DOCSLIB.ORG

Race, Incarceration, and the Shackling of Pregnant Prisoners

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Race, Incarceration, and the Shackling of Pregnant Prisoners 03-Ocen (Do Not Delete) 9/13/2012 2:35:23 AM Punishing Pregnancy: Race, Incarceration, and the Shackling of Pregnant Prisoners Priscilla A. Ocen* The shackling of pregnant prisoners during labor and childbirth is endemic within women’s penal institutions in the United States. This Article investigates the factors that account for the pervasiveness of this practice and suggests doctrinal innovations that may be leveraged to prevent its continuation. At a general level, this Article asserts that we cannot understand the persistence of the shackling of female prisoners without understanding how historical constructions of race and gender operate structurally to both motivate and mask its use. More specifically, this Article contends that while shackling affects female prisoners of all races today, the persistent practice attaches to Black women in particular through the historical devaluation, regulation, and punishment of their exercise of reproductive capacity in three contexts: slavery, convict leasing, and chain gangs in the South. The regulation and punishment of Black women within these oppressive systems reinforced and reproduced stereotypes of these women as deviant and dangerous. In turn, as Southern penal practices proliferated in the United States and Black women became a significant percentage of the female Copyright © 2012 California Law Review, Inc. California Law Review, Inc. (CLR) is a California nonprofit corporation. CLR and the authors are solely responsible for the content of their publications. * Associate Professor of Law, Loyola Law School, Los Angeles. Versions of this Article were presented to the 2011 Advanced Critical Race Studies Seminar at UCLA School of Law, the UCLA Critical Race Studies Works-in-Progress Series, the 2011 African American Girls and the Juvenile Justice System Symposium at U.C. Berkeley School of Law, and the 2011 Southern California Junior Faculty Workshop. I would like to thank Tauny Lovell Banks, Devon Carbado, Sharon Dolovich, Kolleen Duley, Cheryl Harris, Addie Rolnick, Ronald Williams II, Steve Yeazell, Noah Zatz, and Mike Zimmer for their thoughtful comments. I am also indebted to Kimberlé Crenshaw, Carole Goldberg, Jerry Kang, and Saul Sarabia for their willingness to serve as sounding boards for many of the ideas contained in this Article. I am also thankful for the expert research assistance provided by Alisha Burgin, Karla Crone, and Alexandra Oprea. I am particularly grateful to the UCLA School of Law generally, and the Critical Race Studies Program in particular, for their faith in, and support for, this project. Finally, I dedicate this Article to my late mother, Audrey R. Ocen, in whose memory I seek to explore and challenge barriers to racial equity. 1239 03-Ocen (Do Not Delete) 9/13/2012 2:35:23 AM 1240 CALIFORNIA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 100:1239 prison population, these images began to animate harsh practices against all female prisoners. Moreover, this Article asserts that current jurisprudence concerning the Eighth Amendment, the primary constitutional vehicle for challenging conditions of confinement, such as shackling, is insufficient to combat racialized practices at the structural level. Current doctrine focuses on the subjective intentions of prison officials at the individual level and omits any consideration of how race underlies institutional practices. Instead, this Article suggests an expanded reading of the Eighth Amendment and the “evolving standards of decency” language that undergirds the “cruel and unusual punishments” clause. Specifically, this Article argues that evolving standards of decency should be guided by other constitutional provisions, such as the Thirteenth Amendment. This expanded reading, which this Article refers to as the “antisubordination approach,” draws upon Justice Harlan’s oft- cited dissent in Plessy v. Ferguson and his underappreciated reading of the Thirteenth Amendment therein. Under such a reading, conditions of confinement that result from or are related to repudiated mechanisms of racial domination should be deemed “cruel and unusual punishments.” By challenging race and gender subordination at the structural level, this Article suggests that we can move from an aspiration to the actualization of humane justice. Introduction................................................................................................... 