in Ireland they cannot. Their promotion depends on how they serve the government. Sullivan (Rossa's prosecutor) has been made master of the rolls.'

Although the Devon Commission had aired the question of what sort of regime was appropriate for the 'political prisoner class', little had been resolved. The issue was next advanced by a series of protests mounted in Irish prisons by supporters of the Land League, imprisoned under the Prevention of Crimes Act in the 1880s. The prisoners began to refuse to have haircuts, to have their beards shaved off and to wear prison uniform. The impetus for this form of protest appears to have stemmed from inconsistencies within the prison system itself.

Again, the protest was a low-key affair and most of the prisoners would reluctantly accept uniform when threatened with punishments, restraints such as handcuffs, or force. But the issue was a sensitive one given the serious agitation on the land question and the British parliament's moves towards Home Rule, so yet again a government inquiry was established.

Prison protest became much more collective and intense after the turn of the century, With the more decisive rising of 1916, there was so much more at stake for political prisoners with the immediate prospect of liberating Ireland from British rule and the ruthless suppression of Republicans under martial law. The form of protest, whether against imprisonment, internment or military detention, changed dramatically. The war outside the prisons was matched by a life and death struggle inside the prisons. The hunger strike became the dominant form of protest.

The contrast between the treatment of the Fenians and the 1916 rebels shipped over to English jails and the Welsh internment camp could not have been starker. At Stafford jail (which was being run by the army as a military prison) the prisoners managed to negotiate. amongst other things, free access to newspapers, food parcels. free association by day and night (the cell doors were permanently unlocked) and were able to create and administer their own rules to govern their daily activities. The War Office had insisted that letters be addressed to 'prisoners of war' and the rebels had used this to demand the same rights as agreed between Germany and England for prisoners taken in the First World War. The rights were conceded on the condition that the prisoners elected a commandant who was to be responsible to the governor for discipline. Similar rights were' granted to the' prisoners held at Reading jail.

Conditions were not so easy in the internment camps or in the Irish prisons, either before or after the partition of Ireland. Hunger striking may have been the most prevalent form of protest but to achieve specific minor short-term changes other tactics were used such as riots, refusal to work and flooding the formal complaints procedure.

The hunger strike was first used in Ireland by Connolly on his arrest in 1913. Both he and the pacifist Sheffington were released, Although the British government had some experience of prison hunger strikes from the struggles of the suffragettes, no coherent policy seems to have emerged on how to deal with them, The political crisis was such that one moment a person could be sentenced to death and the next released. This, for instance, was the case with Thomas Ashe who took part in the 1916 rising. Likewise, there were uncertainties over the practice of force-feeding hunger strikers. Ashe himself, on hunger strike in 1917, died as a result of force-feeding, yet two years later the practice was not carried out on MacSwiney, the Mayor of Cork. MacSwiney who was serving a two year sentence, died after a hunger strike lasting 73 days.

During the civil war, hunger striking was used as a mass tactic either to demand unconditional release or political status, Both types of demand were usually granted after the ritual death of one hunger striker. Perhaps the most remarkable campaign was the hunger strike launched by 425 men and women in Mountjoy in August 1923 in which around 8,000 prisoners participated at one stage. The aim was 'unconditional release in the defence of the Irish citizens' right to set up their own government and their own courts without voluntary allegiance to any power or authority hostile or inimical to the Republic of Ireland.'

SECURING THE STATE

In one of the lectures first delivered to his only cell mate Joe (a pet blackbird), Michael Davitt. one of the leaders of the Land League, listed no less than 49 'coercion Acts' passed between 1830 and 1882 which were used by the British to maintain control of Ireland, Davitt summed up the Castle system by saying,

its judges are mistrusted, its juries generally believed to be packed, its police hated, its authority defied and the name and power of the British government......held in undisguised detestation by four-fifths of our population........While the imprisoned popular leaders are loved and their names cheered by the people, their Castle jailers are hated, and the mention of their names groaned at every public gathering

The' Irish prisons of the nineteenth century were the bastilles of the Castle system. The disciplines and the surveillance they brought to bear on a hostile people were seen first and foremost as products of an alien power. Ultimately such prisons were not simply the tools of a colonial power, but expressions of the search for a new type of authority and control which was in progress throughout Europe and America. In Ignatieff's words, the penitentiary was 'a response, not merely to crime, but to the whole social crisis of a period ... part of a larger strategy of political, social and legal reform designed to re-establish order on a new foundation.' Initially, this new order seemed inimical to the dominant mode of production and the form of class relations in Ireland. In many areas, the Protestant ascendancy preferred the suspension of civil rights and the open authority of the militia to the closed discipline of the penitentiary. But it was no accident that the industrial north-east was the first to sponsor a large purpose-built monument to the separate system.

Clearly, history provides many parallels as well as contrasts with the prison situation today, but the debate between those trying to rehabilitate the prisoner to the status of free wage labour and those more concerned with punishment, deterrence and control - the tender and tough faces of British rule in Ireland - has been largely resolved. Nowadays, every issue of prison policy and administration seems to revolve around the question of 'security'. We hope to explore this theme in a subsequent article.

(An extended version of this article appeared in Hillyard, P. and Squires, P. (ed) Securing the State: the politics of internal security in Europe, Working Papers in European criminology No.3, Bristol 1982.)

British Prisons in Ireland: Some historical notes (Part One)

2010-06-09T08:00:00.004+01:00

By Mike Tomlinson and Patricia Heatley

This article orginally appeared in "The Abolitionist" The magazine of Radical Alternatives to Prison No 15 in 1983 (An extended version of this article appeared in Hillyard, P. and Squires, P. (ed) Securing the State: the politics of internal security in Europe, Working Papers in European criminology No.3, Bristol 1982.)

The escape in September of 38 Republican prisoners from one of Northern Ireland's notorious H Blocks provides a timely reminder that what goes on in the North's prisons is never very far removed from the broader battle between the Republican objective of national liberation and the British government's determination to contain, if not crush, the Republican movement. Far from being a recent post-1969 phenomenon, this article argues that prison resistance linked to major political struggles outside the prison walls has a long historical pedigree in Ireland.

The first. half of this article summarises the main developments in the prison 'system in Ireland from the end of the eighteenth century onwards and the second half considers a number of selected issues concerning prison regimes. In particular we look at the controversies surrounding the protests of political prisoners and how there were involved.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE PENITENTIARY IN IRELAND

The latter half of the eighteenth century was an unsettling period for British rule in Ireland. On the one hand, prolonged agrarian unrest, perpetrated by secret societies of the impoverished Irish peasantry deprived of political and social rights by the Penal Laws, was providing a major challenge to English and Protestant settler landlordism and specifically to the quadrupling of rents between 1760 and 1815. Effectively, two forms of law existed by this time: the popular justice of the secret societies carried out against landlords and their agents, and the official law which was often difficult to administer without military backing.

On the other hand, the increasing frustration of the Protestant colonists with British restrictions on Irish trade was beginning to generate a movement for political and legislative independence from England. Britain's strategic interests in Ireland were threatened on two fronts: the withdrawal of troops required for the American War of Independence and the subsequent threat of a French and Spanish invasion of Britain through the 'back door' of Ireland. The Irish Protestant volunteer militia, while filling the breach in Britain's defences, demanded greater legislative autonomy for the Irish parliament which was granted in 1782. This was, however, a short-lived resolution of the movement of Protestant nationalism. With the inspiration of the French revolution, the movement acquired a more radical impetus involving demands for a parliament based on representation rather than patronage and for Catholic emancipation. Thus the Society of United Irishmen, initiated mainly by Belfast Presbyterians, became the first advocates of Irish Republican separatism. Having no success with the government and only limited success with other Protestants, many of whom were rallying behind the newly formed Orange Order dedicated to Protestant supremacy, the United Irishmen planned for rebellion, seeking assistance from the French and from the network of agrarian secret societies of the Catholic peasantry with all their experience in rural guerrilla warfare.

The immediate outcome of the United Irishmen's rebellion of 1798 was the creation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland under the 1801 Act of Union. The Irish parliament was abolished and Ireland placed under the direct rule of the British government who used a relatively centralised administrative apparatus with its headquarters at Dublin Castle to carry out its policies. The 'Castle system' as it was known - sinecures, patronage and government appointees survived until the Easter Rising of 1916 and the partition of Ireland under the Government of Ireland Act., 1920

The period surrounding the 1798 rebellion demonstrates the extent to which the prevailing methods of punishment in Ireland were dependent on Britain's changing imperial fortunes and colonial experience. As in England, transportation or execution were the favoured means of dealing with serious crimes, but with the outbreak of the American War of Independence there was a sudden suspension of transportation. The War had two consequences. With the closing off of the American colonies as a depository for British and Irish prisoners, sentences of imprisonment rose dramatically.

Secondly, the crisis in the prisons was further exacerbated by the increase in crime associated with the depression in trade which went. hand in hand with the loss of a major colonial market.2 Although new avenues of transportation were opened up in the 1780s, for instance Gibraltar, the Bermuda Islands and the Antipodes, the serious political disturbances in Ireland referred to above ensured that the county jails and bridewells were overcrowded with prisoners awaiting transportation. To meet this crisis, the lord lieutenant of Ireland had, from 1792, powers to convert transportation to a term of imprisonment and to establish penitentiaries to house such prisoners, but it was not until 26 years later that the first penitentiary was opened at Richmond, Dublin.3 Thus the penitentiary as a system of discipline generalised throughout prisons in Ireland was delayed until the colonial administration of the nineteenth century made a political judgement as to its necessity. Direct military repression coupled with grotesque public displays of torture designed to extract information from suspected rebels, were the chosen methods of suppressing the United Irishmen. In circumstances of continued agitation and revolt, punishment was characteristically arbitrary. The Act of Union heralded a greater centralisation of the coercive arm of the state. Although considerable use was made of 'emergency' legislation, the British were determined, under the direction of Sir Robert Peel, to construct a more permanent and legitimate apparatus of control - essentially less reliant on the military. By 1836, Ireland had a unitary police force under the direct command of Dublin Castle and by 1821, a central inspectorate of prisons was established to give effect to the recommendations of the 1809 prison inquiry for universal regulations to he applied to prisons throughout Ireland - pre-dating the inspectorate for Britain by 13 years. Under the consolidating Prisons Act of 1826, the Inspectors General were provided with wide-ranging powers to use moral and legal pressures to ensure that the local authorities carried out British government policies. As with policing, reforms of the prisons would begin, it was hoped, to break the old running battle between the martial law of the Protestant ascendancy and the popular justice of the secret societies.

Notwithstanding the occasionally defiant local authority, the Inspectors were able to transform the prisons over the l820s and l830s. The continuing agrarian disturbances of the period were an ever-present incentive to local magistrates and Grand Juries to take the ideas of the mind-bending, well-regulated penitentiary seriously, even though the typical fate of political offenders remained transportation or execution. By the mid-1840s more than one hundred local prisons and bridewells had been closed and 26 new prisons built, most of which were constructed along panoptic radial and semi-circular lines. Only a handful of prisons had failed to install tread wheels, a third operated the silent system and educational and religious instruction were universal. From the late l820s separate prisons were being established for women following Elizabeth Fry's dictum, quoted enthusiastically by the Irish Inspectors, that 'the first thing which is absolutely essential if a woman is to be reformed is that she shall be kept from the other sex, not only from prisoners but from the male officers.?

While considerable central control was being exerted by the Inspectors General, individual prisons remained the responsibility of local boards of superintendence appointed by Grand Juries. The Inspectors had succeeded in demilitarising the prison (military guards were withdrawn in 1830), even though they continued to express dissatisfaction with the quality of prison governors and other staff. It took the crisis of the famine years (1845-9) coinciding with the cessation of transportation before the central administration assumed direct control of the incarceration of serious offenders.

