Book Review:
Rethinking prison justice
Review of Angela Y. Davis’ Are Prisons Obsolete?
Reviewed by Patrick McGuire
Published by Seven Stories Press, 2003 (Open Media Series) by Angela Y. Davis
In 1998, a conference entitled Critical Resistance: Beyond the Prison Industrial Complex in Berkley, California brought together over three thousand participants and an impressive selection of presenters and organizers. Angela Y. Davis, former political prisoner, author and currently professor of History of Consciousness at the University of California, Santa Cruz, was one of the 25 core conference organizers. Her new book, Are Prisons Obsolete? is a series of short reflections drawn from her discussions at the conference and subsequent collaborative work on prison issues. As part of its Open Media series, Seven Stories Press has once again published a small yet powerful book of great relevance to those of us who envision and struggle to create a radically different future.
Goal
Are Prisons Obsolete? begins by asking prison activists, “which is your goal: Prison Reform or Prison Abolition?” Should effort be spent ameliorating the current prison justice system or should we begin re-thinking the prison and the central role it plays in an out-dated and ineffective “correctional” apparatus? Not surprisingly, Davis affirms the latter choice. Each chapter of Are Prisons Obsolete? thus focuses on one aspect of imprisonment and the prison system to demonstrate that they are by design racist, sexist and classist. In this fashion, they are beyond reform and are obsolete.
In chapter two, Davis examines the racial dynamics of prisons in the US in depth. Taking a long historical view, Davis traces the connections between slavery as a racialized system of unfree labour and the convict lease system utilized by prisons. While the US Constitution outlawed involuntary servitude, it allowed forced labour in prisons, in effect allowing for the forced exploitation of African-American labour during the reconstruction era and the early 20th century. Newly “freed” Blacks found themselves quickly snared by Jim Crow laws and imprisoned in institutions that could lease them out to private corporations for profit maximization. This exploitation was not an aberration, but rather a systemic pattern that continues today in the form of a dramatic over-representation of people of colour in prison and their modern-day use as a captive labour force.
The gendered structuring of the prison system is the focus of chapter four. Davis points out that although women’s imprisonment has always represented a fraction of male incarceration rates, women are currently the fastest growing prison population. Further, Davis provides examples of bizarre “power feminism” in action such as female prison administrators increasing punishment and repression of women prisoners in order to be “equal” with men’s institutions. Most powerfully, Are Prisons Obsolete? touches on the rampant and systemic sexual assault and abuse of women prisoners. Through comments, groping, rape and, in particular, unnecessary strip searches and cavity searches, the prison system routinely violates the rights of women to control their bodies. A growing number of feminist prison activists both within and outside of bars are building an analysis of these forms of sanctioned “state sexual assault”.
When Davis turns her attention to the privatized nature of prisons today, her book is at its most articulate and interesting. Building on the idea of a “Prison Industrial Complex” originally proposed by social historian Mike Davis, Angela Davis briefly describes the intertwined and self-perpetuating relationships between corporations, government, correctional communities and the media. In this “brave new world” of corporatized punishment, an entire profit-making industry is built around the state’s ability to warehouse human beings and squander social potential. From massive contractors who secure prison construction projects, to corporations like VitaPro Foods of Montreal who supply meat substitutes, there are a huge array of enterprises that exist simply to service what Ward Churchill has called “an ever-expanding penal archipelago”. This is to say nothing of the privatized prisons run by companies such as the Corrections Corporation of America and Wackenhut Corporation that make more money for every new person incarcerated; or of the rapidly growing use of cheap non-union prison labour for a myriad of tasks such as building furniture for educational facilities (ironic given that education programs in prisons are almost entirely dismantled), sewing underwear or booking airplane flights.
The Prison Industrial Complex also enjoys a symbiotic relationship with its namesake, the Military Industrial Complex. Both industries enjoy cozy and heavily subsidized relations with government while swapping ideas regarding the development of new technologies for control and brutality. For example, the Sandia National Laboratories was experimenting with a dense foam that could be used to incapacitate prisoners, while the Stinger Corporation was developing “smart guns” that can only be fired by their owner. Along with the proliferation of Super Maximum Security or Supermax prisons in which prisoners are locked down 23 hours a day, it is clear that the Prison Industrial Complex is specializing in creating more oppressive conditions that are further and further away from the much-vaunted but seemingly abandoned goal of prisoner rehabilitation.
History
Of particular interest is the history of the Prison Industrial Complex’s development as a response to globalization and the de-industrialization of North America in the 1980s. Hundreds of thousands of workers became surplus labour fit for incarceration. Also, as major industries shut down or re-located, entire communities began looking for replacement industries, and prisons appeared as a stable, non-polluting alternative that could guarantee employment. At this stage the media enters to whip up the law and order hysteria fueled by the US government’s ‘war on drugs’. Despite the decrease in virtually all types of crime, harsher penalties such as “Three Strikes” and mandatory minimums were introduced once the populace was soaked in fear by the depiction of racialized criminal “others” on the evening news and television shows such as “COPS”. Thus, Davis argues “the prison has become a black hole into which the detritus of contemporary capitalism is deposited.”
Are Prisons Obsolete? concludes with a brief discussion of “Abolitionist Alternatives”. Rather than focusing on one alternative system, Davis compellingly advocates for a constellation of alternative strategies that would enable our societies to move beyond prisons. Initiatives such as the de-militarization of schools, accessible health care (particularly mental health and drug addictions programs), decriminalization of drug use and reconciliatory justice programs are all suggested as practical and holistic options for decarceration. Most importantly, Davis argues against falling into the trap of simply tweaking the existing prison system, and promotes instead the building of an “antiracist, anticapitalist, antisexist and antihomophobic” movement capable of challenging the very foundations of the prison system’s legitimacy as a social institution. Despite the unfortunate brevity of this section of the book, the reader is amazed by the practicality of Davis’ suggestions.
In spite of all its strengths, Are Prisons Obsolete? does have some weaknesses. First, although Davis writes from an internationalist perspective and includes examples from countries outside the US, there is still an overwhelming focus on the USA. While this is entirely logical given that 20% of the world’s prison population is behind bars in America, Canadian readers would do well to follow up with readings on the domestic scene. That said, Davis’ analysis of the racialized nature of imprisonment could be roughly but equally applied to the drastic overrepresentation of Aboriginal prisoners in Canada and to prison’s function as an expression of colonialism. Secondly, while a listing of a dozen prison activist organizations is included as an appendix, a short list of suggested readings would have been very easy to insert, giving readers further access to materials on prison abolition and the function of prisons. Titles such as Michel Foucault’s Discipline and Punish, Christian Parenti’s Lockdown America and Ruth Morris’ Prison Abolition come immediately to mind.
Thirdly, and most importantly for those of us trying to build socialism from below, Davis says virtually nothing on the prison’s function as an appendage of the State. Given the horrific experiences of prisons, secret police and capital punishment carried out by so-called “socialist” governments during the 20th century, radicals need to engage in a project of critical reflection that envisions a democratic and participatory system of justice. Unfortunately, readers will have to look beyond Are Prisons Obsolete? for this critique. All shortcomings aside, Are Prisons Obsolete? is an excellent short analysis of prisons and it builds a very convincing case for prison abolition. Further, readers who appreciate Angela Davis’ conversational tone would do well to follow up by getting her earlier spoken word CD The Prison Industrial Complex which is available through Alternative Tentacles Records and AK Press.