1241 I. Incarceration and the Shackling of Female Prisoners During Pregnancy .......................................................................................... 1250 A. Control over the Exercise of Women’s Reproductive Capacity in the Criminal Justice System................................................... 1252 B. Shackling of Pregnant Women in Prison and the Attendant Psychological and Physical Harms ............................................ 1255 II. Slavery, Reconstruction-Era Punishment, and Constructions of Black Womanhood ...................................................................................... 1258 A. Racial and Gender Constructs of Black Women During Slavery and Post–Civil War Punishment Regimes ................................. 1260 1. Masculinization...................................................................... 1260 2. Sexual Deviance .................................................................... 1263 3. Maternal Devaluation............................................................. 1266 4. Dangerousness ....................................................................... 1268 B. The Second Reconstruction, Black Women, and the “New” Carceral Regime ........................................................................ 1269 III. The Invisibility of Race and Gender Within Eighth Amendment Doctrinal Discourses ......................................................................... 1274 03-Ocen (Do Not Delete) 9/13/2012 2:35:23 AM 2012] PUNISHING PREGNANCY 1241 A. The Current Constitutional Standard for Evaluating Conditions of Confinement Claims Under the Eighth Amendment............. 1276 B. Doctrinal Elision of Race and Gender in Eighth Amendment Challenges to the Shackling of Pregnant Prisoners.................... 1281 C. Persistence of Shackling Practices................................................ 1285 IV. Unshackling the Pregnant Body: The Liberatory Potential of Reading the Eighth Amendment in Light of the Thirteenth ............................ 1287 A. An Antisubordination Reading of the Eighth Amendment........... 1291 1. Conditions of Confinement as Punishment............................ 1291 2. Objective Measures of Contemporary Values, the Thirteenth Amendment, and the Shackling of Pregnant Prisoners .............................................................................. 1293 a. The Thirteenth Amendment as a Symbol of Contemporary Values ................................................... 1295 b. Standing to Bring Antisubordination Claim .................... 1302 c. Exception Clause No Bar to Symbolic Value of Thirteenth Amendment in the Context of Prison .......... 1304 B. Social Meaning of the Shackling of Pregnant Prisoners and Conflict with the Antisubordination Values of the Thirteenth Amendment................................................................................ 1308 Conclusion .................................................................................................... 1310 INTRODUCTION One might have hoped that, by this hour, the very sight of chains on Black flesh, or the very sight of chains, would be so intolerable a sight for the American people, and so unbearable a memory, that they would themselves spontaneously rise up and strike off the manacles. But, no, they appear to glory in their chains; now, more than ever, they appear to measure their safety in chains and corpses.1 Olivia Hamilton, a Black2 woman, was held in a Georgia jail.3 She was pregnant at the time of her conviction.4 Despite her pregnancy, she often found it difficult to see a doctor because of the indifference of the guards and the overcrowding in the prison.5 When the pains of labor harkened the arrival of 1. James Baldwin, An Open Letter to My Sister Angela, in IF THEY COME IN THE MORNING 13 (Angela Davis ed., 1971). 2. I capitalize Black because as Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw explains, it “reflect[s] my view that Blacks, like Asians, Latinos, and other ‘minorities,’ constitute a specific cultural group and, as such, require denotation as a proper noun.” Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw, Race, Reform, and Retrenchment: Transformation and Legitimation in Antidiscrimination Law, 101 HARV. L. REV. 1331, 1332 n.2 (1988). 3. INSIDE THIS PLACE, NOT OF IT: NARRATIVES FROM WOMEN’S PRISONS 29–31 (Robin Levi & Ayelet Waldman eds., 2011). 4. Id. at 28–29. 5. Id. at 30 (“I was [in jail in Georgia] about a month before I actually saw a doctor.”). 03-Ocen (Do Not Delete) 9/13/2012 2:35:23 AM 1242 CALIFORNIA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 100:1239 her baby, the shackles placed around her wrists compounded her agony.6 Despite being admitted to the hospital for a cesarean delivery, the birth of her child imminent, she remained under the close supervision of armed prison staff and was shackled throughout the procedure.7 Nearly one hundred years earlier, Elvira, also a Black woman, was sentenced to Eastham State Farm,8 a prison camp in rural Texas populated by Black men and women, for a minor offense.9 Although Elvira was pregnant at the time she was sentenced, her status as an expectant mother received no consideration.10 While incarcerated, prisoners, including those
