I love Reader's Digest's condensed books. Packed with so much high-quality writing, every book is a definite must-have for anyone who wants to read and get their money's worth every time(as compared to today's monthly Reader's digest which now sports a lot of pictures but with less written stuff).
There was this one particular book/article, I Chose Prison, by James V. Bennett., which had left a big impression on me. As a background, James Bennett was the Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons spanning the period from 1937 to 1964. A heavyweight in prison reform, Bennett pioneered a lot of things, mainly the professionalization of corrections personnel, the shift to more humane yet more effective methods of treatment for inmates, and the de-politicization of appointees to the bureau.
One notable idea he mentioned was the concept of a prison without walls. In his time, he described a system where prisoners are free to walk around and integrate themselves back into society, all the while serving their terms in jail. The usual day would involve leaving the prison camp, going off for work or visiting the family, and returning back to federal prison before curfew. Every now and then, there would be rehabilitation seminars for the prisoners.
Bennett noted that such a treatment shouldn't apply to every prisoner but only to a select few, who have shown exemplary conduct. In such a case, the Prison Without Walls becomes both a reward and a final step to a convict's eventual introduction back to society.
Experiments were done to select communities and, ironically, these communities generally accepted the idea eventually. Even if the fear of having convicts walk around unnoticed in their neighborhood was an everyday presence, the idea had latched onto America's psyche and there was no doubt that this was a better idea than putting everyone behind bars.
This was the same idea expounded by a recent Atlantic article by Graeme Wood. I bet Bennett couldn't have foreseen how surveillance systems had advanced since then. But now, convicts are left on the streets, each being monitored by a tamper-proof device which reports back their every movement (Maybe, later on, we'll graduate to actual chips embedded beneath the skin, which can be tracked via GPS without the need for external power). Among the benefits are reduced admin costs since surveillance is way cheaper than incarceration.
But the most important benefit is the potential of this new system to actually modify the convict's behavior by not subjecting him or her to the toxic environment behind a prison wall. Indeed, prisons are still here to stay, to house the most notorious and most difficult individuals (like those which have dangerous psychological pathologies) but for the majority of those who can be rehabilitated, Prison Without Walls is the best route.
Wish we had something like this in the Philippines. Hmmm...
There was this one particular book/article, I Chose Prison, by James V. Bennett., which had left a big impression on me. As a background, James Bennett was the Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons spanning the period from 1937 to 1964. A heavyweight in prison reform, Bennett pioneered a lot of things, mainly the professionalization of corrections personnel, the shift to more humane yet more effective methods of treatment for inmates, and the de-politicization of appointees to the bureau.
One notable idea he mentioned was the concept of a prison without walls. In his time, he described a system where prisoners are free to walk around and integrate themselves back into society, all the while serving their terms in jail. The usual day would involve leaving the prison camp, going off for work or visiting the family, and returning back to federal prison before curfew. Every now and then, there would be rehabilitation seminars for the prisoners.
Bennett noted that such a treatment shouldn't apply to every prisoner but only to a select few, who have shown exemplary conduct. In such a case, the Prison Without Walls becomes both a reward and a final step to a convict's eventual introduction back to society.
Experiments were done to select communities and, ironically, these communities generally accepted the idea eventually. Even if the fear of having convicts walk around unnoticed in their neighborhood was an everyday presence, the idea had latched onto America's psyche and there was no doubt that this was a better idea than putting everyone behind bars.
This was the same idea expounded by a recent Atlantic article by Graeme Wood. I bet Bennett couldn't have foreseen how surveillance systems had advanced since then. But now, convicts are left on the streets, each being monitored by a tamper-proof device which reports back their every movement (Maybe, later on, we'll graduate to actual chips embedded beneath the skin, which can be tracked via GPS without the need for external power). Among the benefits are reduced admin costs since surveillance is way cheaper than incarceration.
But the most important benefit is the potential of this new system to actually modify the convict's behavior by not subjecting him or her to the toxic environment behind a prison wall. Indeed, prisons are still here to stay, to house the most notorious and most difficult individuals (like those which have dangerous psychological pathologies) but for the majority of those who can be rehabilitated, Prison Without Walls is the best route.
Wish we had something like this in the Philippines. Hmmm...
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