The Consolidation of the Modern Prison

Transportation ceased for a number of economic and social reasons. 'Convict labour' wrote Rusche and Kirchheimer, 'could not compete with free labour the moment the latter began to assume appreciable proportions '. Initially, convict labour was tolerated by the colonisers out of necessity. Once the pioneering work was done, the presence of convicts threatened the search for stability and social maturity. The governor of Western Australia, referring specifically to Irish convicts reported that 'coercion appears to be the only force they are capable of appreciating' Another observer noted that 'even in Australia, where, in consequence of the want of labour, healthy muscular power was held in higher estimation than resolutions of amendment, the Irish convict was feared, and on account of his entire uselessness was considered fit for no occupation'. Such sentiments were echoed by Nassau Senior's comment that transportation was 'sowing our colonies with poisoned seed '. However, Rude suggests that Irish political transportees were generally highly regarded by the colonial administrators, much to the resentment of those trying to keep the lid on Irish revolt back home. From the account of John Mitchel, transported under the Treason Felony Act 1848 for publishing a journal, the United Irishman, we learn that Irish political convicts were indeed respected by the Australian colonial authorities. But at the same time, fearing their escape and re-involvement in politics, the authorities kept these prisoners under much closer surveillance than the 'real convicts', as Mitchel called them. Political leaders such as Mitchel himself were singled out for particular scrutiny

Despite the growing restrictions on transportation, there was an explosion in the numbers sentenced-to transportation as the famine progressed - a fourfold increase in 1847 alone. The prisons, particularly in the hardest hit south and west, rapidly filled to overflowing, quickly disrupting the regime encouraged by the Inspectors over the past twenty years and increasing disease and death to epidemic proportions. 81 prisoners died in 1845 compared to 1,315 two years later. Petty larceny soared as people tried to fight against starvation - as the Inspectors put it, 'men will steal food rather than die'. The authorities responded by cutting the milk ration in the bread, oats and milk diet by half. Many committed more serious offences to secure the comparative respite of transportation. Over 40,000 rural outrages were recorded for 1849 alone. In 1853, there were complaints that women were deliberately seeking conviction as a cheap way of emigrating taking their children with them, as they were permitted to do. The following year, 42% of new inmates were women (compared to 25% in England). As a temporary disincentive, children over 2 years old were forbidden to accompany their mothers if transported, but the ultimate solution was seen to be a 'separate and distinct model prison' for women.

It must be said, however, that notwithstanding individualised political responses to the famine and the abortive 1848 insurrection, the most dramatic consequence of the famine was mass starvation and migration. Estimates suggest that just under a million peasants died and a further 1.5 million emigrated, mainly to America.

But the problem of disposing of a grossly inflated prison population was real enough. New convict depots for those awaiting transportation were hastily constructed, notably on Spike Island, a military fortress in the mouth of Cork Bay. Spike Island quickly became a massive hard labour camp housing 2,000 convicts. Many others were put on the Hulks moored at Dublin. With the ending of transportation, a number of Acts were passed to enable the government to set up a new system for dealing with convicts within Ireland itself. Transportation was converted to a term of penal servitude and a central administration under the control of Directors of the Convict Prisons was appointed. The Directors were responsible for managing the Hulks, Spike Island and the four large Dublin prisons at Richmond, Smithfield, Kilmainham, and Mountjoy which was opened in 1850 as one of the Jebb-designed 'national model' prisons alongside Perth and Pentonville. It was from this basis that the Directors constructed the full rigours of the Irish convict system.

Initially, the Directors concentrated on problems of accommodation, but they also took steps to tighten prison discipline not only as regards prisoners but also prison staff. For the latter, detailed rules were issued describing their duties, qualifications for entry to the prison service and the keeping of records and returns to be forwarded to the Directors. A new temporary prison of iron huts was opened at Philipstown. By 1854, the Directors controlled eight prisons including the large women's prison at Grangegorman, Dublin. Most of their accommodation was situated in the Dublin and Cork areas. Much of it was recently built and therefore suitable for separate cellular confinement. However, two-thirds of all convicts were still housed on Spike Island where, due to the numbers and the essentially temporary nature of the accommodation, discipline remained a constant headache for the authorities. There was little prospect of closing Spike Island in the short term, even though the drop in the crime rate after the famine years reduced the convict population from 3,933 in 1854 to 1,768 ten years later. After 1864 the numbers of convicts began to rise, largely as a result of a change in sentencing policy. Under the Penal Servitude Act of that year, five years (instead of three) became the minimum sentence.

As regards the local prisons, the Inspectors continued to apply pressure on the boards of superintendence to modernise buildings, conditions and regimes, using British developments and penal servitude as their models. They were particularly enthusiastic about the English Prisons Act of 1865 which legislated separate cellular confinement, graduated penal labour and standardised diets. While four attempts were made to copy this law for Ireland, none was successful. It seems that Irish members of the English parliament, conscious of the treatment of Irish political prisoners under the convict system, resented these attempts to perfect the penal servitude regime throughout the Irish prison system. It was certainly on this basis that they opposed the centralisation of the entire prison system under the Act of 1877 .

It is difficult to make conclusive comparisons between the convict system and local prisons during the period from the famine to the 1877 Act which brought all prisons in Ireland under the direct control of Dublin Castle and the General Prisons Board for Ireland. Certainly there was a marked difference in the emphasis on separation; by 1866, 17 of the 39 local prisons under the watchful eye of the Inspectors General were recorded as having no separation of the different 'criminal classes' (but separation of males and females was universal). 'Punitive labour' was the dominant form of work, although as might be expected in the newest prisons such as Belfast's Crumlin Road jail, opened in 1840 and very similar in design and construction to Mountjoy. ?industrial labour' was 'carried on with great activity' and was combined with strict separation.

It would appear then that by the time the General Prisons Board took over, the largest and newest local prisons provided a very similar disciplinary experience to that of the permanent prisons used for the initial stages of the convict system. It was around these similar institutions that the Prisons Board consolidated the prison system. By the middle of the nineteenth century the wave of prison construction was over and the Board's modernising function was one of closure and demolition, with the scrapping of 90 bridewells and 24 local prisons over the next forty years. Only the core of the convict prisons, those at Mountjoy and Portlaoise (formerly known as Maryborough), survived this consolidation; indeed these prisons remain the backbone of the penal establishment in the Republic of Ireland today, just as Belfast's Crumlin Road jail still stands as the central monument to nineteenth century discipline and punishment in the North.

PRISON REGIMES

The pre-famine period had reflected various themes in penitentiary theory; an emphasis on hygiene, deterrent labour, religion, education, surveillance, silence and separation. There was even mention of 'useful' labour and trades, but this was confined to stone-breaking and from the prisoners' viewpoint was scarcely distinguishable from turning the crank or treading the wheel. None of these elements was of course contradictory although they were yet to be assembled and refined as a coherent science of punishment. The impetus for that came with the need to set up the convict system.

Though its architects were ex-military Englishmen, notably Knight and Crofton, the Irish convict system differed in a number of respects from the English system. In theory, convicts were first sent to Mountjoy for a period of total solitude, but unlike in England, they were given no work to do. The purpose of this stage was described by four visiting Justices from Wakefield prison:

idleness and dislike of steady work are probably the most universal characteristics of the criminal class We in England have sought to correct that evil by making labour as penal as possible ... The Directors of the Irish convict prisons have adopted the opposite plan: they have made idleness penal and work a privilege ... The want of work becomes the severest punishment..

Once this had been endured, the 'privilege' of solitary work was granted - typically the tedious oakum picking for men and needle work for women. The boring labour presumably kept the mind constantly open to the process of repentence and the occasional dose of direct moral persuasion. Such instruction was, according to one observer, explicitly concerned with teaching the 'fundamental principles of political economy'. It was a schooling that must have been particularly alien to a rural peasantry struggling for subsistence.

Eventually, the male convicts would he transferred from Mountjoy for a period of 'hard labour in association' at Spike Island. This was to be conducted in silence and convicts were to be excluded from 'association with free labour of the working classes outside'. The latter requirement was largely unenforceable because much of the work, for example the building of roads and fortifications for the British army, took place outside the depots.

The next stage was unique to the Irish system and involved a term in what was called an 'intermediate prison' There were two of these, one at Smithfield and the other at Lusk. Not all convicts were processed through this type of prison since entry was selective. For instance all agrarian offenders were barred from intermediate prisons. The aim here was to establish an environment in which the prisoner was 'assailed by temptations' and his conduct as a reformed character put on trial. Prisoners were usually employed outside of the prison and were sent to visit shops as a test of self-discipline. They were required to accumulate all but a small proportion of their earnings so that they would have a sizeable lump-sum when discharged. More than two-thirds used this to finance emigration, which was the intention behind the scheme. The authorities therefore saw the intermediate prison as a sort of 'finishing school'.

The equivalent of intermediate prisons for women were known as 'refuges' of which there was one each for Protestants and Catholics. Again, entry was selective. Women were groomed for domestic service, marriage or for returning to the family. In fact this emphasis on femininity and domestic labour was a strong current running through every stage of the convict system as it applied to women. Many of the women in the refuges were prostitutes and for this reason, and others, were encouraged to emigrate. An extra £5 gratuity was paid to those women who left the refuge with the intention of emigrating. As a matter of government policy therefore, emigration was seen as one way of reducing both male and female crime.

The final stage of the convict system was release on licence, and this too differed in practice from the English system. The length of licence rested on the amount of remission earned through good conduct, but whereas in England remission was seen as a right by prisoners, only to be withdrawn for serious misconduct, in Ireland it had to be positively earned. Moreover, the conditions of licences were rigidly enforced. Failure to report to the police meant being sent back to prison; in England police reporting was usually ignored. Given the political nature of many of the offences of Irish prisoners, it was clearly important to extend the surveillance of the convict system well beyond the prison walls. But this had drawbacks. Reporting on a regular basis to the Royal Irish Constabulary, the front-line of the Castle system, was very unpopular amongst prisoners. More important to the authorities however were the views of potential employers of ex-convicts. If criminal reform was to be successful, convicts had to be accepted as free labourers outside the prison walls. Some employers obviously felt that the need for police supervision meant that prisoners were untrustworthy. The problem for the managers of the convict system was to legitimate the system to this class; release on licence could be misunderstood as an admission of failure of the other stages of the system.

Part two will be posted tomorrow

Out of sight but in our minds

2010-06-08T08:00:00.050+01:00

This article from the No more Prison website in 2005 was orginally published in Fight Racism Fight Imperialism

Out of sight but in our minds

Segregation units are prisons within prisons - the places where the most unchecked brutality is meted out to prisoners. In recent years conditions in high security segregation units have deteriorated, and the use of long-term segregation as a control mechanism has increased. FRFI asked some of our readers in gaol to send us their views and experiences. We welcome further contributions.

Frankland

On 31 January 2005 the inquest will open into the death of Paul Day, who died in Frankland segregation unit on 2 October 2002. This inquest is expected to reveal damning details of the conditions in the seg at that time. Paul Day?s family is still appealing for anyone who knows anything about events in the run-up to Paul?s death to come forward. *

For the two months before Paul Day died there had been repeated dirty protests by segregation unit prisoners in response to the conditions in the block. Prison staff had retaliated by contaminating the protesters' food, limiting the amount of water they were allowed and threatening them with physical violence. Yet when prisoner Keith Pringle allegedly threatened an officer in return, he was charged with a criminal offence of making threats to kill. His trial was expected to expose conditions in the segregation unit; however unfortunately Keith was persuaded that if he pleaded guilty he would not get extra time added onto his already lengthy prison term. This turned out to be a false promise and he received an additional three-year sentence.