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Thinking Intersectionally About Women, Race, and Social Control Kimberlé W
    From Private Violence to Mass Incarceration: Thinking Intersectionally About Women, Race, and Social Control Kimberlé W. Crenshaw ABSTRACT UCLA LAW REVIEW UCLA LAW The structural and political dimensions of gender violence and mass incarceration are linked in multiple ways. The myriad causes and consequences of mass incarceration discussed herein call for increased attention to the interface between the dynamics that constitute race, gender, and class power, as well as to the way these dynamics converge and rearticulate themselves within institutional settings to manufacture social punishment and human suffering. Beyond addressing the convergences between private and public power that constitute the intersectional dimensions of social control, this Article addresses political failures within the antiracism and antiviolence movements that may contribute to the legitimacy of the contemporary punishment culture, both ideologically and materially. AUTHOR Kimberlé W. Crenshaw is Professor of Law at UCLA and Columbia Law Schools. I have benefited tremendously from the comments, suggestions, and helpful insights of Luke Charles Harris, Devon Carbado, George Lipsitz, Barbara Tomlinson, Gary Peller, Joseph Doherty, Stephanie Bush-Baskette, Monique Morris, and the participants of the African American Policy Forum’s Social Justice Writers Workshop. Allen Secretov, Scott Dewey, Ezra Corral, and Stephanie Plotin provided excellent research assistance. I would also like to express my gratitude to the UCLA Law Review for sponsoring this symposium, to the participants who shared their work and insights, and to my colleagues in the Critical Race Studies Program who contributed to the symposium’s success. Lastly, I would like to thank my faculty co-leads on this symposium, Jyoti Nanda and Priscilla Ocen, who worked tirelessly to see this important symposium come to fruition.
    [Show full text]
  • © 2014 Thomson Reuters. No Claim to Original U.S. Government Works
    Dignam, Brett 8/7/2014 For Educational Use Only PUNISHING PREGNANCY: RACE, INCARCERATION, AND..., 100 Cal. L. Rev. 1239 100 Cal. L. Rev. 1239 California Law Review October, 2012 Article PUNISHING PREGNANCY: RACE, INCARCERATION, AND THE SHACKLING OF PREGNANT PRISONERS a1 Priscilla A. Ocen a2 Copyright (c) 2012 California Law Review, Inc., a California Nonprofit Corporation; Priscilla A. Ocen The shackling of pregnant prisoners during labor and childbirth is endemic within women's penal institutions in the United States. This Article investigates the factors that account for the pervasiveness of this practice and suggests doctrinal innovations that may be leveraged to prevent its continuation. At a general level, this Article asserts that we cannot understand the persistence of the shackling of female prisoners without understanding how historical constructions of race and gender operate structurally to both motivate and mask its use. More specifically, this Article contends that while shackling affects female prisoners of all races today, the persistent practice attaches to Black women in particular through the historical devaluation, regulation, and punishment of their exercise of reproductive capacity in three contexts: slavery, convict leasing, and chain gangs in the South. The regulation and punishment of Black women within these oppressive systems reinforced and reproduced stereotypes of these women as deviant and dangerous. In turn, as Southern penal practices proliferated in the United States and Black women became a significant percentage of the female *1240 prison population, these images began to animate harsh practices against all female prisoners. Moreover, this Article asserts that current jurisprudence concerning the Eighth Amendment, the primary constitutional vehicle for challenging conditions of confinement, such as shackling, is insufficient to combat racialized practices at the structural level.
