Punishment: The U.S Record
16th Social Research Conference November 30 - December 1, 2006
The conference examined the foundations of our ideas of punishment, explored the social effects of current practices and searched for viable alternatives to our carceral state. Our nation's prison population has soared by more than 600% since the 1970s, despite a drop in crime rates. As of 2005, over two million people were imprisoned in this country: almost one in every 136 U.S. residents. Black men, who make up 6% of the U.S. population, comprise over 40% of our prison population. A black male born today has a 32% chance of spending time in prison. Eleven states do not allow ex-cons to vote. Nearly 2,800,000 American children have at least one parent in prison or jail. What does this mean for our democracy? Where do our concepts of punishment come from? What is the effect on our families, communities and the economy of our staggeringly high incarceration rate?
This conference was made possible with generous support from the Russell Sage Foundation, the Open Society Institute’s U.S. Justice Fund, the Ford Foundation and the J.M. Kaplan Fund. The conference was also cosponsored by the ACLU and the PEN America Center.
To order the related issue of Social Research: An International Quarterly
PROGRAM
Thursday, November 30
Session I: Why We Punish: The Foundation of Our Concepts of Punishment Historical and Comparative Perspectives on Punishment
Practices
James Q. Whitman, Ford Foundation Professor of Comparative and Foreign Law, Yale Law School The Legacy of Theology (Transgression, redemption, atonement, retribution and forgiveness)
Moshe Halbertal, Professor of Jewish Thought at the Hebrew University and the Gruss Professor at NYU Law School
Punishment and the Spirit of Democracy
George Kateb, Professor Emeritus of Political Science at Princeton University
Beyond the Cultural Turn: 21st Century Meditations on Punishment
Bernard E. Harcourt, Professor of Law and Faculty Director of Academic Affairs at The Law School, University of Chicago
Moderator: Suzanne Last Stone, Professor of Law, Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law and Director of Jewish Law and Interdisciplinary Studies
Session II: What and How We Punish: Law, Justice and Punishment
Changes in the Law: From the Present to the Past to the Present
Michael Tonry, Marvin J. Sonosky Professor of Law and Public Policy, University of Minnesota Law School
Economic Models of Crime and Punishment
John J. Donohue III, Professor of Law, Yale Law School
Retribution and the "Desert" Model: Should Punishment Fit The Crime?
Andrew von Hirsch, Honorary Professor of Penal Theory and Penal Law, Cambridge University and Director of the Centre for Penal Theory and Penal Ethics
The Forms and Functions of American Capital Punishment
David Garland, Arthur T. Vanderbilt Professor of Law and Professor of Sociology, New York University
Moderator: James Jacobs, Chief Justice Warren E. Burger Professor of Constitutional Law and the Courts Director, Center for Research in Crime and Justice, New York University
Session III: Special Event
Richard Gere and Carey Lowell Read Prison Writings (The PEN America Center cosponsored this event; Audio recordings of the readings are available online.)
Friday, December 1
Session IV: Who We Punish: The Carceral State
The Rise of the Carceral State
Jonathan Simon, Associate Dean, Jurisprudence and Social Policy Program, and Professor of Law, University of California, Berkeley
Inequality and Punishment
Bruce Western, Professor of Sociology, Princeton University
When is Imprisonment Not a Punishment?: Immigrants and Immigration
Mark Dow, Author of American Gulag
Supermax as a Technology of Punishment
Lorna A. Rhodes, Professor of Anthropology, University of Washington
Moderator: Susan Tucker, Director, The After Prison Initiative, Open Society Institute's U.S. Justice Fund
Session V: Consequences of a Carceral State
The Social Effects of Imprisonment: A Labor Market Perspective
David Weiman, Alena Wels Hirschorn '58 Professor of Economics, Barnard College
The Impacts of Incarceration on Public Safety
Todd Clear, Distinguished Professor, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York
Hitting Home: How Perpetual Punishment Hurts Families
Elizabeth Gaynes, Executive Director, The Osborne Association
Incarceration and Reentry Reforms in an Era of Robust Democracy
Jeremy Travis, President, John Jay College of Criminal Justice
Moderator: Deborah Mukamal, Director, Prisoner Reentry Institute, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, The City University of New York
Session VI: Round-table Discussion on Alternatives to a Carceral State
Gordon Bazemore, Professor of Criminal Justice, Florida Atlantic University
Stephen B. Bright, President and Senior Counsel, Southern Center for Human Rights, Visiting Lecturer in Law, Harvard and Yale Law Schools
Nancy Gertner, Judge, U.S. District Court, Boston
Marie Gottschalk, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Pennsylvania
James Jacobs, Chief Justice, Warren E. Burger Professor of Constitutional Law and the Courts Director, Center for Research in Crime and Justice, New York University;
Marc Mauer, Executive Director, The Sentencing Project; Christopher Uggen, Professor of Sociology, University of Minnesota Moderator: Brent Staples, Editorial Writer, Member of the Editorial Board, The New York Times