In April 2004 Stephen Lloyd died in Frankland segregation unit. The solicitor representing his family is also appealing for witnesses.

Alan Porter has been in segregation at Frankland for 14 months. He sent this contribution to FRFI:

This is about a 73-year-old man who I am unable to name because of prison security. I'm writing about humanity and respect. In every gaol you will see signs saying you will be treated with humanity and respect. At present I'm in Frankland block with this man who has been between the hospital and the block so many times he has now refused to leave the block and go back to the hospital, because he knows next time the hospital needs a space, it'll be back to the block. This may not sound so terrible but he is 73 years old and in extremely poor health after years of protest to highlight his unlawful conviction. When arrested, the police tried to kill him with an illegal shoot-to-kill policy. Then he was refused a proper trial with no legal representation; then they changed the law for his appeal.

He's spent 17 years in gaol. Much of this time has been spent on dirty protests, hunger strikes or other protests to try to have this miscarriage of justice brought to light. All the protest over the years has taken a toll on his health. He has not eaten a meal in this block and has been here since the start of October, and is now very frail. He is existing on oxo-cubes and sweet, black coffee. Although this is extremely detrimental to his health, this is a protest against the treatment he has had from the hospital here. He's in such a state of mind that he believes he has nothing left to live for and is prepared to starve to death and die in gaol as he knows he'll never be released alive.

[FRFI recognises and salutes our old friend and comrade Ronnie Easterbrook.]

Long Lartin

In February 2004 Anwar Islam was found dead in Long Lartin segregation unit. As we go to press at least one prisoner there is on a dirty protest. Long Lartin seg is infamous for holding prisoners for lengthy periods of time "awaiting transfer"; with little or no attempt to actually transfer them to anywhere. John Shelley writes from Long Lartin:

Ten years ago, punishment blocks (as they were then known) did exactly what they said on the tin - punished prisoners. In later years this type of physical and mental punishment would be the subject of some high profile criminal trials; however and although the surface has finally been scratched, the gouge was not deep enough to blow the whole thing wide open.

A decade on and, as far as the high security estate goes, little has changed. New measures have been put in place to guard inmates against the attacks, the type of which were the subject of the Wormwood Scrubs trials, but they do not go far enough and offer little comfort to those languishing in the blocks. CCTV has been installed across most of the high security segregation units, but it seems that when attacks take place the particular camera that would have captured the scene is conveniently out of order or, worse still, switched off. Since most attacks take place in the confines of a prisoner?s cell, the cameras prove absolutely useless in any case.
There is also a new image - the "Blocks" have been given a lick of paint to cover the bloodstained walls and there is even a statement of purpose. Instead of segregation units we now have Security, Care and Control Units (SCCUs) - suggesting a more caring role. Underneath though, there is a machine that is incapable of change, where beatings, intimidation and mental torture will continue to be the order of the day.

Whitemoor

Reports currently coming out of the Whitemoor segregation unit are of a climate of sustained verbal racist abuse against black prisoners.

Leroy Smith writes:

The ideology behind segregation is, I presume, to subdue people and get them to do what they are told, when they are told. So if you are someone that thinks for yourself you will be in problems because a lot of the ways they want you to adapt do not make sense.

The people that work in segregation units in the dispersal system for the most part fit a certain criteria. They seem to be sexist, racist automatons and they all read The Sun.

Full Sutton

In 1994 FRFI was involved in a campaign initiated by prisoners in Full Sutton to expose the brutal regime in the segregation unit. Ten years on Full Sutton?s segregation unit still has an appalling reputation. In March 2004 Arif Hussain died there in horrific circumstances, apparently after a bag of drugs he had swallowed exploded in his stomach while he was being kept in a cell with no water, supposedly being ?observed? but according to witnesses, simply being taunted and abused for a week.

John Bowden, now at HMP Saughton, Scotland, who has served time in the segregation units of all the high security prisons in England, writes:

Prior to about 1994, serious mental and physical abuse in segregation in the long-term dispersal system was relatively rare, basically because those administering the segregation knew only too well the extent of solidarity among long-term prisoners; ill-treatment of prisoners in segregation units at Parkhurst, Gartree and Hull having provoked major uprisings.

During the late 1990s, and largely as a gradual reaction to the Strangeways revolt, a vicious screwing down of regimes took place. The brutalisation of perceived ringleaders and 'subversives' became a necessary part of the strategy. Segregation units in gaols like Long Lartin and Full Sutton were turned into brutal control units designed to actively intimidate and subdue the prisoners on every level. The destruction of solidarity and organisation among long-term prisoners generally and a change in the social and political climate beyond the walls encouraged the screws running the seg units to believe that their actions would never be questioned, challenged or avenged.

Serious brutality against prisoners is now routine in segregation in gaols like Full Sutton, Frankland and Long Lartin, and all levels of staff - screws, governors, doctors, boards of visitors etc - collude and co-operate with the sadists directly inflicting the violence. The conspiracy of silence extends from the Home Office and Prison Service to middle class prison reform organisations who accept that exceptional measures are sometimes justified when dealing with "control problem" prisoners.

The single factor capable of stopping the brutality is of course solidarity and unity among prisoners themselves. In summer 1976 long-term prisoners at Hull rose up against the ill-treatment of one prisoner in the segregation unit. For days they demonstrated on the roof, erecting banners and displaying their solidarity to the media and world outside. They made it clear that an injury inflicted on one of them was an injury to all. That spirit of Hull must be recreated if the abuse and cruelty prevailing in many segregation units is to be stopped.

*Any reader with relevant information about this or any of the deaths concerned should contact Inquest at 89-93 Fonthill Road London N4 3JH; 020 7263 1111

What Law? Whose Order?

2010-06-07T08:00:00.001+01:00

By: George Coombs

The present government is toying with yet another criminal justice bill, it is perhaps sobering to recall that they came to power with a promise to be "tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime" yet, when have they ever clearly identified what they consider the causes of crime to actually be? The plain fact is that the so called justice system is a cruel and deceitful oppressor of working class people and is itself a substantial contributor to that which is labelled crime. Irrational sentence disparity is widespread, suicide while in custody is a national disgrace and one can be left with no surprise that Henry Fielding once described the money he made as a magistrate as "the dirtiest money on earth."

I am personally aware of cases of older people and known suicide risks being sent to prison , also of people sentenced to periods of custody who, through no fault of their own are unable to pay for television licences, unable to pay fines etc. Oppression of the poor and deprived is so blatant and yet, the Magistrates Association state that one of the requirements for consideration in becoming a magistrate is "social awareness."

One can pause and consider here the case of Sheila Kent cited by Ann Worrall on page 17 of her book Offending Women, this lady was sent to prison for four months for failing to honour a £10 a month fine for a motoring offence as well as not having a television licence with no notice being taken of a delay in receiving her benefits. The same Magistrate, a day after this woman was sentenced gave a Mr Michael Hardstaff a twenty eight day suspended sentence for an almost identical offence. This is just one case among many one could cite where injustice has occurred and it surely calls into question a claim later made by the Magistrate concerned that "I like to think we use our common sense" (Ann Worall Offending Women Routledge 1988) One historical figure, among others that we could consider given the above outline is the Greek philosopher Anarcharsis. Diogenes Laertius mentions this man as does Herodotus and Cicero, some sources number him among the Seven Sages of Athens and it is even said of him that he was initiated into the Eleusinian Mysteries of the Great Goddess, a privilege usually denied to those who did not speak fluent Greek.

Anarcharsis was in fact a Scythian who arrived in Athens at about 589 B.C.E. In one of his books he compared the Greek and Scythian laws of his day to spiders webs that catch small flies and allow wasps to escape the hornets nest. Does this not sound a disconcerting ring of truth in our own times?

I am personally aware of a Public House in Hove that is a known haunt of local police said to be off duty. I am reliably informed that on one occasion a group of them were sitting together laughing while passing a piece of paper around. Closing time came. Not unusually bar staff found police were difficult about leaving and when they eventually quit the premises they left the piece of paper behind. It turned out to be a witness statement related to a case of indecent exposure. This then exemplifies the abuse of trust and confidentiality local police proved themselves capable of in order to satiate their need for crude self-gratification.

These then are the upholders of justice certain of whose colleagues came to my former residence one night looking for me. I was out, they would not accept the word of my landlord/friend concerning this and forced their way into the house upsetting the family I was living with who had two small children. Eventually I was found and arrested on false unverified charges and, taking full advantage of my physical and emotional ill health I was bullied into a sham confession obtained under obvious serious duress which a magistrate's court (another requirement of magistrates, according to their association, is to be of good character) accepted without question.
The verbal aggression to which I was subjected prompted intervention from the duty solicitor, fluid and sleep deprivation were also practiced and on one occasion while I was being searched a police officer drove the side of his hand straight into my testicles. While I was on police bail I took an overdose and this directly after being in police custody and, during this period I was also falsely re- arrested on a charge of breaching police bail, police, like the bullying cowards so many of them are were all to ready to take the word of known liars in order to persecute the vulnerable in order to enhance performance figures and impress senior personnel.
All complaints were ignored. I couldn't cope with the bullying and stress. A notable component of any idea of justice as fairness has to be impartiality. This was absent in my case and has been in others I'm aware of. Commenting further on Athens Anarcharsis argues "Those with no skill judge" and how true this is of courts where twisted notions of punishment against the poor, the deprived and the vulnerable are the real crimes. In Plato's Republic we find the notion of Justice as being the social virtue that hold society together but the society fostered by the present system is hardly just and increasingly lacks feeling of authentic community which will inevitably lead to desperation, inequality and despair.
Prison overcrowding is a disgrace. Suicide and self harm in custody are also a disgrace and knowing my past history (albeit some years ago and for unrelated reasons) I know from my own experiences and observations that one is not counted as a risk if the attempt was some time ago I of course had the attempt linked to police custody as well.

Prison does not work in any sense of the term. Anyone deprived of their liberty is an automatic suicide risk and overcrowding and lack of one's own space enhance this. Thinking in this area by judicial authorities becomes more and more shallow as time goes on.

Liberal Criminology

2010-06-06T19:12:00.001+01:00

by: Caries Hanson

The trends within the discipline of criminology have been to search for a methodological and ideological update of liberal thinking.

The cry should not be for a new criminology as a distinct body of knowledge that promises equality within the framework of mechanisation or the state.

The recent trend has been to latch on to authoritarian Marxist principles for meaning and survival, as political and economic elites have historically done, but this only suggests the desperation of criminologists to avoid the choices that have to be made. If anything we should be defining a different world without criminology or the science of punishment in which the hierarchical institutions of the state are dissolved.

By assuming definitions of crime within the framework of law by insisting on legal assumptions as sacred, criminologists comply in the concealment and distortion of reality of social harms inflicted by persons with power.

The world is full of strife, war, misery, injustice, poverty, crime, and exploitation along with rulers, governors and humiliators of the downtrodden. Specific persons pose serious threats to our freedoms because they wish to use each and every one of us instruments of their freedoms. They surround us with their language, concepts, theories, ideas and meanings.

In the process they construct powerful hierarchies and institutions to control manage and teach ideas, legitimising their acts to create docile legally conditioned animals. They teach and coerce us into their values and make it in each person's interest to uphold the political economy which benefits them only.

It is not the social harms punishable by law, which cause the greatest ills of the world. It is the lawful harms, those unpunishable crimes justified and protected by law, the state and the ruling elite's that fill the earth with misery, want, strife, conflict, slaughter and destruction. War and the health of the state are the misery most obviously produced and the most cleverly concealed.