    [Show full text]
  • Women in Prison in Oregon
    WOMEN IN PRISON IN OREGON DATA, PATHWAYS INTO INCARCERATION, AND CHARACTERISTICS OF WOMEN PRISONERS. BEN SCISSORS AND ALICE LUNDELL ABOUT OREGON JUSTICE RESOURCE CENTER OJRC is a Portland, Oregon, 501(c)3 nonprofit founded in 2011. We work to promote civil rights and improve legal representation for communities that have often been underserved in the past: people living in poverty and people of color among them. Our clients are currently and formerly incarcerated Oregonians. We work in partnership with other, like-minded organizations to maximize our reach to serve underrepresented populations, train public interest lawyers, and educate our community on civil rights and civil liberties concerns. We are a client-centered organization that uses integrative advocacy to achieve our goals. This strategy includes focused direct legal services, public awareness campaigns, strategic partnerships, and coordinating our legal and advocacy area to positively impact outcomes in favor of criminal justice reforms. WOMEN IN PRISON PROJECT The Women in Prison Project is a program of OJRC. We created the Project as the first and only program in Oregon to exclusively address the needs of women who are intersecting with the criminal justice system. Our goals are to ensure the criminal justice system treats women fairly, protects their health and safety, and makes it possible for them to successfully rejoin their communities when they are released. We do this through integrative advocacy: combining litigation, legislative and other reforms, and other policy and communications initiatives. For more information, contact Project Director and Attorney, Julia Yoshimoto, at [email protected]. www.ojrc.org “Women’s engagement in crime ..
    [Show full text]
  • How Women Have Become the Fastest-Growing Population in the American Carceral State Spencer K
    Berkeley Journal of Criminal Law Volume 23 | Issue 2 Article 1 2018 “Lock Her Up!” How Women Have Become the Fastest-Growing Population in the American Carceral State Spencer K. Beall Georgetown University Law Center, [email protected] Recommended Citation Spencer K. Beall, “Lock Her Up!” How Women Have Become the Fastest-Growing Population in the American Carceral State, 23 Berkeley J. Crim. L. (2018). Link to publisher version (DOI) https://doi.org/10.15779/Z38X34MS09 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Law Journals and Related Materials at Berkeley Law Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Berkeley Journal of Criminal Law by an authorized administrator of Berkeley Law Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Beall: Lock Her Up! ISSUE 23:2 SPRING 2018 “Lock Her Up!” How Women Have Become the Fastest-Growing Population in the American Carceral State Spencer K. Beall* The majority of discourse on American mass incarceration attempts to explain the outsize populations in jails and prisons as the result of a political war against a specific group of people (e.g. against a certain race, against the poor), rather than against crime itself. Less attention has been paid to women, even though they are the fastest- growing population in the carceral state. Since the 1970s, law enforcement has imprisoned women at twice the rate of men, despite relatively static female criminality patterns. Rampant sexual abuse, inadequate female healthcare, and pitiless shackling during labor and childbirth are among the consequences of rapidly locking women into a corrections system established for—and designed by—men.
    [Show full text]
  • Gender-Based Violence, and an Analysis of the Criminal Justice Laws and Policies That Perpetuate This Narrative
    UCLA UCLA Women's Law Journal Title Women and Girls' Experiences Before, During, and After Incarceration: A Narrative of Gender-based Violence, and an Analysis of the Criminal Justice Laws and Policies that Perpetuate this Narrative Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/4773j0sp Journal UCLA Women's Law Journal, 20(2) Authors Sangoi, Lisa Kanti Goshin, Lorie Smith Publication Date 2014 DOI 10.5070/L3202021355 Peer reviewed eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California WOMEN AND GIRls’ ExpERIENCES BEFORE, DURING, AND AFTER INCARCERATION: A Narrative of Gender-based Violence, and an Analysis of the Criminal Justice Laws and Policies that Perpetuate This Narrative By Lisa Kanti Sangoi* & Lorie Smith Goshin** I. Introduction Women and girls involved with the United States’ (U.S.) criminal justice system experience gender-based violence (GBV)1 at rates that far exceed the general population. Their experiences with GBV often start in childhood or early adolescence, and may continue through adulthood, producing lifelong histories of abuse. These violent experiences can influence involvement in criminal ac- tivity.2 They may extend throughout incarceration, as correctional staff emotionally, verbally, physically, and sexually abuse women and girls at high rates, or facilitate such abuse by other inmates. Many criminal justice involved (CJI) women reenter their commu- nities debilitated by their time and experiences in detention, and by laws that limit their access to public assistance due to their status as convicted felons. As a cumulative result of their histories of vio- * Lisa Sangoi received her Master’s in Human Rights Studies from Colum- bia University, and is currently pursuing a J.D.
