PRISON-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX.   Term Paper ID:28679 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Discusses growing private prison industry & its role in U.S. economy & in poor small towns. Social implications. Special interests. Prison construction. Issue of "legal exploitation" of prisoners.... More...

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Paper Abstract: Discusses growing private prison industry & its role in U.S. economy & in poor small towns. Social implications. Special interests. Prison construction. Issue of "legal exploitation" of prisoners. Paper Introduction: The United States has the highest per capita incarceration rate in history and the prison-industrial complex has become a key element of the U.S. economy. Like the military industrial complex, a term coined in President Dwight D. Eisenhower's farewell speech in 1960, the prison-industrial complex is a mixture of government interests and private business. Profit, of course, is a major motive with social control another. The social implications of the prison-industrial complex are profound, and indicate the direction the United States is taking after the Cold War to solve its social problems. The result, however, is not the solving of social problems with better health care, education and services for people, but the growth of a new big business, the prison industry. Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. Criminal Justice Agencies alone cost $1 1 billion each year (taxpayer's money) and do little to prevent crime or rehabilitate people. Typically,this means that it tends to be the poor and ethnic minorities who findtheir labor, their spirits, and their lives exploited, whether as thekeepers or as the kept. "I want them to make prisoners work 1 hours a day, sixdays a week," says Gramm. The other solution, suggested perhaps by the Kent State shooting,was to take a somewhat harder line. is the domestic component ofcapitalist globalization and structural adjustment." Moorehead, althoughpolemic at times, does have an awesome level of research backing up herstand. They say the U.S. We recognize the imperative need for this development. The growth of theprison industrial complex depends on a growing prison population. Unlikeother wars, however, the identified enemy is ourselves. * Prison construction is increasing at some 12 to 15 percent peryear, worldwide. . . The result, however, is not thesolving of social problems with better health care, education and servicesfor people, but the growth of a new big business, the prison industry. We should take nothing for granted. Workers' World Magazine, a socialist publication (as in the sense ofhaving a strong commitment to equality) points out on its web site thatthere is a logical reason for the PIC. Big business had been, and was, incollusion with the military to create some kind of danger, but noidentifiable enemy. We need more cheap labor; prisoners are aform of cheap labor; therefore, let's use prisoners. The sourceof that statistic is reliable, since it is from the 1999 annual report ofthe Corrections Corporation of America (formerly Prison Realty Trust).With 1999 revenues of some $285 million, it is one of the major players inthe industry, although not the biggest. 61). Thirty-seven states participate in these arrangements, which put prisoners to work in a variety of manufacturing and service jobs. Retrieved at:www.theatlantic.com/issues/98dec/prisons.htm. Outside the U.S., it provides prison management with the Frenchcompany Sodexho. The social implications of the prison-industrial complex areprofound, and indicate the direction the United States is taking after theCold War to solve its social problems. Honda pays $2 an hour to prison labor in Ohio who do jobs that UAW members once did for $2 an hour. "Fueling business interest inprison labor is today's tight labor market, which gives workers an edge.Legislation in Congress would allow more companies to use the U.S. But when incarceration becomes an industry in which more bodies and longer sentences translate into bigger profit margins, the consequences are haunting (Lichtenstein & Kroll, 1996, 42). But isit? (1998), The PIC: Is it Real?, Berkeley, CA:Prison Activist Resource Center Lichtenstein, A.; Kroll, M. "I want to enter into contracts with majormanufacturers so that we can produce component parts in prisons now beingproduced in places like Mexico, China, Taiwan, and Korea" (Workers' World,2 , Online). (1998, Fall), Masked Racism: Reflections On The PrisonIndustrial Complex, Colorlines, 6 Eisenhower, D.D. There was also the issueof the United States being attacked by Japan. A look at CCA's annual report's financials tell aninteresting story. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. It takes the shape of schools falling down, 25 percent of Black men missing, new state-of-the-art prisons cropping up, people being shot and killed by the police and the Border Patrol, jobs lost as they go behind prison walls, 1 million people of color absent on election day, young people regularly harassed in their own neighborhoods. Perhaps the most difficult task the brain trust would face is how torepeal the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which allows for legalexploitation of prisoners. CCA, as do its competitors, Wackenhut and Cornell and others, buildsprisons and owns nearly 5 (one in the United Kingdom, the rest in 17states in the U.S.) and manages nearly 7 , prison beds in more than 75facilities. 1 35- 1 4 , online athttp://coursesa.matrix.msu.edu/~hst3 6/documents/indust.html Evans, L.; Goldberg, E. It's too bad that this is in the Constitution,since that makes it so hard to correct. And so it was on record. Profit, of course, is a major motive with social controlanother. Sen. We spend $25, year to keep someone in prison. The concept of a "brain trust" -- a council of devoted and dedicatedintelligences is a valid method of coming up with potential solutions toserious problems of policy. The United States has the highest per capita incarceration rate inhistory and the prison-industrial complex has become a key element of theU.S. Or, perhaps more relevant, does the publiccare? Many African-Americansnow wanted to be called Blacks, not Negroes, and a lot of college studentsdidn't want to go to Vietnam and kill children. For years prisoners in California booked flights for TWA. (Eisenhower, 196 , Online). The derivation of the Military/Industrial Complex (MIC) is a biteasier to trace then is the prison-industrial complex and so are the socialproblems that it was designed to solve. In 196 , as President Eisenhower was preparing to leave office, hegave a speech that has since become known as simply the "Military-Industrial Complex Speech," in which there was a passage that resonatedwith insight and fear. In a series of articles written for The Atlantic Monthly, EricSchlosser (1998) called the prison-industrial complex "a set ofbureaucratic, political, and economic interests that encourage increasedspending on imprisonment, regardless on the actual