Liberal criminology has become a 'gatekeeper' for state domains of control, the value assumptions of hierarchical authority, of centralised controls and a safety valve and temperature gauge in the limits on how far the state can go.

The liberal writings of the various sociologists, criminologists and psychologists are given much attention in criminology which is indicative of the continued fascination with power, control and the models of the mechanical world. Their thinking is that man is the centre of the universe, but that they are the centre of man. They prescribe what is good and acceptable and how the world and life processes should be managed.

To remain part of the 'status quo' and the academic scene requires at its least submission to a shearing of consciousness, that is tantamount to a shearing of ones humanity, to stand by and observe is to participate, passivity is activity, passivity is assent.

If social scientists have emerged as the market researchers for the state, criminologists, sociologists and psychologists have become the locksmith's, they provide as do all other branches of the social sciences the rationale for the maintenance of the state and its control of its dissidents, but they shield the eyes and close the noses of people to the destruction of themselves as people.

They prefer to spend their time on researching shoplifting, parking-meter fraud, offending behaviour in general and the dubious interventions, which they promote with gusto than the struggles of humanity.

Historically it is not surprising to find statements about justice reflecting the ideology of the state, of law and the existing economic order. The just were always the state.
In the context of the liberal state, the 'black-bag* magicians issue forth no statements about the quality of life, but rather the quality of certain lives, of liberalism and of systems that have no regard for individuals. They have accepted the divisions of the world as it suits the destroyers rather than its creators. They are mercenaries, 'guns for hire* willing to compartmentalise themselves into as many parts as is necessary to carry on 'business as usual' with minimum interference, in so doing they define and label victims of the state.

Rather than smashing idols that take away clarity and vision, these so-called 'scientists' of human nature have posed themselves as minor idols (mandarins) and breathe the uneven breath of the saint who considers himself beyond humanity.

To them human experiences that do not meet standards of certainty and cannot be measured by the dubious methodology of the social sciences are abandoned as irrationalities. In so doing these 'experts' of life continue to defoil the natural living world, they also defoil the minds and tongues of its human inhabitants. They control language about what is real, coin and fit words for the kaleidoscope of illusions they design, thus we live in a culture in which people have no sense of their position.

Criminologists especially among the social scientists continue to demonstrate an outright rejection, at least a reluctance to believe that the methodology of science can be viewed in the context of ideology. They believe as if law and state are absolutes and the impeccable foundations of the correct world, receiving authority by way of some absolute divine right.

Though criminologists have been concerned with social relationships, social organisation and disintegration, the underlying philosophy of thought has been essentially the same as that of he physical sciences, people are seen as 'out there', as objects, things that can be viewed and reviewed as under a microscope, dissected, labelled and stuck back together.

They demonstrate little questioning of the sources of authority that dictate who is to be observed and controlled. They continue to assume the benevolence of the cloak of rationality, observation and policy to define the sick, the criminal and the withering members of the world. In so doing they hang out shingles advertising their messianic nature, their secret priesthood to save and restore for the right price those whom their research and policies set up.

In becoming more vociferous about their authority and 'mandarin' status, they have begun to lose their 'flock', to be without convinced believers, they have become beyond belief, beyond the human, in exchange for becoming a source of ideological comfort for the stomping elite.

Many social scientists still see the world of social problems to be the world before their 'scientific' legally corrected and state corrected eyes.

For continued membership of the elite class, these mandarins, and the 'do-gooders'. And the reformists pay their dues by mitigating the guilt of the elites, by providing scientific rationale for the destruction of various scapegoat groups. Given people to look at without an historical relative view of law and illegality, social scientists see 'abnormalities' as conflicts residing within the soul, the person rather than within the ideas, values, interests and authority of the powerful and crime as one form of resistance to these ideas, interests and persons.

What behaviour the criminal law cannot contain within its domain to hunt out the pathological, institutionalised psychiatry, psychology and social work in its sheepish submission to positivistic modes of thinking, will seal tight.

Those who seek meaning for their personal lives are the first to be acted upon, those who retreat, 'bail out' or rebel and for whom no community exists become ready victims of the one forced reality of the state.

The problems of justice have always been a problem of 'people management, responded to in the form of a well regulated 'stable' and a humanitarian system of criminal justice under existing existing economic and political arrangements. Some communities now become managed like some farms with the influx of the do-gooder, social worker, 'out-reach ' worker, community workers, sociologists and psychologists who seek to measure conflicts and the shifting of resources but always within the rule structure of the game warden.

Even the notion of the therapeutic state has evolved historically through humanitarian motivation, though this motivation may have been involved, it was certainly accompanied by control motives and policies of recognised safety valve effects.

The judiciary, which is an integral part of the drama, requires some attention. With its black robes (priests of the state) enforced deference, demanding linguistic superiority and unintelligible jargon, the judiciary cloaks the basis of law and the reality of equity in myths of fairness, the show never stops.

The very processes of law are designed such that the processed person is ignorant of the process and required to have others act on his or her behalf in a language that is incomprehensible. These processes are carried out in a series of legal, psychological, medical and sociological invasions of the person. The processes of law reduces humanity, objectify persons as cases to be disposed of, sold to the highest bidder of diversion or to penal programmes. What human alienation might have existed, the legal processes completes, destroying belief on oneself.

Apologists for the criminal process present defences for the necessity and continuation of law - 'the rule of law'.

In their reification, such bodies hide the fact that law is one instrument by which men have attempted to resolve the question of authority. They hide the fact that the rule of law is rule by men often through violence coercion, brutality, isolation and punishment. The analysers do not analyse the roots of grievances, inequality, injustice and abuses or the reasons why we have become a 'suing society'.

To believe that justice can be culled from bureaucratic red-tape processes in which the actors have no human stake in the processes is to believe in slavery, defend the sources of injustice and to promote the continuation of the slave plantation.

According to the social science ideology, each person is determined by forces of which he or she is unaware of As a consequence, he or she is not responsible for his or her actions, the offensive act signifies (is a symptom) that the actor is sick, unbalanced, unsocialised or chromosomically deviant.

The actor is a criminal, his or her whole being is criminal, he or she is different than others and therefore unequal, a part of the world that needs re-ordering. Conflicts must be resolved scientifically by experts who understand the malaise of the criminal, they can 'treat' the criminal into compliance and obedience through castration, lobotomy, psychological intervention (brainwashing) and when all else fails by lethal injection or the hangman's noose.

The criminal needs to be re-educated, to be bureaucratically processed, medically or scientifically judged different and where necessary contained and isolated until he or she thinks, feels and acts 'correctly'.

Though science and law are conflicting ideologies especially regarding the issues of responsibility, volition and state benevolence, they are as equally serviceable to those in power. Both focus on the individual through symbolic deterrent processing or treatment, both uphold the superiority of the 'experts' judicial or scientific and both postulate one-reality consensual view of the world. Neither question the current political-economic-social order, rather both owe their presence and allegiance to serve, to maintain the present order.

The whole of society has come to take on the properties of a 'total institution' best characterised as an asylum. The state lias become the 'protector', the 'parent', the 'teacher' and the 'punisher'. The 'Nanny State' and its squads have reduced the individual to total property, the tool - the inert extension of the machine of the state.

If you seek positions of power or that of intervention on behalf of elites or power structures, to be a decision maker or to make a career of directing others you are part of the corruption of the state in its oppression. To make a life activity of exercising power is to perpetuate a malevolent state of human affairs.

If you are seeking positions of power or decision making for others, it is you that become criminal, inspecting, bossing, registering, ordering, rehabilitating, paroling, spying, informing or executing places one firmly within the pattern of power holder.

The misery, hunger, wars and strife far surpass the harm of common theft, that the former are intentionally clothed in myth aggravates the harm of the acts themselves. Punishment, retribution, deterrence and protection are concepts logically consistent with imposed authority and loss of human dignity. They are bye-words for ceremonies of enslavement in a society in which slavery is cherished. Treatment, re-education, therapy and behaviour modification are concepts logically consistent with state scientism, the up-dated technology of bureaucratic control.

In the past those who posed a normative threat to localised religious ruling elites were designated as sinners, witches or heretics and met with whippings, brandings, and banishment even death. Those who posed a threat in the early capitalist state alliance were designated as criminal and imprisoned where they were subject to economic exploitation. In current times, those posing a threat to the welfare-scientific states are likely to be designated as mentally ill, socially disordered or even as victims.

Those who refuse to accept the conditions of the welfare state megamachine are sifted, sorted and designated until they reach the components of the paper by which they are processed, in other words social lobotomomization.
Since the late 19th century there has been an increase in the number of people criminalized and sent to penal 'dustbins' and 'warehouses' large expenditures are required to maintain the flow, necessitating an expansion of prison building programmes. Prison overcrowding, idleness and the potential threat of riot and disturbance with consequential lack of control have caused the power structure to seek ways to ease the pressures whilst at the same time retaining the symbolic values of criminalizing members of the 'dangerous class', hence probation, community service, parole and electronic tagging.
Within the social sciences the ideology of determinism was taking hold, its proponents held that each person was propelled by forces - economic, psychological, anthropological or physiological all of which he or she is unaware of, human kind therefore was not capable of exercising free-will, man was determined, the individual as a consequence was not responsible for his or her acts or character.

Punishment or confinement was inappropriate; deterrence foolhardy, fixed sentences were counter-productive to the reduction of crime. The individual must be diagnosed scientifically and a cure prescribed. Indeterminate sentences were required to protect societies and bring about a cure, the actor becomes the focus not the act, the criminal was invented because of ones behaviour, thoughts or mental-health attitudes, states were symptomatic of the person's essence, illness.

The criminal now is not a human person committing an irrational act but rather someone different - criminal (determined and different) or pathological, the criminal is not a person with an alternative or authentic morality or reality, he is undersocialized and in need of treatment

Social structure, social change, human diversity, similarity and human need now takes precedence over duty as the basis of society.

Psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, therapists and counsellors and other sundry 'treatment experts' have now entered the prison and juvenile 'fortresses', criminals now have to be studied, each one's unique and different characteristics must be located and rooted out, lawyers in feeding off this approach now employ the various differences to crime on behalf of their clients, pathology, mental incompetence, insanity, the weather, age, gender to the extremes of whether the defendant 'victim' was breast fed as a child.

Understanding the criminal mind has become a rich industry in recent years. The so called 'experts' have cast themselves as interpreters of 'monsters minds', occasionally even casting the criminal as a victim of one sort or another but invariably complicating rather than simplifying the matter. If taken seriously the result of such pseudo-science and history will be moral mayhem.

Individual treatment programmes have never been fully practised and rarely if ever showed results except at Auschwitz.

Locating he pathology in the community rather than in the individual has lead to numerous attempts to correct and control the criminal and drug sub-culture. Out-reach and street-gang detached worker programmes which focus on the local community does deter certain specific persons from lives of crime or drug abuse but it will never alone dam the floodgates of its production.

There is a move within the Criminal Justice System towards de-institutionalisation and an ideology of de-criminalization and diversion in search for alternative management stratagems. Dc- institutionalisation means closing the gates of the 'fortress' prison in favour of therapeutic communities and community based sentencing. The reasoning implies that the community must get involved, that members of the community are responsible, that the community must participate in the control of its problem persons, that the offender must be integrated into the local community.

This decentralisation of institutional diversion presents the appearance of local control (more mythology) but is also a movement towards the welfare state.

Such programmes are institutionalisation, its form (reform) is worse because it makes the problem and remedy (control) less stark.