    [Show full text]
  • Research on Women and Girls in the Justice System
    U.S. Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs National Institute of Justice Research on Women and Girls in the Justice System Research Forum U.S. Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs 810 Seventh Street N.W. Washington, DC 20531 Janet Reno Attorney General Daniel Marcus Acting Associate Attorney General Mary Lou Leary Acting Assistant Attorney General Julie E. Samuels Acting Director, National Institute of Justice Office of Justice Programs National Institute of Justice World Wide Web Site World Wide Web Site http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij National Institute of Justice Research on Women and Girls in the Justice System: Plenary Papers of the 1999 Conference on Criminal Justice Research and Evaluation—Enhancing Policy and Practice Through Research, Volume 3 Beth E. Richie Kay Tsenin Cathy Spatz Widom Sponsored by OFFICE OF JUSTICE PROGRAMS BUREAUS National Institute of Justice Bureau of Justice Assistance Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Office for Victims of Crime OFFICE OF JUSTICE PROGRAMS OFFICES Corrections Program Office Drug Courts Program Office Executive Office for Weed and Seed Violence Against Women Office September 2000 NCJ 180973 Julie E. Samuels Acting Director John Thomas Program Monitor The Professional Conference Series of the National Institute of Justice supports a variety of live researcher-practitioner exchanges, such as conferences, work- shops, planning and development meetings, and similar support to the criminal justice field. Foremost among these forums is the Annual Conference on Crimi- nal Justice Research and Evaluation. The Research Forum publication series was designed to share information from this and other forums with a larger audience.
    [Show full text]
  • Overlooked: Women and Jails in an Era of Reform
    Overlooked: Women and Jails in an Era of Reform Elizabeth Swavola, Kristine Riley, and Ram Subramanian From the Director Since 1970, the number of women held in local jails— for the realities of women’s lives. Moreover, without facilities that form the front door to incarceration in accounting for gender, programs and practices drawn the United States—has grown exponentially, outpacing from studies about what works for men can have rates of growth for men. Yet surprisingly little research unintended negative consequences for the women who has explored why so many more women wind up in also experience these programs and practices. jail today. The research that does exist suggests that the experiences women have in jail often deepen the At this critical moment in jail and local justice system disadvantages that contributed to their incarceration in reform, Vera has taken stock of the existing research the first place—trauma, behavioral and physical health on women in jail to begin to reframe the conversation needs, single-parenthood, and poverty. to include them. After drawing a profile of women in U.S. jails, this report—released by Vera and the Safety Spurred by overcrowding, escalating expenses, and Justice Challenge—sheds light on the particular and increasing evidence of jail’s harmful impact challenges these women face and the ways the current on individuals and communities, policymakers system can exacerbate them. The gaps in research and justice-system officials have begun a national on these challenges underscore the urgent need for discussion about curbing jail overuse. Jurisdictions expanded data-collection about women caught up in around the country are designing and using a variety of the justice system as the basis for future evidence- approaches to divert people away from jail based upon based analysis and policymaking.
