Question 1
Part 1
There are many cons that David Benatar brings up when discussing corporal punishment, while he argues against the cons, they are still important to mention. He mentions that many often argue that repeated corporal punishment leads to abuse as the frequency and amount of punishment may be viewed as such. It is also discussed that corporal punishment is viewed as degrading for those receiving it. It may push one to feel they have been violated in a manner and ultimately shamed which leads into psychological damage that one may feel following corporal punishment. The argument of psychological effects is prominent because many believe those that use corporal punishment have received their ideas from sexual deviance of some sort, such as masochism, which can ultimately impact the receiver and the executor in a negative manner. It can scare the receiver and continue to perpetuate the behavior of the acting agent. It is also said that corporal punishment teaches one the correct response to conflicts. Instead of correcting the behavior, many believes it prompts more negative behavior in the future. Furthermore, Bentar mentions that others argue the relationship between pupils and authority is greatly changed through corporal punishment. The belief is that corporal punishment is a result of the figure of authority improperly doing their job, worsening the situation, and building distrust in the receiver. Ultimately, perhaps one of the most prominent arguments is that corporal punishment does not deter the receiver from further engaging in improper behavior.
After mentioning those arguments, David Benatar argues in his study regarding corporal punishment that there are many positives that come along with the practice. The first of which being that corporal punishment only punishes the guilty party and does not affect other actors in the situation. He also mentions that it is on a scale stating that “having different forms of punishment that vary in severity can enhance the expressive function of punishment by making the varying degrees of condemnation more explicit” (Benatar, 252). He then says that being forced to pay retribution for a bad behavior might result in one attaching a negative connotation with a behavior like community service, whereas corporal punishment is bad and will be associated with punishment. When taking corporal punishment outside the context of the prison system, it is also arguable that disagreeing with the act is infringing on the parents’ liberty to raise their children how they would prefer to be raised, especially when there is no data to state that it negatively impacts behavior. Benatar then mentions that corporal punishment must be done in a just matter which includes infrequent application without lasting injury, nondiscrimination of those receiving it, due process to those accused of acting unacceptably, accurate timing of punishment following bad behavior, and the proper precautions must be taken when acting with corporal punishment.
While both sides of the argument raise good points, the argument against is more because it is easy to attack the violence in modern day society and correlate it with negative behavior. In contemporary times, we find ourselves in increasingly uncomfortable positions when faced with the idea of violence in videos games, schools, etc. With corporal punishment becoming a taboo to the public at large, as seen in households with children, it becomes largely discussed topic with many being against corporal punishment because of our own discomfort.
We are now uncomfortable with forms of public pain and punishment because with the turn of modernity, our ideas of “cruel and unusual” have shifted. While before things like public hangings were seen, it is not so common anymore because our thoughts of what discipline is has altered. Society has become more vulnerable to the ultimatum of death, thus resorting to a more widely-accepted version of penance. With the emergence of things like social media, punishment is harder to hide. Garland mentions that we have adjusted from public spectacles of shaming to a more modern discipline that focuses on physical discomfort. Due to this, things like chain gangs exist because prisoners are not just docile bodies, rather contributing to society in a small way.
Corporal punishment differs between children and convicts. In regards to children, corporal punishment is used as a deterrent for long-term behavior, in hopes to create good behavioral habits for children in different social atmospheres such as school and in the home. However, for convicts, corporal punishment is used more as an incapacitative measure with the goal to keep prisoners from bad behavior. For children, corporal punishment is less harsh, with less publicity in aim to avoid negative psychological effects in the future. Prisoners experience more public corporal punishment, in example the removal of privacy created by visibility into cells, to keep prisoners from engaging in improper behavior. This discomfort is more frequent and harsher than the rare corporal punishment enacted upon children.
Part 2
While many disagree in the use of chain gangs as a form of punishment, there are few that do agree with chain gangs because of the positive outcomes from the system. It is observed that chain gangs work to discipline prisoners into obedience. Chain gangs give prisoners something to do which is ultimately productive to the individual as they give the individual a sense of repentance from their wrong-doing. It is also helpful to the entire community at large. Suddenly city jobs that were being put-off are quickly taken care of for a cheaper wage than city workers demand. While the prisoners are out and working, other prisoners benefit from the greater prison space available to them, which in turn could reduce prison violence because there are less inmates leading to fewer instances of agitation. Also, when the prisoners return, it is possible that many of them are too tired to act on aggressive behavior. However, there is a flipside to that argument.