Small residentially based prisons or institutions (hostels, halfway houses) which improve the living conditions of its captives take the appearance if not the heart out of the 'fortressed ' reality of elite control,

The fact is that among the persons to be deinstitutionalized few could return to the community. They do not control the substance of law, their schools, their economies, the police, or the social structures. For them the community represents one more piece of baggage of the elites programmes. One cannot be integrated into a community when community does not exist, but this is the ever-increasing language of the welfare state. The structure is not changed only the managerial mode. The other strategy is behaviour or mind control through the use of dubious pseudo-scientific psychological practices.

The great fear is that the potential for social harm has no limit, who controls, treats, conditions and demolishes whom? How? And why?

Can we all become subject to behaviour modification and all in effect be indeterminately sentenced?

To all those who have explored, there have been no successful correctional programmes yet they have all been successful in retaining a pool of persons for processing. One cannot participate in the therapeutic state without realising that persons with the greatest sense of sociability are resolutely criminalised or submitted to the therapy.

The history of deviance designates and state responses has reflected the modes believed to be best to secure obedience and control. The designates and responses have also reflected the historically and geographically specific economic and social conditions of the time. Sinners, criminals, the mentally ill and the poor (surplus) have been responded to with banishment, brandings, prisons, factories, asylums and lobotomies and in the process welfare consumptive worthlessness.

For the new mandarins, the Blairites, the liberals and the 'centre left' concern for human liberty and the ideals of a just society are to be treated with scorn, taken as naive, primitive impracticable and Utopian. Technological managerial ideologies and the authority based economic hierarchies they protect dismiss all concerns for liberty and justice and any non-hierarchical forms of society.

Today the state has succeeded in meddling in every aspect of our lives.

From the cradle to the grave it strangles us in its arms, pursues us at every step, it appears on every street corner, it imposes on us, holds us, harasses us, it regulates over all our actions and in the process accumulates mountains of laws in which the shrewdest of lawyer is lost. It creates an army of employees, an evil band who have only one religion - control, manipulation and an easy buck. For social workers, probation officers, community workers, counsellors, psychologists who ' hook up' with any political party, they do so in order to be guaranteed maximum appointments for a minimum of work.

Within the order of the new mandarins, justice is transformed into universalistic treatment, equality is uniformity, the mandarins pervert their 'proficiency' in managing people and societies into a justification for doing so.

Those who administer or scientifically manage the lives of many are now servants of the ruling elite by the very nature their work, if they are not in fact the elite. Those most concerned about social problems are not quite at one with themselves in their desire to change them, solving social problems would necessitate a change in the organisational mores from which they arise.

The humanitarian for all his allegiances to the humanitarian mores, the drug counsellor seeking to divert the drug and substance abuser, the social worker the underprivileged and the probation officer the offender remain members of our society and as such is under its organisational mores. They wish to improve the conditions of victims but not interfere with the structures which create them. Until they give up their allegiance to the organisational mores and in some cases run squarely against them they must continue to treat symptoms without removing the causes.

No one loses by giving verbal expression to humanitarianism, the 'do-gooder1 is perfectly adept at this, but many would lose by putting humanitarianism into practice and certainly someone would lose by any conceivable reform.

Significant reforms within the prison system have not always come about by liberal intervention. In many cases reform has come about as a 'knee-jerk' response from the realisation that some prisoners are now more articulate, more socially and politically conscious and seek to by-pass the status quo in exposing their control and being that loss of control is their defeat they resort to compromises.

Other changes have resulted from the direct action of those who sought not reform or structural changes but an overhaul, it was not reformist in content, rather it was revolutionary in practice - Strangeways, Parkhurst, Hull, Dartmoor and Whitemoor!

Prisons have always been run by the consent of its inhabitants, do-gooders and reformists keep them 'in check' on behalf of the state, only those selected by the state are indeed allowed to enter our prisons, control must be maintained.

These people survive because of the 'safety valve' they operate on behalf of the state and the Prison Service to the extent that they are funded directly or indirectly by state operated organs. Organisations like the Preservation for the Rights of Prisoners founded by Dick Pooley on the exercise at Dartmoor prison. The League of Human Rights Observance founded in Parkhurst Prison and Radical Alternatives to Prison were all inspired by prisoners themselves and were always outside the sphere of the influence of 'do-gooders' probation officers etc.

The prisoners active involvement presented a revolutionary approach and found expression through such organisations, protests within prisons for a time mounted and certainly PROP became the focus of concern to the Home Office and indeed the do-gooders for they were bereft of control, these individuals wanted to believe that only they had the special skills and insights to articulate prisoners grievances, it never occurred to them that like the state appointed Boards of Visitors to prisons, they were merely seen as a safety valve and at times that valve was to blow.
Their self assumed monopoly on prison reform and manipulation had revealed them to be totally worthless at the crucial time, they became empty vessels,

Today we have The Fight Racism, Fight Imperialism Group and the Anarchist Black Cross who campaign for what they view as prisoners of the state, neither pull any punches and are always ready to expose abuses and denial of human rights, even the organisation of protests and limited financial assistance to prisoners.
Prisoners cannot rely on the do-gooders or indeed those self-assumed or self-appointed egocentric prisoners who assume such roles because of the benefit of being more articulate than their fellow 'cons', you do not negotiate from a position of weakness or from the surrender to the pseudo-reformists.

Today with this in mind and with the various government reports in recent years which do no more than show disaffection within the penal system, a new method of control has been introduced - The Incentive and Enhanced Privilege Scheme, the carrot and the stick to keep prisoners 'in line', to set prisoner against prisoner, a divisive mechanism based more on psychological intervention, but we hear little from the 'reformers' on the subject of the proposals to incarcerate those individuals considered dangerous irrespective of whether they have committed an offence or not, where does it stop? Who is dangerous and who decides? Indeed what is being dangerous?

After a thousand years of the right to jury trial that looks now set to end as does the shifting of the burden of innocence in specific cases and sentences become longer, and the prison building programme being extended to accommodate even more prisoners, where are the 'do gooders'?

In the final analysis, control by the elites will always remain intact and who really cares about that?

HMP Kingston, June 2000

Prison Abolition Has New Voice

2010-06-05T14:00:00.001+01:00

This report, of the founding of No More Prison, was published on its website in 2004

Prison Abolition Has New Voice

Over sixty people from across Britain joined together in London on Saturday, 28th January to establish a new, forceful organisation, No More Prison, determined to fight for the end of prisons. At the Prison Abolition Seminar held in Conway Hall, former prisoners, activists, health and prison workers and academics exchanged ideas and strategies to stop prison building, end child imprisonment and develop alternatives to punishment that better meet the needs of victims and lawbreakers. Driven by a populist criminal justice policy fuelled by screaming red top headlines Britain locks up more people than any of country in Western Europe, currently standing at over 88,000 children, women and men.
Opening the seminar, Professor Joe Sim argued the need for a new abolitionist movement in Britain which distinguished itself from the prison reform group movements that have become entangled with New Labour's law and order project. Drawing upon Norwegian abolitionist Thomas Mathiesen, Professor Sim illustrated how such groups have been "defined in" as acceptable commentators on prison, while other, more challenging groups remain "defined out" and consequently silenced.

Both the State and Prison reformers are focusing on fixing rather than reinventing the penal system. He stressed how the rebranding of jails as places of reform and progress shrouded the reality that prisons remain instruments of pain delivery, and that the collateral damage to prisoners' families is consistently ignored.

He called upon the seminar to challenge the notion of New Labour's "what works" policy and the discourse of the "working prison" and to ask for debates about what doesn't work, why prisoners' rights and conditions continue to be eroded and why progressive regimes such as those at the Special Unit at HMP Barlinnie in Glasgow and Blantyre House in Kent have either been systematically dismantled or consistently attacked.

In the rich and vibrant discussion that followed, John Moore facilitated moves towards establishing a new abolitionist movement in Britain, in which No More Prison planned for a innovative and productive strategy to end the prison estate. The group called for a moratorium on prison building; a redirection the prison budget; a dismantling of the negative and punitive prison officer culture, and a widening of definitions of social harm to encompass white collar crime, deaths at work, fraud amongst others.

No More Prison will be an activist organisation open to all who oppose mass incarceration. It was agreed that it was crucial that group remained as broad based as possible and maximized the participation of current and former prisoners.

If you want to be involved in setting up the new organisation or want to become a founder member let us know

Remembering Karen Ann Fletcher

2010-06-04T10:00:00.000+01:00

This report was orginally published on No More Prison's website in 2005

Report on Prison death demonstration held on Wednesday 09.11.05 outside Holloway Prison to protest against the death of Karen Ann Fletcher, 30, who died on 28.10.05

By Pauline Campbell

16th demonstration since protests began in April 2004;
two-hour demonstration was attended by 25 protesters (including two ex-prisoners).
Prison van halted at 2.55 pm, as it attempted to take prisoners into the jail.
While the van was stopped, Duty Governor Mr McCaighy, and his colleague Mr Ryan, came out of the prison, and requested that the vehicle be allowed to enter the jail.
Request refused on the grounds that it was unsafe to allow prisoners to be taken into Holloway, following the recent death.
Police were called, and approx 15 officers attended the incident.
3.15 pm: I was arrested (my 10th arrest since last year) for an "alleged obstruction of the highway", and taken to Islington Police Station.
Handcuffs were not used at this arrest.
After two and a half hours, I was released without charge. Custody Sgt White and his Inspector made the decision that it was "not in the public interest to continue with a prosecution".
I was held in the custody suite but not, on this occasion, locked in a police cell.

Comment:

"It is believed that Karen Fletcher was recently transferred to Holloway from Styal Prison, Cheshire. Her death, the fourth at HMP Holloway since April 2004, again raises questions about the legal duty of care owed to prisoners. In addition, a Holloway inmate remains on a life support machine, after being cut down from a makeshift noose at the jail in May 2004. The Chief Inspector of Prisons' report, published earlier this year, highlighted problems of dirt and vermin at HMP Holloway."

Demonstration was attended by local photographers and reporters.

The Prison Governor did not respond to a note sent into the prison.

Which Children do we send to Prison

2010-06-03T08:00:00.018+01:00

By John Moore (Originally published on NMP's website in 2003)

Which Children do we send to Prison

Imagine a government that wanted to ensure high levels of crime. Imagine that to achieve it they set up training camps for children to produce the criminals of tomorrow. In chosing the children to place in these factories of criminality it would make sense to select children with the most potential. In particular you would select children with poor educational achievement, those with experiences of physical or sexual abuse, those in poor mental health particularly those showing signs of personality disorder or psychotic illness and those with alcohol and drug problems.

These are exactly the children we choose to send to prison in Britian today.

Educational Disadvantaged Children

The fact that our prisons are attracting educational disadvantaged youth is well established. (Graham and Bowling 1995, Audit Commission 1996) In its 2002 report 'Reducing re-offending by ex-prisoners' the Governments Social Exclusion Unit reported that nearly half the children in prison have literacy and numeracy levels below that of the average 11year old, indeed over a quarter have level equivalent to an average 7 year old. (SEU 2002). In statistics provided by HM Inspectorate of Prisons Hodgkin (2002) show that 84% had been excluded from school with 60% excluded on two or more occasions. In addition 9% last attended school when they were 11 or younger. A former Chief Inspector of Prisons has given an extreme example of the extent to which imprisoned children had been denied educational opportunities. "I found one boy in a young offender institution who had been expelled from his playgroup at the age of four, and never allowed to attend primary or secondary school" (Ramsbottom 2002)

The Prison Inspectorate undertook a detailed review of education and training for children in prison jointly with OFSTED. The resulting reported noted the average spend per child prisoner was £1,810 compared to over £16,000 in both secure training centers and local authority secure units (HMIP A Second Chance 2002). The report in particular was critical of special educational provision. This is obvious a serious concern given the needs of the children in our prisons.