    [Show full text]
  • The Incarceration of Women
    SECTION X TheThe IncarcerationIncarceration ofof WomenWomen Section Highlights •• Historical trends in the incarceration of women •• Contemporary issues in the incarceration of women •• Gender-responsive treatment and programming for incarcerated women •• Barriers to reentry for incarcerated women his section focuses on issues related to the supervision and incarceration of women. Drawing from historical examples of incarceration to modern-day policies, this section first looks at the treatment T of women in prison and the challenges that women face. Following this discussion, this section highlights how the differential pathways of female offending affect the unique needs for women under the correctional system and presents a review of the tenets of gender-responsive programming. This section concludes with a discussion about the lives of women following incarceration and how policy decisions about offending have often succeeded in the “jailing” of women, even after their release from prison. y Historical Context of Female Prisons Prior to the development of the all-female institution, women were housed in a separate unit within the male prison. Generally speaking, the conditions for women in these units were horrendous and were char- acterized by excessive use of solitary confinement and significant acts of physical and sexual abuse by both the male inmates and the male guards. Women in these facilities received few, if any, services (Freedman, 1981). At Auburn State Prison in New York, women were housed together in an attic space where they were unmonitored and received their meals from male inmates. In many cases, these men would stay longer than necessary to complete their job duties.
    [Show full text]
  • Women in California Prisons: Hidden Victims of the War on Drugs
    Center on May 1994 Juvenile and Criminal Justice 1622 Folsom Street, 2nd Floor San Francisco, California 94103 Report WOMEN IN CALIFORNIA PRISONS: HIDDEN VICTIMS OF THE WAR ON DRUGS Barbara Bloom, University of California, Riverside Meda Chesney Lind, University of Hawaii at Manoa Barbara Owen, California State University, Fresno As the number of California prisoners Getting Tough on Women surged past the 100,000 mark in April of 1991, women became the hidden victims of Without any fanfare, the "war on drugs" the state's zeal for incarceration. California has become a war on women, and it has niJw has the dubious distinction of having clearly contributed to the explosion in the most women prisoners in the nation as women's prison populations. One out of well as the world's largest women's prison. three women in U.S. prisons in 1991 were doing time for drug offenses (up from one in California Between 1980 and 1993, the number of 10 in 1979).4 While the intent of get tough· now has the women incarcerated in California increased policies was to lid society of drug dealers dubious 450 percent, from 1,316 to 7,232 as of June and so called king-pins, over a third (35.9%) 30, 1993.1 Women now account for 6.3 of the women serving time for drug offenses distinction of percent of the total California prison in the nation's prisons are serving time solely having the population, compared to a national average for "possession." most women of 5.7 percent.2 prisoners in The percentage of women incarcerated for the nation as The increases seen in the number of drug offenses in California more than well as the women in California prisons are lodged doubled between 1984 and 1993 and now within larger shifts in the climinal justice over one-third of all the women in California world's response to women offenders.
    [Show full text]
  • Examining the Impact of Maternal Incarceration on the Social, Emotional, Behavioral and Educational Functioning of Children : Released Mothers' Perspectives
    Cleveland State University EngagedScholarship@CSU ETD Archive 2008 Collateral Damage: Examining the Impact of Maternal Incarceration on the Social, Emotional, Behavioral and Educational Functioning of Children : Released Mothers' Perspectives Roberta Treadway Gaston Cleveland State University Follow this and additional works at: https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/etdarchive Part of the Education Commons How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! Recommended Citation Gaston, Roberta Treadway, "Collateral Damage: Examining the Impact of Maternal Incarceration on the Social, Emotional, Behavioral and Educational Functioning of Children : Released Mothers' Perspectives" (2008). ETD Archive. 103. https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/etdarchive/103 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by EngagedScholarship@CSU. It has been accepted for inclusion in ETD Archive by an authorized administrator of EngagedScholarship@CSU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. COLLATERAL DAMAGE: EXAMINING THE IMPACT OF MATERNAL INCARCERATION ON THE SOCIAL, EMOTIONAL, BEHAVIORAL AND EDUCATIONAL FUNCTIONING OF CHILDREN: RELEASED MOTHERS’ PERSPECTIVES ROBERTA TREADWAY GASTON Bachelor of Science in Education Bowling Green State University June, 1977 Master of Education Kent State University August, 1978 Master of Arts Northeastern Illinois University June, 1985 Submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for the degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN URBAN EDUCATION at the CLEVELAND STATE UNIVERSITY December, 2008 Signature sheet © by Roberta Treadway Gaston 2008 DEDICATION This dissertation is dedicated in loving memory of my mother, Ossie, who departed this life way too soon, but left me with a deep understanding of the meaning of the word fortitude by the way she lived her life and overcame adversity.