It is possible that being in the heat for long periods of time makes the chain gang members more aggressive toward one-another and the guard(s) present while they are working. Their working on the line can also be seen as representative of slavery which is potentially the largest argument against chain gangs. The connotation of slavery associated with chain gangs is dehumanizing as the shackles resemble a not-so-distant America where they were used to delineate between what many saw as “human” and “non-human”. The lack of access to resources are arguably safety violations, which includes few mental health resources. In this way, chain gangs are the essence of discipline without rehabilitation. Ultimately, the prisoners receive punishment but their behaviors are not necessarily changed for the better.
According to Anderson, Dyson and Brook’s work about chain gangs, in the 1960s there were still some southern states that used chain gangs but they rapidly were approaching their end because many saw the brutality that came along with the labor. However, by the turn of the 1990s, there were more prisoners in states like Alabama with less economic resources supporting the prisons. Upon doing research between the years of 1990-1994, it was found that there was a surge of violence in Alabama and the state used the statistics as a reason to justify the bringing back of chain gangs to help decrease the violence (Anderson, et al., 11). It hasn’t come as a surprise that Alabama is in support of chain gangs as they have a deep history with racism and slavery being in the south. Their use of chain gangs in prisons works to establish a hierarchy within that is not questioned due to the cultural practices of most southern/red states.
Question 2)
Foucault, Garland, and Burke are invoking readers to find a deeper understanding of the prison and punishment system. To look beyond the crime control purpose of prison, one must analyze the social, political, and economic factors leading to an overinflated populous contained within the prisons systems of today. There is an emphasis placed on the idea that prisons are no longer produced simply to prevent crime; instead they have become outlets of deeper purposes. Economically, prisons have proven time and time again to be money-making machines. Since the 70s during the shift from rehabilitation to retribution, which was primarily influenced by society, middle class and upper class citizens saw it in their best interest to remove the burden placed upon them to support the welfare class. It became common interest to force prisoners to effectively pay for their crimes rather than simply rehabilitate; enacting prisoners into doing physically demanding jobs for next to nothing. Politically and socially Foucault states that prisons are in place to create docile bodies which in turn helps control the masses. As stated in The Culture of Control, “ …globalized economy in which nation states are less and less able to control the economic and social destinies of their subjects” (Garland, 79). This supports the ideal that prisons are indeed out to form a sort of control for governments to utilize against a growingly out of control society. Based on the information presented, the claims made by Foucault, Garland, and Burke regarding prisons and their use for more than just punishment are confirmed.
Sociology of punishment aims to understand the institutions in place that determine how we punish crime, who we punish and why we punish them. According to Burke’s chapter in GDP on “Punishment in modern society”, the correctional goals we hope to achieve are deterrence, incapacitation, rehabilitation, retribution, reparation and restitution. However, through punishment we don’t always see the correctional goals being reached; instead the “creation” of criminals may be the outcome. According to Foucault, criminals are made in two ways: they enter prisons, meet criminals and become better criminals by networking or they end up receiving a record that ultimately personifies them. If a person of good-standing in a community commits a crime, they are less likely to be labeled a criminal than somebody committing the same crime with a poor record. So, if one enters the prison system, they receive a label as a criminal which will follow them in and out of prison, effectively constructing as an unlawful person, no matter how minor the offense.
