Voices of Abolition: Unterschied zwischen den Versionen

Judge Carter, of Ohio, avowed himself a radical on prison discipline. He favored the abolishment of prisons, and the use of greater efforts for the prevention of crime. Any system of imprisonment or punishment was degradation, and could not reform a man. He would abolish all prison walls, and release all confined within them...

:—Minutes of the 1870 Congress of the American Prison Association/American Correctional Association

Richter Carter aus Ohio gab sich als radikaler Gefängnisgegner zu erkennen. Er befürwortete die Abschaffung der Gefängnisse und größere Anstrengungen zur Verbrechensvorbeugung. Jedes System der Inhaftierung oder Bestrafung sei eine Erniedrigung und könne einen Menschen nicht bessern. Er würde alle Gefängnismauern abschaffen und alle, die hinter ihnen eingeschlossen seien, freilassen ...

:—Protokoll des Kongresses der Amerikanischen Gefängnisgesellschaft von 1870 (American Prison Association/American Correctional Association)

 

 

Das Gefängnis, wie jetzt geduldet, ist eine ständige Bedrohung für die Sicherheit aller. Ein anachronistisches Relikt mittelalterlicher Konzepte von Verbrechen und Bestrafung, das das Verbrechensproblem nicht nur nicht heilt; es verewigt und vervielfältigt es. Wir bekennen uns zu unserer Sicherheit auf das Gefängnis; Dennoch ist es direkt für einen Großteil des Schadens verantwortlich, den die Gesellschaft durch die Täter erleidet. Aufgrund meiner eigenen Erfahrung bin ich überzeugt, dass Gefängnisse abgeschafft werden müssen.

 

'''Advocates of swift & massive change'''

The most common cry for abolition is one using such slogans as "Tear Down the Walls" and "Free All Prisoners." These anguished demands have been issued by a wide range of persons including judges, physicians, prisoners, ex-prisoners and anarchists, to name a few. Very often this graphic message is accompanied by calls for community alternatives, or if none can be satisfactorily developed—no alternatives at all. Doing nothing is seen as a better response than imprisonment. The demand for immediate abolition of prisons speaks to the urgency of freeing prisoners from oppressive situations. It admonishes us to act swiftly to end imprisonment. Such demands also serve to raise public consciousness to the need for fundamental change. Mere repetition of slogans, on the other hand, does not suggest a process for crumbling those walls, and it may even play into public fear. '''The myth that prison protects is widespread. To a public immersed in the myths of prison protection, the image of prison walls suddenly being torn down can create unnecessary fear and a backlash that ultimately may inhibit change.'''

Nevertheless, it is important to observe that the closest anyone has come to abolishing an existing prison system, involved a relatively abrupt strategy. The almost total abolition of juvenile prisons in Massachusetts occurred because of a rare combination of personal creativity and the power invested in that person by the legislature. Dr. Jerry Miller, Director of the Department of Youth Services, in three years emptied all but one juvenile prison in Massachusetts by "transferring" the young prisoners into a variety of community alternative living situations. Miller believes "swift and massive change" is the only sure way to phase out juvenile institutions: "Slow-phased winding down can mean no winding down," and often insures they'll "wind up" again.  

'''Constitutionalists'''

The most hopeful constitutionalists support the theory that prison walls will eventually collapse under the weight of mounting legal pressure. They recommend a dual strategy: pressures by prisoners "via constitutional case law" from within, and social and legal pressure from reformists, legal advocates and abolitionists, from without.

Many prison litigation advocates describe prisons as "lawless agencies," almost totally non-responsive to due process of law-or law itself. Because the constitution should follow a person into prison, the prisoners' legal struggle is one for rights-not privileges which can be manipulated or withdrawn as a control device. Prisons lack substantive and procedural safeguards to redress grievances. Since rights cannot be guaranteed, prisons per se are profoundly unconstitutional and illegal.