    [Show full text]
  • How Many Americans Are Unnecessarily Incarcerated?
    HOW MANY AMERICANS ARE UNNECESSARILY INCARCERATED? Dr. James Austin and Lauren-Brooke Eisen with James Cullen and Jonathan Frank Preface by Inimai Chettiar Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law ABOUT THE BRENNAN CENTER FOR JUSTICE The Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law is a nonpartisan law and policy institute that seeks to improve our systems of democracy and justice. We work to hold our political institutions and laws accountable to the twin American ideals of democracy and equal justice for all. The Center’s work ranges from voting rights to campaign finance reform, from ending mass incarceration to preserving Constitutional protection in the fight against terrorism. Part think tank, part advocacy group, part cutting- edge communications hub, we start with rigorous research. We craft innovative policies. And we fight for them — in Congress and the states, the courts, and in the court of public opinion. ABOUT THE BRENNAN CENTER’S JUSTICE PROGRAM The Brennan Center’s Justice Program seeks to secure our nation’s promise of “equal justice for all” by creating a rational, effective, and fair justice system. Its priority focus is to reduce mass incarceration while keeping down crime. The program melds law, policy, and economics to produce new empirical analyses and innovative policy solutions to advance this critical goal. ABOUT THE BRENNAN CENTER’S PUBLICATIONS Red cover | Research reports offer in-depth empirical findings. Blue cover | Policy proposals offer innovative, concrete reform solutions. White cover | White papers offer a compelling analysis of a pressing legal or policy issue. © 2016.
    [Show full text]
  • Download Download
    IJCJ&SD 9(4) 2020 ISSN 2202-8005 Fractured Lives, Dissenting Voices, Recovering ‘Truth’: Frontiers of Research and Resistance Phil Scraton1 Queen’s University Belfast, United Kingdom Abstract Emerging from critical conferences in the early 1970s involving academic researchers, community-based workers and activists, critical social research challenged the role and legitimacy of mainstream social sciences in their support of social orders fractured by class, ‘race’, sectarianism, gender, sexuality and age. This article opens with a brief reflection on the emergence and consolidation of critical social theory as the foundation and context for research that challenges state-institutionalised power and authority. It draws on long-term, in-depth primary research into the operational policies and practices of policing and incarceration, exploring the profound challenges involved in bearing witness to the ‘pain of others’. Recounting personal testimonies ‘from below’, revealing institutionalised deceit and pursuing ‘truth recovery’, it argues that dissenting voices are the foundation of hope, resistance and transformation. Keywords State power; legitimacy; regimes of truth; structural inequality; critical social research; incarceration; Ireland; Hillsborough. Please cite this article as: Scraton P (2020) Fractured lives, dissenting voices, recovering ‘truth’: Frontiers of research and resistance. International Journal for Crime, Justice and Social Democracy 9(4): 1-15. https://doi.org/10.5204/ijcjsd.1686 Except where otherwise noted, content in this journal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence. As an open access journal, articles are free to use with proper attribution. ISSN: 2202- 8005 © The Author(s) 2020 Phil Scraton: Fractured Lives, Dissenting Voices, Recovering ‘Truth’: Frontiers of Research and Resistance Introduction In his classic text Ways of Seeing, the artist John Berger encouraged wide public debate about how selectivity afforded to images ‘establish our place in the surrounding world’.
    [Show full text]