Abused Children

The Social Exclusion Unit have found that over half the children in custody have been in care or otherwise known to social services, One in three girls reported sexual abuse and two out of five had suffered violence in the home. One in twenty of the boys admitted being a victim of sexual abuse and one in four had suffered violence in the home. (SEU 2002). These are significant figures and indicate a very high level of vulnerability. Using information provided by HM Prisons Inspectorate Hodgkin (2002) reports that one in three children have been in care and just under a half had been in custody before. She also noted that one in ten were themselves parents.

Disturbed Children

There is considerable evidence of the appalling state of young prisoner's mental health (Hagell 2002). To illustrate the disturbed characteristic of these children between January 1998 and January 2002 there were 1111 reported incidents of self-harm by children in prisons. In the same period 11 boys committed suicide. (Hodgkin 2002)The Social Exclusion Unit?s description of the characteristics of imprisoned children are deeply worrying. Two out of five boys and two out of three girls had symptoms of anxiety, depression, fatigue or related problems. One in ten showed signs of a psychotic illness and 85% signs of a personality disorder (SEU 2002)

As Hodgkin has observed. 'The Prison Service is taking the mentally ill children that nobody else wants.' (Hodgkin 2002 Page 56)

Addicted Children

The links between drugs and offending are well established and much current policy is focused on responding to this link. However there tends to be less emphasis on the role of alcohol. This is a serious omission. As the SEU report indicates whilst one in four girls and one in seven boys were dependant on opiates, over half the girl population and two thirds of the boys had alcohol problems prior to being sent to prison. (SEU 2002) Hodgkin's analyses of HM Prisons Inspectorates records indicate that 33% of children had drug problems on imprisonment but only 21% had alcohol problems. The majority of these had received no help for their drug or alcohol problems in prison (Hodkin 2002).

In addition Black and Minority Ethnic Children are over represented in the children we imprison, an over representation by five times according to the Governments Social Exclusion Unit.(SEU 2002). However from HM Prisons Inspectorate statistics indicate that in fact they are over represented ten times. (Hodgkin 2002)

Crime Control is Out of Control

2010-06-02T08:00:00.015+01:00

This statement was issued by No More Prison during the General Election campaign in 2005.

Crime Control is Out of Control

Crime and punishment are key issues in the current election campaign. Politicians are grossly pre-occupied with trying to convince us, the voters, that they are 'harder', 'tougher' and more punitive in their responses to crime. More Crime Bills are promised, Bills that will create more crimes, harsher sentences and inevitably imprison more and more of our fellow citizens.

Crime and disorder are an obsession of the media who send out the message that 'crime is out of control', they devote endless column inches persuading us that we should all fear for our lives and never allow any constructive debate on the matter.

The reality is crime in Britain is not out of control. In fact we have more ways of controlling crime than any other Western European country. We imprison more people, including children, we have more CCTV, more laws, spend more money, have more police powers, implement more targets and legislate for more ways of controlling behaviour that is considered 'anti-social'.

In fact it is Crime Control that is out of control. The current Labour Government has created 618 new crimes many aimed at criminalising children. It has introduced Anti-Social Behaviour Orders targeted at the young, poor and powerless that are administered through the Civil Courts but have criminal consequences, including the very real possibility of a prison sentence. 90,000 men, women and children are in Britain's prisons. 2004 saw a record number of women in prison and a record number being killed, in HMP Holloway Prison Officers are cutting down up to 5 women hanging from ligatures in the cells every night.

We currently we send around 1,000 children a month to prison, many of them vulnerable and victims of abuse. Both the Conservative and Labour Party are committed to sending even more children to Prison. Prison is no place for a child and sending children to them is child abuse. Politicians appear unconcerned about the bullying and abuse that is rife in our children's prisons. They are also unconcerned about children like Gareth Myatt, a 15 year old boy killed by Prison Officers last year whilst being restrained at Rainsbrook Child Prison or Adam Rickwood, a 14 year old boy who was found hanged at Hassockfield Child Prison, the youngest person to ever die in custody.

As we elect a new government we call on politicians of all Parties to have the courage to tell the truth about crime and crime control. Locking up more men, women and children is not the answer. When we build a new prison we lose an opportunity to build more hospitals, schools and good quality affordable housing and it is access to these things that truly prevents crime.

We call on voters to reject the politics of fear and to back candidates who oppose prison building and support community based responses to law breaking, responses that respect the human rights of both the victim and the law breaker and focus on correcting the harm done not on retribution and pain.

Remembering Joseph Scholes

2010-06-01T08:00:00.025+01:00

This page was first published on the No More Prison website in April 2004

Inquest Verdict

The jury at Shrewsbury coroner's court today (30th April 2004) returned a verdict of accidental death following the inquest into 16 year old Joseph Scholes death in Stoke Heath Children's Prison, Shropshire. Following the verdict the coroner, John Ellery, said he would be writing to the Home Secretary recommending a Public Inquiry into Joseph's tragic death.

Speaking after the case, Joseph's mother, Yvonne Scholes, said she hoped the government would listen to the coroner's call.

"What I would like to come out of Joseph's death is that all children are removed from the care of the prison service, who time and time again have failed to care for those children, and instead put them into local authority secure units under the care of local authorities."

The Inquest Press Release on today's verdict can be read here

The Facts

On 24 March 2002 Joseph was found hanging from a sheet attached to the bars of his cell window. His death occurred one-month after his sixteenth birthday, just nine days into a two-year sentence for street robbery.

Joseph was an extremely disturbed young boy who had a long history of anxiety and depression, self-harming behaviour and suicide attempts. Despite the serious concerns expressed by all those who had the most knowledge and information about Joseph and his extreme vulnerability, the Youth Justice Board made the decision to place him in prison service accommodation at Stoke Heath Young Offender Institution.

Upon arrival at Stoke Heath Joseph was initially put in strip clothing and placed in a cell with a surveillance camera, reduced ligature points, and high levels of observations. His mother Yvonne telephoned Stoke Heath Young Offenders Institute to ensure that they were aware that Joseph had been a victim of rape and to inform them that he was depressed and unstable with a history of self-harm and suicidal behaviour. Within days of his arrival and without consultation with Yvonne, Joseph was moved to a single cell with no surveillance camera, with ligature points and reduced observations.

Further Information

BBC Coverage
Guardian Coverage
Shropshire Star's Coverage (no longer available)
North Wales Weekly News

European Group Conference 2005 - A personal report

2010-05-31T00:01:00.029+01:00

by John Moore

As someone angry about prisons and crime control and hungry to understand as much as possible about the criminal (in)justice system, particularly from a critical perspective I came across details of the conference of the European Group for the Study of Deviance and Social Control in Belfast in September 2005 on the internet. The conference appeared to provide space for activists rather than being exclusively restricted to academics so I decided I would attend.

Arriving at a conference where you know no one is a bit weird. Any group of people, particularly one where many individuals have known each other for decades can be intimidating. However I confronted little hostility and after breaking the ice found the group to be very welcoming. (I would advise anyone else considering going along to e-mail the respective national representative - their contact details are on the groups website before going and introduce yourself. They would hopefully get you in touch with other people going and provide initial contacts that would be helpful in the initial hours of the conference.)

My fear on arrival was that the conference would not be relevant to me. The majority (but certainly not all) of the participants either worked or studied at university. Some of the sessions had titles and descriptions that were technical and occasionally a little intimidating. But the conference was as much focused on doing as it was on ideas. Often sessions linked both.

The conference was in Belfast and the content of the conference reflected this. The opening session included a passionate speech by Geraldine Finucane detailing the struggle she and her family have waged to find out the truth of the murder of her husband Pat Finucane, a civil rights lawyer gunned down by Loyalists operating with collusion from the British Intelligence services. A number of the sessions focused on the north of Ireland and on the Saturday we had, in quick succession, a panel discussion with key actors in the peace process and the conflicts that preceded it, a tour of West Belfast hosted by former political prisoners, the screening of a film on the hunger strike followed by a discussion with those involved. The panel discussion was the most impressive presentation I have ever heard from politicians.

Margaret Ward started off explaining the experience of women in Northern Ireland and the perspective of her party, The Women's Coalition Danny Morrison set out the Republican perspective in a remarkably considered way which honestly acknowledged the impact of the troubles on his own and the loyalist/unionist community and was realistic about the limitations what could be achieved in the future. My sympathy has always been with the Republican cause and I awaited David Ervine setting out the loyalist position with distrust. I did David a grave injustice. It was quite simply the most honest and non-sectarian analysis of a situation I have ever heard from a politician. The Peace process presents a difficult and complex challenge for working class Protestants. David Ervine articulated both the psychologically and economically challenges facing his community whose position is the most precarious of any group in Northern Ireland. Unionist politicians like Ian Paisley exploit these fears for political gain but do nothing to address their underlying causes or indeed to represent the interests (economically and politically) of working class loyalists. David' party linked to the Loyalist paramilitary groups has very little electoral impact.

We then set off on a tour around Belfast. Accompanied for the first part by a republican former prisoner we soon saw why it existed as we visited Bombay Street Road. In 1969 a loyalist mob unrestrained by the then unconstructed "wall" had driven the local nationalist community from their homes, injuring many and killing Gerald McAuley, 15, before burning the houses to the ground. My impression of this side of the wall was a disciplined and proud community. High quality murals cover the end walls of terraces as well as hoardings down the Falls Road, giving out a consistent, defiant and internationalist message. The Hunger strikes are remembered alongside support for the Palestinian struggle, anti Brit propaganda alongside support for liberation struggles around the world, and support for (the now released) political prisoners alongside wonderfully cruel caricatures of George Bush.

Particularly notable was a couple of the question of racism. They include a quote from Fredrick Douglass pointing out that the Irish had as well as suffering racism shown a capacity to behave in a racist manner to others. This self-awareness and capacity to see themselves in a critical light characterised for me Northern Irish Republicanism. As we approached a gate in the wall (these can be opened and closed by the police from the safety of their own forts - I use the word "forts" as the only adequate description having seen one!) our Republican guide left the bus.

On the other side our Loyalist guide got on. This side of the wall was in many ways the same but in others dramatically different. The houses looked the same, as did the people. But instead of murals that were works of art the loyalist side had predominately graffiti. Images designed to remind the community of centuries of history were replaced by crude sectarian graffiti. Loyalist Belfast feels scared, ready to lash out, but also resigned to defeat. The Shankill Road was closed for a march of loyalist bands. Watching them marching by was a chilling sight. I asked our Guide about the lack of any visible police presence and was informed that they policed their own events. Indeed it was clear that others on both sides of the wall carried out policing in West Belfast.

Next stop was the Conway Mill community centre where we got to see H3 a film about the hunger strikes in the early 1980's when Bobby Sands MP, and nine of his comrades died in a protest at the removal of political prisoner status. I am normally good at controlling my emotions but I found this film overwhelmingly powerful. At times I was unable to watch the screen and like many others ended the film with red eyes. {Read my full review here} But before I could recover we were introduced to the films writer Lawrence McKeown, and Seanna Walsh. Lawrence McKeown had been the eleventh hunger striker, and in a coma, when the action was called off. For years IRA statements have been issued in the name of P O'Neil, but the recent announcement of the end of the armed struggle had a human face, Seanna Walsh, a former cellmate of Bobby Sands, had made it. Yet again we were involved in dialogue with major actors. Listening to their stories and their responses to challenging questions from conference participants from across Europe was a real privilege. We then had the best food of the conference, cheap wine, passionate debate, local music and a late night.