Others, tho constantly loyal and active in the movement for prisoners' constitutional rights, are less optimistic. They caution against exaggerating the possibilities of litigation, both in impact and implementation. They remind reformers and abolitionists of the enormous problems which lie in translating a court decision into reality.

'''Prisoners'''

 

The movement for constitutional rights has been and is prisoner led. Beginning in the 1960's, sparked by the Black Muslims' struggle for religious rights, thru 1970 when an entire state penitentiary system was successfully challenged on a constitutional level, [6] prisoners moved the struggle from the specific to the general. Encouraged by their occasional successes, prisoners have plunged wholeheartedly into the study and practice of law. "Jailhouse lawyers" have won significant victories, and, as a result, are frequently subjected to additional punishments by prison managers. In San Quentin alone, the number of prisoner-prepared writs increased from about 50 in 1960 to more than 5,000 in 1970.

 

'''Advocates of moratorium'''

'''Peace advocates'''

Tho the above strategies cover a wide range of concepts and tactics, most prison changers are bound together by at least two commonly held beliefs: Few people believe all prisons should be abolished simultaneously or that all persons should always be free of social control. The majority of prison changers believe that prisons can be eliminated for all but a very few who require restraint or limited movement for periods of time. Clarity is needed on the process and criteria for restraint and on the nature of the responses and settings most appropriate for that very small group.

In reversing the prison response to crime and social inequities, we need to be confident that our abolitionist advocacy is rooted in the most humane, useful and realistic points of view. Most changes needed to reduce crime and eliminate prisons lie outside the criminal (in)justice systems—in the cultural values and institutions of society. These causal factors necessitate broader systemic analysis. For the purposes of this handbook, however, we limit our focus to the connections between social, economic and cultural causes of crime and the use of prisons as a social control mechanism. - On the basis of our analysis, we have formulated a series of practical abolitionist actions. These strategies rest on an ideology—a set of beliefs and values which serve as reference points for our actions. We advocate a three-pronged abolitionist ideology: (1) Economic and social justice for all, (2) concern for all victims and (3) rather than punishment, reconciliation in a caring community.

'''Economic & social justice'''

The creation of new, caring communities where power and equality of all social primary goods will be institutionally structured and distributed to every member is implicit in the long range goals of those who would see penal sanctions drastically reduced and eliminated. But the new community will not miraculously appear. Its creation rests upon the participation and empowerment of all its members.

The focus on power is the major issue. The only meaningful way to change the prevailing American system of liberty for the free, justice for some, and inequality for all, is thru shifts in the distribution of power. Any ghetto dweller can link powerlessness to poverty—it is caused by lack of money. They are poor because they have first, insufficient income—and second, no access to methods of increasing that income-that is, no power.

'''Who decides? Who benefits?'''

If being poor is having no money, "poverty in the U.S. is almost a picayune problem. A redistribution of about $15 billion a year (less than two percent of the Gross National Product) would bring every poor person above the present poverty line." The amount involved is less than half the U.S. annual expenditure on the Vietnam War.

Yet decisions are now being made by the powerful to spend at least $20 billion on the construction of new prisons to house the powerless. Cages which cost from $24,000 to $50,000 each to construct will provide space behind the walls for many who have never had decent housing in the community. In New York, it will cost an average of $13,000 a year to keep each prisoner on the cage side of the wall. A willingness to commit these resources to the community would improve the lives of those who are targets for imprisonment as well as society in general.

'''Concern for all victims'''

'''Reconciliation rather than punishment'''

'''Abolition strategies'''

The pressure is excessive for abolitionists to immediately produce a "finished" blueprint, to solve every problem, to deal with every "criminal" before we can begin to deal with and change the systems. The first step toward abolition occurs when we break with the established prison system and at the same time face "unbuilt ground." Only by rejecting what is "old and finished" do we give the "new and unfinished" a chance to appear. Pursuing an abolition continuum strategy, we can undertake a program of concrete, direct and immediate abolitions of portions of the system beginning with abolishing further prison/jail construction.