Question 3)
The social, economic, and political watershed of the 1970s drastically shifted the prison system from one of rehabilitation to retribution, largely in part to the advancement of technology and its effects on the world. Social change was most dramatic following the 1960s as society became more susceptible to the improvements of technology and its effects on information, family constructs, and the work environment. The massive change had a strong correlation to record crime rates. As stated in The Culture of Control, “… causal link between the coming of the late modernity and society’s increased susceptibility to crime” (Garland, 90). Garland’s assertion supports the idea that social advancement often leads to crime spikes, most closely shown in the coming of the late modernity and the impact it had on crime rates. The late modernity and the advancement of technology allowed for increased opportunities for crime as social ecology changed. Social ecology changed as money became more readily available due to the invention of credit, and therefore the middle class suddenly became able to purchase new technology just as the upper class could. This led to crime on a mass scale as valuable commodities became increasingly common. Alongside this, society changed as urban sprawl became a staple of westernized societies. With automobiles becoming available to most families, houses became distant from working districts and downtown metropolises shifted from being heavily populated to having little to no residents and rather only forms of entertainment and work. Socially, family norms changed as women began to hold more powerful roles in families due to their increased presence in the workforce alongside their male counterparts. According to Garland, this led to an increase in the opportunity for crime; cars were almost always unattended and therefore could be victimized on almost any street day or night, and houses also became easy targets as all family members were often gone throughout the day. As mass media and technology became progressively more influential on society, police and prison figures’ rehabilitative efforts became viewed as adversarial power rather than a want to focus on helping rehabilitate inmates themselves (Garland, 92). Access to information regarding politics frightened the population, and therefore a strong shift took place from strong support towards democratic-socialism to a conservative wave as welfare became cyclical and rather than shrinking the problems it was supposed to fix, it grew them. Conservatives strongly opposed the welfare-state and presented a “no tolerance” stance on crime and the welfare state as conservatives shifted the depiction of an offender and became increasingly controlling on crime. A disposition towards experts towards experts was created, as rehabilitation became unwanted and and retribution became the norm due to the rise of the victim. Crime became more segregated as the welfare state was labeled dangerous, and therefore became closely controlled. According to Garland, crime became more racialized as people sought hard criminals and the white middle class often looked towards minorities to fit their effective mold (Garland 92). The political watershed created a lens in which the welfare state, primarily made up of minorities, began to be depicted as dangerous and overbearing to the middle class.
Undoubtedly, the most influential factor towards the overpopulation of prisons is the political watershed that took place from the 1970s onwards. A cycle was created effectively oppressing the welfare state; almost setting them up for failure as a negative connotation was created to follow the welfare state around. Conservatives jumped at the opportunity to seize power and saw the best way to do so as attacking the welfare state that the middle class blamed for the economic problems that presented themselves in the 1970s and 80s. It became almost a demand from the people for government to closely police criminal acts, leading to increased criminal control. Due to this, “911” policing was introduced, which allowed for quicker response times and the government enacted “no tolerance” policies. Politics affected the economy, society, and the war on crime, and therefore it can be concluded that it had the largest impact on the contemporary carceral crisis.
The contemporary carceral crisis was created by more than just criminal actions as society, the economy, politics, and the world changed greatly. The coming of the late modernity posed many problems regarding crime as the social and political landscapes transitioned into a new period. According to Garland, the late modernity brought about change to the basic principles in which the crime control field had previously relied (Garland 4). Furthermore, new opportunities to commit crime became ever-more present due to the advancement of technology and creation of urban sprawl. More than ever before, great holds were placed upon the powers of nations as their citizens began to control their own paths in regards to societies advancement alongside economic advancement. This made it hard for governments of the time to create law to govern citizens, and effectively put governments behind the figurative eight-ball. The shift from a welfare-state to an anti-welfare state brought on upon by economic troubles in the 70s majorly impacted the crisis. A war on crime was waged by the government and middle class against the welfare-state and minorities due to this political shift that ultimately led to over-incarceration. Furthermore, the introduction of “no tolerance” policies on crime and the shift of the common criminal as needing rehabilitation to needing retribution can be strongly linked to the contemporary carceral crisis. As Garland puts it in Culture of Control, “The recurrent image of the offender ceased to be that of the needy delinquent or the feckless misfit and became much more threatening-a matter of career criminals, crackheads, thugs, and predators…” (Garland 102). This new image pushed the war on crime, as people came to be constantly afraid of criminals and labeled the welfare-class, predominantly made up of minorities, as a “dangerous” group. This shift brought upon the rise of the victim, and with that shift compassion no longer benefitted criminals, but rather had an adversarial affect as the victim and the now fearful public brought upon sensitivity towards themselves, and therefore punishments became harsher and more frequent for criminals.