The theme of the conference was " transition" and I attending sessions covering a wide range of different themes. The format for much of the conference was three different parallel sessions. At each two or three people presented papers followed by group discussions. These sessions often tried to cram too much into to little time with the result that presentations were rushed and there was to little time for others attending to ask questions or make contributions. I attended sessions around the theme of Iraq, Imprisonment, Drugs, Food, Health and Safety and Environmental Crime, Women, and Community Attitudes to crime. All discussions are in English and this obviously presents real challenges for participants whose first language is not English. Overall the quality of the presentations was good. There was a good balance between theory and practice and many applied critical thinking that allowed me to see issues in new ways.

One issue that came up was the use of the concept of "crime" by progressives. On the one hand there was the view that "crime" is a flawed concept and we should be trying to resist and indeed role back criminalisation (e.g. drugs and minor anti social behaviour in working class communities). However others were effectively seeking to extend the definition of crime and the role of law to include war crimes, environmental crime, food crime, health and safety crime and other crimes by the powerful. Criminalisation has historically been used to regulate and control the poor, weak and marginalized. Can the same mechanism be used to protect them and control the powerful?

A second issue that came up for me was the way transition of the former communist countries into capitalist parliamentary democracies had resulted in them replicating the experiences of Western Europe over the last 30 years. Within these countries there appears to be a tendencies to conceive of for example drugs as a new phenomenon. In fact the adoption of policies in the 1990's that the UK had adopted in the 60's and 70's had resulted in the drug markets and cultures developing in identical ways. The only difference being the speed, possibly reflecting the increased speed with which globalisation is currently working.

A third issue was around human rights. This was linked to the idea of a progressive extension of the concept of crime. For example we explored the difficulty of defining "war" crimes. This is not as easy as it seems or indeed many of us would like. Using the UN as part of a definition was problematic given the veto. Israel would in all probability be protected by the US veto. Human rights were offered as a potential alternative route. This was also suggested as having potential in terms of environmental and issues of genocide. I remain unconvinced that any model like this can be effective when in essence its has to be policed by the very people who such laws would be intended to control. The winners of any war are never likely to be held to account.

I think the group should promote itself more to new people. For those of us engaged in resisting prisons or challenging a class based criminal (in)justice system or promoting alternatives to the punitive policies of most governments we need to spend time with comrades, we need it for the energy it can give us if nothing else. I found it incredibly exciting spending time with a group of people who shared my passions and whose knowledge and experience could not but help me further develop my thinking. The conference was informal, no one had titles, status was not an available tool. The European dimension really made this an event; I loved the different perspectives that people from across the continent (and at least three other continents!) were able to bring. With the communication potential of the Internet I know that I will maintain contact with many of them. The conference cost £250 (including accommodation and food) for someone waged. Its not cheap but I believe there is potential to help any activist who can not afford it and there are reduced rates for students, part time workers and the unwaged. One thing I must check up with other participants was the level of interest shown them at Belfast airport. I was subjected to a very thorough search, had my laptop taken away for further examination and myself and my bags "dabbed" for explosives. In the old Belfast this would have worried me given the hands I had shaken over recent days.

Next years conference is in Greece, I certainly intend to be there. But given the healthy rate at which the leaflets for the Prison Abolition Seminar disappeared and the interest expressed I suspect I will be seeing a number of people sooner than that.

Update 2010

This year's European Group's conference is again in Greece at the beginning of September. Further details can be obtained from http://soc-eknexasrv1.aegean.gr/site/European%20group.html

A Prison Visit

2010-05-30T08:00:00.004+01:00

The Government and Penal Reform Charities claim the Prison service works hard to help prisoners maintain links with family and friends. It is they claim evidence of how prison works to achieve successful rehabilitation.

Elizabeth, a regular visitor to a prisoner, describes how she was treated. Sadly her experience is not uncommon.

I'm 52 years old. I have been an almost weekly visitor to the same private prison in the UK for nearly 3 years.In November 2006 I alighted from a public service bus with 2 other ladies and were subjected to having all my personal data collated by police officers in the prison car park . My bags were rummaged by 2 police officers. Nothing was found. We then lined up in the middle of the car park and had our already rummaged bags sniffed by a drug dog, as well as our persons. Nothing to report likewise.

We then went into the prison visitor's centre, and after checking in I was further questioned by police as to how tall I am. I am very petite, but have no accurate idea. Two police officers deliberated and came up with 'my height' measurements. My bags were already in a locker. The police officer ordered my bags to be removed and the entire contents, including reserve sanitary pad was screened in public gaze of prison visitor's centre snug against the communal lockers. I was then told that they needed to investigate me further, and was taken off to the prison staff toilet and a strip search was performed. I had no pockets to turn out, there were no reasonable grounds to by-pass the primary procedures of asking me whether I had any 'unauthorised articles' which I had not. They did not offer me a pat down. They did not electro scan me. They did not provide me with a F2141 consent form to read and sign so as to offer consent to the search. (see Wainwright v United Kingdom). No record of the search incident was offered to me at time of strip search nor after.

Apparrently flawed intellegence had been given to the police by the prison. This was linked to a misunderstanding 6 months ago, and cleared up, at that time, by the Governor of the prison. His letter to me was dated May 2006 accepting my honest explanation, and wishing me very positive visits at the prison. Six months later this is what they did to me. I was strip searched by a police woman whilst trying to explain that the matter had been the focus of correspondence between the Governor and myself. I mentioned his name. The police woman asked who Mr. X was whilst I was wearing no lower underwear. I was then allowed to go for a 'normal' visit. Nothing was on my person to find.

I found out my rights after the trauma. I found the case of Mrs Wainwright who was subjected to a strip search and given the consent form after her ordeal. I wasn't given the consent form before of after by prison, nor a record of the outcome of my strip search by police at time of incident.

They control the information and use our ignorance as a weapon to manipulate us into 'consenting' or we are 'expelled from the prison'. It was a choice of having no choice. Being obligated to comply or forego a visit to a low category prisoner, no drug history, and does not smoke. I have no history of drugs, never even seen drugs! No history of violence either! Please ensure you are aware of your rights as protection if you are obligated to be marched off to the prison staff toilet and strip as I was.

Has anyone else been degraded in this way without being told why it is happening, and the object of the strip search?

Don't expand Styal Prison - Close it down

2010-05-29T00:01:00.033+01:00

A Report of a No More prison demo held outside Styal Prison in April 2006

Within 3 month of its establishment No More Prison organised its first direct action - a demonstration outside styal prison on April 8th 2006.

The Demostration was in opposition to the Governments plan to expand the failed prison to make it Europe's largest prison for women. No More Prison called instead for the prison to be closed.

Among those attending the demonstration were former prisoners Susan May and Sandra Gregory. Also attending were three mothers whose children had been killed by Britians Prisons.

Many friends and relatives visting stopped to talk about the experiences of their loved ones inside Styal and to support No More Prison's call for its closure. A number were surprised that despite the prison's well publicised failures the Government is planning to double the number of women imprisoned in it.

Granda TV covered the demo and Pauline Campbell, whose 18 year old daughter Sarah died in the "care" of Styal, and is supporting No More Prison's call for the closure of Styal, was interviewed by MFM, Signal, Classic Gold Marcher, Wirral's Buzz, and Silk FM Radio Stations.

Although we recognise that it will take more than one demonstration to close down Styal Prison it was important as it shows both the incarerated women and the Government that people are concerned and prepared to take action. No More Prison is committed to continuing to highlight the abusive nature of prison and to campaign for its abolition.

During the demonstration an Ambulance arrived at the prison. This is a regular event. The pain of being locked up in Styal sees daily self harm and attempts by the women to end their lives.

Facts about Styal

Six women tragically died in the 12 months ending August 2003
In March 2005, Governor Hall admitted there had been 41 attempted hangings over one week-end alone (Mother's Day week-end).
Nine out of ten of the women caged at Styal have been convicted of non-violent offences
On 28 October 2005, Karen Ann Fletcher, 30, died in the 'care' of HMP Holloway, shortly after being transferred from Styal.
In Feburary the Guardian revealed that a 27-year-old Styal prisoner spent four hours locked in a small cage inside a prison van the day before her baby was due
In response to this disclosure of abuse Styal Prison banned the Guardian's correspondent from visiting the jail until further notice.
Two thirds of the women locked up in Styal are mothers
The most common offence women are caged for in Styal - Shop Lifting
Over 1 in 3 women will lose their home as a result of their imprisonment in Styal
Over half the women in Styal are victims of childhood abuse, rape or domestic violence
Over a third of the women in Styal have attempted to kill themselves
2 out of 3 women in Styal have mental health problems

The racism continues

2010-05-28T08:00:00.000+01:00

By: John Bowden, HMP Saughton

Less than a week after the publication of the scathing official report into the racist murder of Zahid Mubarek at Feltham, which condemned the prison system for its treatment of Zahid and held it significantly responsible for his murder, the shocking treatment of mixed-race prisoner Sean Higgins showed how absolutely nothing has changed.

Sean has been a consistent target of racism throughout his sentence and suffered flagrant abuse and serious assaults from prison officers because of his vocal objection to the sort of treatment highlighted in the Mubarek report. Always his protests and complaints have been met with violence and victimisation, and for years his enduring spirit of resistance has resulted in a vicious cycle of complaint and brutal repression with his captors that now threatens his life.

On 30 June whilst at Gloucester prison Sean became involved in an argument with a prison officer in the presence of other staff and prisoners. The officer, angered by Sean's temerity and refusal to back down, called him a "black cunt"; and threatened to take him to the punishment block and "squash him like a bug". Sean was soon afterwards transferred to Bristol prison as a "problem" and met there by a reception committee of the goon squad. Sean described to his lawyer Vicky King what happened, saying that on arrival at Bristol he was seriously assaulted by staff there, sustaining a broken arm and a broken ankle. Staff refused to arrange x-rays. Sean was left with 27 shards of glass in the bottom of his feet. He says that a senior member of staff tried to force a fire hose up his rectum and also wrapped it round his neck. Vicky King said: "He sounded absolutely dreadful. I have never heard him sound so awful. That's including the time that I sat with him in cells in Hull Crown Court whilst he was almost naked, on dirty protest, and with a freshly broken arm. He was in a bad way then but he sounds a hundred times worse now."

The truth is that Sean is being pitilessly driven beyond the limits of human endurance and systematically destroyed by the racism of the prison system. The same racism that drives a disproportionate number of young black men to self-harm and kill themselves in prison.

Despite what the official mouthpieces of the prison system say publicly about "tackling racism", the reality is that at the direct point of repression prisoners of colour are being brutalised and sometimes murdered by racist prison staff who are allowed to get away with it.

Please email and write to Prison Service Headquarters, Cleland House Page Street

LONDON SW1P 4LN and the governor of Bristol prison complaining about Sean's treatment and send cards and letters of support to Sean Higgins VA3977 HMP BRISTOL Cambridge Road BRISTOL BS7 8PS

What is Prison Abolition all about?

2010-05-27T08:00:00.001+01:00

The following is a copy of a document produced by an American Organisation Critical Resistance.

For more information about Critical Resistance click here to visit their web site

WHAT IS ABOLITION?

Abolition is a political vision that seeks to eliminate the need for prisons, policing, and surveillance by creating sustainable alternatives to punishment and imprisonment.

Abolition means acknowledging the devastating effects prison, policing, and surveillance have on poor communities, communities of color and other targeted communities, and saying, "No, we won't live like this. We deserve more."

