1 The major dangers of crime in modern societies are not the crimes, but that the fight against them may lead societies towards totalitarian developments.
– Nils Christie, Norwegian criminologist

2 The prison industry is said to employ more than 523,000 people, making it the largest employer in the U.S. after General Motors. (see endnote 1)

3 Imprisonment is a process whereby a large number of unemployed are made invisible. American unemployment statistics appear to be low compared to those of other industrial democracies because 1.6 million mainly low skilled workers are imprisoned, with a 2% difference in real unemployment levels. (2)

4 Obviously crime pays, or there would be no crime.
– Gordon Liddy, American radio talk-show host

5 Few men desire liberty; most men wish only for a just master.
– Sallust, Roman historian, c. 40 BC

6 Drugs – if they did not exist, our governors would have invented them in order to prohibit them and so make much of the population vulnerable to arrest, imprisonment, seizure of property, and so on.
– Gore Vidal, American author of The War at Home

7 If we make enough laws, we can all be criminals.
– Anonymous

8 Our current* prison state has the dual effect of getting rid of extra people (unskilled workers – this is related to race), and demonizing them. The drug war is basically for this - it has nothing to do with drugs, but much to do with criminalizing an unwanted population and scaring everybody else.

Rates for serious violent crimes are more or less stable, but prison populations and the resources spent on the crime-control industry are both increasing rapidly. While the US leads, the trend is the same almost everywhere.


1. Rates of Imprisonment
• In 1994, 5.1 million in the US were on probation/parole or in prison – nearly 3% of the population.

2. Petty Crime
• Large numbers of people are doing jail time for non-violent, often petty (not serious) crime, or even the failure to pay fines.
• The 11,846,833 US arrests in 1994 included 86,733 for prostitution, 1,117,323 for drug offences, 600,345 for disorderly conduct, 105,781 for curfew and loitering violations, 200,863 runaways, and 21,407 for vagrancy.
• In the UK in 1994, 22,723 persons were imprisoned for not paying fines – an increase of 36% for men and 68% for women from 1990. In 80% of the cases, the cost of imprisonment was more than the amount of the fine.

3. Money
• By the mid-1990s, the US was spending over $200 billion a year on the crime-control industry.
• In Canada between 1971 and 1991, the number of police officers increased 41% and the number of private security guards increased by 126%. By 1991, private security forces outnumbered police by about 2 to 1.
• In the US, two major companies account for 50% of private contracts to run prisons.
• Average yearly cost per prisoner in 1994: US $30,000, Aotearoa (NZ) $40,000, Canada $51,000.

4. The War on Drugs
• Some 60% of prisoners in US prisons are there for drug offences. In 1992 some 3000 drug offenders with no record of violent crime in the last 15 years were sent to prison for a minimum of 5 years.
• The 1988 anti-drug abuse act gives a minimum imprisonment of 5 years for possession of more than 5 grams of crack cocaine (mostly used by blacks) on a first offence. You need to possess 100 times that amount of powdered cocaine (mostly used by whites) to get the same sentence.
• In 1992, the US Public Health Service estimated that 76% of illegal drug-users in the US were white, 14% black, and 8% Hispanic. Yet in New York state 92% of all drug-possession offenders sent to prison were black and Hispanic; in California it was 71%.

5. The Color of Justice
• The number of white young people brought into the US criminal justice system increased by 1% during 1987-88; for non-whites it increased by 42%. In 1991 the US national imprisonment rate was 310 per 100,000: amongst white males it was 352; amongst black males it was 6,301.
• One in three black men (aged 20-29) in Los Angeles are jailed annually. In 1990 on an average day, one in four black men in the US were either in jail, prison, or on probation/parole11. In Washington D.C., 75% of black males could expect to be arrested at least once before age 35.
• In Canada, native Indians make up 5% of the total population, but 32% of the national prison population. There was a 204% increase in the number of blacks imprisoned in the province of Ontario between 1986 and 1994; for whites it is 23%.
• In the state of Western Australia, native aborigines13 make up 3% of the population, yet account for 51% of all those imprisoned by the high courts (75% for less than three months).

1 "Crime Does Not Pay" is a slogan we have often repeated, but which today is in doubt. Crime does indeed pay! Some corporations are taking advantage of what is being called by Norwegian criminologist Nils Christie the "corrections industrial complex", an industry which since the mid 1980s has become an economic giant. It includes the construction, maintenance, and operation of private prisons. There is a basic problem with an industry which is economically interested in the continuation of a negative aspect of society. Dr. Christie explains, "You get private lobbying for prisons and you get private capital interested in building more prisons, in expanding that system. The industry has no interest in its own abolition."

2 With a prison population of over 1.8 million in the U.S., which has doubled within the last ten years, there will be a need for more room. Existing prisons are overfull and filled with the product of the “war on drugs”. Non-violent drug offenders are the largest and fastest growing section of the prison population. "Three Strikes and You're Out" laws serve neither society nor the offender. Such "band aid" approaches have not been useful, except for creating corporate profits. Crime-industry lobbyists want tougher and longer punishment, even though the crime rate has actually decreased and is below what it was 25 years ago.

3 Not only do those financing private prisons have an interest in “the bottom line”, but often the guard does as well. Many private prisons offer employees stock ownership as opposed to guaranteed pensions, a money-saving plan that encourages guards to lengthen prisoner stays at every opportunity, while saving on such things as food, medical services, and rehabilitative activities.

4 Another issue in this industry is prisoner labor. If private prisons can use prisoner labor, then the investment comes full circle. Not only are they paid to house inmates for the state, but they have a labor force which needs no benefits, has no lobbying power, and cannot strike for higher wages or better working conditions. Critics are concerned with prison labor undercuttingoutside wages or removing jobs from the private sector. There is also the fear of poor health and safety standards. Is such prisoner labor is a way to rehabilitate them and decrease the amount paid by taxpayers, or if it is exploitation of a particular class of society?

5 There is a tendency to deprive individuals of their liberty for purely economic reasons as the "prison industrial complex" (like any other) desires to expand. The only possible way for the industry to do this is for it to maintain high rates of imprisonment, while providing the least number of services (that cut into profits). This could lead to the privatizing of the justice system by the influence of the industry's lobbying power for longer, tougher, and stricter punishment.

6 The focus must be shifted away from profits made by a few individuals and financial interests, and redirected towards building a system that takes from the best of both public and private sectors. The goal is a system which is cost-effective, serves society, and produces what prison systems are designed for: a rehabilitated prisoner. It is not an unachievable goal; America has done as much with greater problems. It is already proven that prisoner labor and prison privatization creates huge amounts of money. This money should benefit the taxpayers, and it should, in part, be for the funding of the justice system, including defenderexpenses, prison construction, operation and maintenance, and crime prevention and prisoner rehabilitation. Truly looking for answers to stopping crime is the only way that the industry will benefit society in a responsible way.