On Prisons
The punitive system functions as a tool for the ruling class to maintain their status quo. Disobediant workers are criminalized while incarceration fails to provide public safety.
Although abolitionism in the contemporary context is largely associated with anarchism, dismantling carceral infrastructure in order to fund universal public resources is firmly entrenched in a marxist ethos. Abolitionism argues that we dismantle the carceral state because incarceration and its adjacent mechanisms are a necessary tool that the elite capitalist class uses to instill social control over the working class and protect capital accumulation.
The state resolves the class contradiction by criminalizing the working masses instead of promoting equitable distribution of resources in order to further privatize wealth produced by society as a whole. By analyzing the tension between different methods of social discipline—punitive carcerality on the one side and expansive social spending on the other—we illustrate how widespread cultural values (punitive carcerality) and the actual mechanisms of control (capitalists dominating the working class) largely benefit elite interests at the cost of everyone else’s autonomy, dignity, and ability to flourish. Only through a socialist reorganization of society can we simultaneously dismantle the carceral state while executing and maintaining life-affirming universal social programs.
Under a capitalist system, some demographics are more vulnerable to the criminal label (the poor working masses, particularly those of oppressed identities) and others escape the carceral eye (elites). Further, the poor are incentivized to engage in anti-social (sometimes labeled ‘criminal’) behavior by the capitalist socio-economic order which provides fodder to 1) vilify the working masses and, in turn, 2) promotes further investment in the carceral system, i.e. the further expansion of the capitalists’ domestic occupying army.
Carceral logic is a reactive approach. It operates on the principle of deterrence through punishment—the threat of state-sanctioned consequences, ranging from arrest and incarceration to post-release surveillance. This method focuses on managing anti-social behavior most commonly associated with the working class (referred to as ‘crime’) only after it has occurred by punishing individuals. Carceral logic is founded on the twin assumptions that 1) harsher penalties will lead to a more obedient populace and 2) people independently choose to participate in criminal activity. We use the term “crime” to refer to actions or antisocial behaviors like homicide without casting individual culpability upon would-be “criminals” in order to address the selective nature of state surveillance and application of the criminal label.
Crime is not the result of individual decision-making, but instead a consequence of inequitable distribution of resources. As neighborhoods become underfunded, plagued by incarceration, and under the heel of various identity oppressions, their ability to socialize well-adjusted adults decreases in kind. These areas deteriorate into underdevelopment, forming ghettos.
Alternatively, broad social spending is a proactive humanist approach and insists that crime is best addressed by preemptively investing in public resources. Of course there is far more required to build a communist state than simply investing in a universal safety net, but the act of dismantling the repressive arm of the capitalist state through collective organizing is an important site of conflict. By enhancing the accessibility and quality of services such as healthcare, education, housing, and employment programs, this framework aims to create a society where individuals have fulfilling lives, thus making criminal behavior an unnecessary and undesirable risk. This method seeks to eliminate the root causes of crime by fostering social stability and well-being for all, effectively eliminating crime before it’s incentivized.
The choice between these two methods of social discipline is not a neutral or arbitrary decision, but deeply embedded in the economic reality of class interests. A punitive carceral system, while presented as a solution for public safety, primarily serves the interests of the ruling class by being a comparatively cheaper option for the state. The cost of expanding police forces, building new prisons, and implementing widespread surveillance is significantly less than the cost of establishing and maintaining universal social programs. This cost differential allows the wealthy to minimize their tax burden while still protecting their property and maintaining social order through force. Consequently, the punitive model perpetuates a cycle where the working class is disproportionately disadvantaged by both proximity to crime and the brunt of the carceral system, while the ruling class benefits from a system that protects their assets as its primary objective and social function.
Incarceration does not fulfill its mission statement—it doesn’t make people safer. Any intelligent analysis of the contemporary carceral system will show that incarceration makes societies more dangerous and massively exacerbates antisocial behavior over time. The Sentencing Project estimates that the scale of mass incarceration, and the resulting suppression of wages and employment for those affected, increased the overall United States poverty rate by at least 20 percent between 1980 and 2004. Empirical evidence shows that parental incarceration significantly influences a child’s future trajectory. A Harvard Kennedy School study found that the incarceration of a parent during childhood leads to a significant increase in teen crime, a decrease in educational progress, and lower future income for the child. Not only does crime destroy neighborhoods immediately, it destroys their futures, too.