Abolitionists recognize that the kinds of wrongdoing we call "crime" do not exist in the same way everywhere and are not "human nature", but rather determined by the societies we live in. Similarly, abolitionists do not assume that people will never hurt each other or that people won't cross the boundaries set up by their communities. We do imagine, however, that boundary crossings will happen much less often if we live in a society that combines flexibility with care to provide for, and acknowledge, people's needs. To do that, we must create alternatives for dealing with the injuries people inflict upon each other in ways that sustain communities and families. Keeping a community whole is impossible by routinely removing people from it.

An abolitionist vision means that we must build models today that can represent how we want to live in the future. It means developing practical strategies for taking small steps that move us toward making our dreams real and that lead the average person to believe that things really could be different. It means living this vision in our daily lives.

IF NOT PRISONS AND POLICE. THEN WHAT?

If our vision is to eliminate the need for prisons, policing, and surveillance, we must have a clear idea of what we need to make our communities safe and secure. We must make those alternatives realistic and we must be able to begin building them today. We need community alternatives that keep people out of the hands of police and out of prisons and jails, while addressing the fears that people live with on a daily basis. We can do that by building our communities and ending a reliance on, and belief in, law enforcement as the only solution. Here are just a few examples of what those alternatives might include:

Community-based economic resources:

Current cooperative economic models provide us with one set of strategies to build our communities. We can create a means for providing meaningful work - and training for that work?to all. This work and training can provide for our housing, food, and clothing, and should contribute to the well being of the community.

Community-based education models:

We have examples of small, charter and alternative schools that have been successful in showing us alternative means of educating our community. Community-based schools can offer education to anyone who wants it (youth and adults). Education can be free, participatory, and aimed toward sustaining the kinds of social environments we want to create. They can also model the community forms we want in their teaching practices. Our schools can tailor the learning process to the needs of the students and can involve the adult community in learning and teaching so schools are not isolated from the rest of the community.

Community forums:

Some current restorative justice models from around the world provide us with examples of how community mediation and problem solving is used to resolve conflicts and keep our communities safe. We must create a means of dealing with people who hurt each other (physically, mentally, emotionally, materially). We can establish community forums to address grievances people have regarding each other and as a means of resolving those conflicts. Such formations could include community councils that mediate between individuals/groups, community elders to whom community members could go to for advice and counsel, age-, issue-, and interest-specific groups for building community ties (youth groups, artists' circles, support groups, study groups, etc.), to community-based strategies for keeping individuals community members from harming themselves or others and to provide disincentives for repeating such actions. Above all, these groups can grow from the community and their direction and scope should come from the people involved in them and whom they affect.

Community Services:

Current community-based organizations provide us with good examples of how services may be provided. We must provide services to those who have difficulty providing for themselves. Such strategies can emphasize not only taking care of those who need the most help, but finding ways to help people get through these systems and come out with both what they need and their humanity and dignity intact. These models can also include working with people who currently provide such services to design workshops, trainings, and ongoing support and resources that go beyond providing indi vidual advocacy and services, and emphasize gaining independence from those systems.

Medical care:

Current neighborhood clinics and free clinics provide us with good examples of strategies for making free health care available to all. Such services can include basic health (preventative, check ups, acupuncture, etc.), health crises (major medical emergencies, terminal illness), dental and visual health, and mental health (both routine counseling and therapy as well as crisis care and care for the mentally disabled, etc.).

Many of the strategies discussed above are already in place. They are not fantasies, but real life examples of community building and growth.

WHAT CAN I DO?

Abolition means that every time we oppose or try to tear something down, we need to build something sustainable in its place. We can do this by being strategic, by researching not only what the problems are, but also what resources are available. We must look not only at what the state is doing wrong, but what is already available in our communities that could provide economic and social sustainability for all, or what needs to be created and how we will create it. Each step in our organizing must be able to do this.
Being an abolitionist means taking action and putting energy into building our families, neighborhoods?all of our communities. It means creating a firm community foundation for people to come to when we finally tear down all the walls. Together we can do this, but we must believe that it is possible.

WHAT DOES ABOLITIONISM MEAN FOR ME AND WHY SHOULD I CARE

Taking an abolitionist approach means radically shifting the way we think about providing for ourselves and living with each other. It means imagining social environments that provide all of us with basic necessities: a safe place to live, enough food, access to medical care for minds and bodies, access to information and the tools with which to understand and use that information, the resources to participate in whatever kind of economy we have, a means of expressing opinions/interests/concerns, and living free of bodily, psychological and emotional harm (both from individuals and from the state).

Can you say that you have access to all these things? Does every one in your community have that same access?

We need to start building the kinds of social environments that will provide these resources for all before we can abolish anything. We need strategies that will keep our communities whole and keep us safe, not ones that rely on punishment, caging, and bodily harm. The environments most of us live in offer us "public safety" that does not serve the entire community, but protects the interests of the state and the rich and powerful. We cannot abolish prisons if we don't have sustainable communities for people to come home to.

Crime

2010-05-27T00:01:00.007+01:00

By: George Coombs

Crime and its ramifications are of understandable concern to many people. Prisons are full to bursting point with national figures exceeding eighty five thousand. Overcrowding with its inevitable consequences of escalating tension and violence is a national disgrace but more prisons at enormous expense often constructed by American companies are not the answer.

There needs to be new thinking. Justice equals understanding, not revenge. Crime does not equal punishment but clear thinking and seeing. The vast majority of the prison population are working class people from deprived areas and with disturbed backgrounds. Havelock Ellis is right to argue that "Every society has the criminals it deserves."

Long periods of deprivation of liberty, isolation and lack of one's own safe space are dangerous. In a 1965 paper Professor Harry Harlow described his studies of the effects of social isolation by describing how he, and colleagues had reared monkeys from birth onward in bare wire cages causing them to experience paternal deprivation and these studies lasted for periods of three, six or twelve months. They concluded that severe and enduring isolation reduced the monkeys to a kind of socio/emotional level where the primary social response is fear.

This idea and related matters are taken up by the Chinese scholar Chiang Yee "Life came into being with space in which to live. Room in which to be and move....space in which to live. To be alive inwardly as well as the life seen by others. Take away that space, that room in which to live and inner death is inevitable. Deprivation is so often inflicted on those already deprived of so much and this, and emotional deprivation lead the scream nobody wants to hear.......to actions called crimes yet are not the real criminals the creators of deprivation, isolation and fear?"

Chiang Yee asks a telling question here and elsewhere he suggests that "Justice is light leading to light. It is not revenge or pandering to the deceitful, the powerful and the selfish.....stains are on many hands I tell you truly too many hands have been washed too often."

Life needs space in which to live, Take away that space and fear is inevitable. Fear as a social response leading to resistance and anger, two expressions of the scream society seeks to ignore. The anger may well be turned outward in violence or inward in self harm and suicide.

All this find terrible expression in the death in custody in Flagstaff, Arizona of Bill Rogers. Bill was an environmental preservation activist who had been accused of destroying corporate property and is remembered as an intelligent man and full of activity.

Bill chose to end his life rather than spend a good deal of it in prison as could well have happened. On the Winter Solstice of 2005 he was found in his cell with a plastic bag over his face and his fist raised above him. If treated with understanding, compassion and awareness he might still be alive today.

In this excerpt from another of his meditations Chiang Yee gives us a fitting conclusion when he says to anyone in prison "Strive to maintain your inner life......keep alive the inner vibrations of your higher self......be aware justice is a lone frightened child who roams your prison crying "Not in my name."

Blair's criminal justice reforms - another step on the road to social fascism

2010-05-26T08:00:00.000+01:00

The following first appeared in the Newspaper "Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism!"

By: Nicki Jameson

On 23 June Labour Party Prime Minister Tony Blair made a speech in Bristol, setting out his manifesto for the "reform" of the criminal justice system. Thinly disguised as a call for a 'considered intellectual and political debate about the nature of liberty in the modern world', the speech set out the Labour Party's plans for policing Britain in the interests of capitalism in the next period. While, as in all such speeches, Blair paid lip-service to the genuine problems faced by inner-city working class communities on drug and crime-ridden estates, his words were squarely directed at the middle classes and labour aristocracy, who Blair describes as 'ordinary, decent law-abiding folk... [who] think they play fair and play by the rules and they see too many people who don't, getting away with it.'

Although the speech was peppered with attacks on immigrants and would-be terrorists, and on courts and judges that have upheld their rights not to be deported or tortured, the main target was the impoverished native working class. Blair's explanation for increased crime and alienation over the past 50 years is that along with changed demography and a less cohesive society (more social mobility, migration, divorce, employment of women, less "deference" etc) 'a more prosperous nation is a more demanding nation. Prosperity increases the opportunity for crime and makes it more lucrative.'

In this deliberately dishonest take on the world, everything can be easily explained: 'Prosperity means most people have something worth stealing. Drugs means more people are prepared to steal. Organised crime which trafficks in drugs and people make money. Violence, often of a qualitatively as well as quantitatively different sort than anything before, accompanies it. Then there is the advent of this new phenomenon of global terrorism based on a perversion of Islam.'

But the truth is that it is not increased prosperity that characterises Britain under Labour, but increased inequality. Since 1997 the rich and middle class have grown better off while the poor have become poorer. In August 2005 research by the government's own Office of National Statistics showed that the income gap between rich and poor has widened significantly under Labour.

Traditionally this situation would have resulted in at least a nod towards redistribution of wealth, usually through increased taxation of the better off. But Blair's Labour Party has no intention of taking the smallest thing away from the "prosperous"; his sole aim is to attack the impoverished working class still further. When he speaks of 'rebalanc[ing]...in favour of the decent, law-abiding majority who play by the rules and think others should too' he is actually setting out plans to tilt the scales still further against those already suffering the most. The people who are the poorest and most alienated will henceforth be targeted, monitored, and punished not just as a result of crime they might be driven to commit, but simply for existing, for being poor, for having children who are poor, or for being addicted to drugs. This is fascism.

Blair's concrete plans break down into four sections:

More laws. A power to arrest and bring immediately to court anyone who breaks an undertaking to have treatment for drug addiction. Swifter, summary powers to deal with anti-social behaviour. Changes to limits on the seizure of assets of suspects.
New systems Special summary "community courts", "anti-social behaviour courts", "drug courts" and "domestic violence courts".
Tracking of 'suspects and offenders' who will be 'given not just a sentence but an appropriate process for sorting their life out; and if they don't, be followed up, brought back to court'. If you don't follow orders, you can not only be imprisoned - but also starved or made homeless, as local authorities will be allowed to take compliance into account when deciding on entitlement to benefits and social welfare.
"Public service reform - this is described as 'Capturing and disseminating best practice; using different and new providers...in the management of offenders'. In effect it means more privatisation. It also includes 'giving the victim a right to be heard in relation to sentencing', which is code for lynch-mob justice, as victims who ask for leniency do not make headlines.

Blair makes no apologies for this programme: 'We need far earlier intervention with some of these families, who are often socially excluded and socially dysfunctional. That may mean before they offend; and certainly before they want such intervention. But in truth, we can identify such families virtually as their children are born.'

The children and families Blair wants to label as deviant from birth are precisely those who are not benefiting from the 'increased prosperity' he harps on about. Labour pledged when it came to power that it would end child poverty and has singularly failed to do so. In Bristol where Blair delivered this speech, 26% of children live below the poverty line. In Britain's wealthy capital city, London, 41% of children live in poverty. But the "intervention" that the government will be making in their lives is not to provide relief or assistance but simply punishment.

Nicki Jameson

Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism!
BCM BOX 5909
LONDON WC1N 3XX
http://www.revolutionarycommunist.com/