need." Schlosserbelieves that the prison-industrial complex is not a conspiracy but rather"a confluence of special interests that has given prison construction inthe United States a seemingly unstoppable momentum." (The Prison-IndustrialComplex - 98.12) How Do these Complexes Affect Our Ability to Solve Problems? This line led directly to the increasein prison populations. During the past two decades, the United States alone builtmore than 1 new prisons and jails, and more are under construction.Ironically, building prisons in impoverished rural areas has become themeans to economic development. captivelabor force. Phil Gramm (R., Texas) would like prisons turned intoindustrial parks. Sothen is the public at fault? These are the key questions that a brain trust would be challengedto answer. To College, and Thence to A Brain Trust? * There has been a decrease in crime over the last 15 years. This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. can best compete with China and its prison labor by expanding prison labor in this country (Evans and Goldberg, 2 , Online). Microsoft uses convicts to ship Windows software. (December, 1998), "The Prison-Industrial Complex," TheAtlantic Monthly. During the years of the Eisenhower presidency -- 1952 to 196 --America was in the "Happy Days" if we believe the TV show and the mediaapproach to the 195 s. Thelegislators usually say that they are acting on behalf of the public. In Georgia a recycling plant replaced 5 sorters with prisoners. As Eisenhower said at thebeginning, "The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power existsand will persist" (Eisenhower, 196 , Online) References Davis, A.Y. If this were a videotape we could fast forward some 35 years to adifferent war, one in which the United States again finds itself. One of the sources of those revenues, according to a prison activistpamphlet written by Linda Evans and Eve Goldberg and presented online byWorkers World Magazine , are prison/industry partnerships which are up 2 percent since they were created in 1979. Its 1997 revenues were 2 .6 million dollars, its 1998revenues were 7 .7 million, and its 1999 revenues were 285.7 million.Similar growth can be cited with the other private prison companies. Workers World, online at http://www.workers.org The efficiency and effectiveness of suchtrusts is directly proportional to the ability of the trust members toarrive at a clear separation of issues. we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. Of those laid off, 35 had taken the jobs to get off welfare, and ended up with neither welfare nor work. Companies such as CCA, when looking for newfields to tap, seeks areas which have a surplus of prisoners and areas ofhigh unemployment which often welcome prisons as a new form of economicdevelopment, rural New York and California are prime examples. (1996), Criminal Injustice: Confrontingthe Prison Crisis, New York: South End Press Schlosser, E. Eisenhower's farewell speech in 196 , the prison-industrial complex is a mixture of government interests and privatebusiness. According to the Constitution, the Criminal Justice system enforcesthe law, and does not make it. There is ampledata to consider. To fight these two socialproblems -- genocide and imperialism -- it was necessary to convertAmerican industry from peace-making machinery to weapons-making machinery. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. For instance, the Criminal Justicesystem is often cited as the lead villain in the PIC discussion. economy. More than 6 million people, a majority of them people of color, are in the criminal injustice system--jail, probation or parole," (Moorehead, 2 , Online). Our communities are occupied by militarized police and border patrol units. At issue were the concepts ofgenocide, i.e., the elimination of some 6 million Jews, some 1.2 millionhomosexuals, some 8 , Gypsies and many Turks. At the same time, there has been a monstrous growth of the prison-industrial complex, so that today more than 2 million people are in prison on any given day, the highest rate of imprisonment in the world. Like the military industrial complex, a term coined inPresident Dwight D. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Then are the legislators to blame? * 7 percent of all prisoners are people of color As Lichtenstein and Kroll (1996) point out, the use of corporateprison labor and private prisons reveal themselves to be tools used in amasked effort to warehouse people of color as part of a large-scalegenocidal conquest. (1961) Public Papers of the Presidents, Dwight D.Eisenhower, 196 , p. Curiously, Eisenhower canbe accused of helping create the PIC, but from a more philosophical pointof view. The reasons for the development of the Prison/Industrial Complex(PIC) are not as clear-cut as those for the MIC. In the196 s, some problems began rising to the surface. It's a logical argument. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We, as a society, could decide to send that person to college (Davis, 1998. Here in the U.S. 'structural adjustment' has taken theform of slashing welfare, food stamps, health care, job training and all other social programs. That is, those ofus who run the risk of running afoul of myriad laws that criss cross theland of the free and the home of the brave. The United States imprisonsmore people than any other country in the world; today, nearly 2 millionAmericans are behind bars in federal, state or local custody. In this election year, with the Supreme Court deciding whichPresidential Candidate gained office, little has been said about MonicaMoorehead, the presidential candidate for the Working World Party, who ledan April 15, 2 march in Washington to "Shut down the prison-industrialcomplex [because] the PIC in the U.S. Angela Davis, a woman of scholarly bent who has some knowledge of thesubject, describes the PIC vividly: In our communities the prison industrial complex looks many different ways. What social problems there were, were barely discussed. That act alone would seem to be a formidable task, since the PICquestion has numerous stakeholders. In an attempt to save money on an increasingly expensive prison system, several states (over half) have turned to the private sector, contracting out the construction and maintenance of prisons to private corporations. It seems that professorslike Timothy Leary were saying "Tune in, turn on, drop out." The "turn on"of course, was drugs. Advocates of prison labor say that exploiting convicts doesn't undercut American workers because this manufacturing and service work is done overseas anyway. The effectiveness of a brain trust is usually related to the amount ofquantifiable, statistical information it has to draw on. To enforce this, the police forces have been built up to unprecedented levels and given a license to kill, especially in the African American and Latino communities. One solution to these problems was to listen to oneanother, to ask the question that maybe there was something amiss inAmerica. If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.