Incar­cer­a­tion and Crime: A Complex Relationship, a new report by The Sentencing Project, exam­ines the finan­cial and social costs of incar­cer­a­tion, and eval­u­ates the lim­it­ed effec­tive­ness it has on crime rates. The report notes that the num­ber of peo­ple incar­cer­at­ed in the United States has risen by more than 500% over the past three decades, up from 330,000 peo­ple in 1972 to 2.1 mil­lion peo­ple today. Though an increase in the num­ber of offend­ers who are incar­cer­at­ed has played a mod­est role in the nation’s decreas­ing crime rate, the report notes that this pol­i­cy is sub­ject to decreas­ing effec­tive­ness in the long-term. The Sentencing Project warns that increas­ing incar­cer­a­tion while ignor­ing more effec­tive approach­es to pre­vent­ing crime will impose a heavy bur­den upon the courts, cor­rec­tions sys­tems, and com­mu­ni­ties, while pro­vid­ing a mar­gin­al impact on crime. The group rec­om­mends that pol­i­cy­mak­ers fur­ther assess this prob­lem and adopt more bal­anced crime con­trol poli­cies that pro­vide resources for crime-pre­ven­tion efforts such as pro­gram­ming, treat­ment, and community support. 

The Sentencing Project is a nation­al non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tion that works for a fair and effec­tive crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem by pro­mot­ing alter­na­tives to incar­cer­a­tion, reforms in sen­tenc­ing law and prac­tice, and bet­ter use of com­mu­ni­ty-based ser­vices and insti­tu­tions. (“Incarceration and Crime: A Complex Relationship,” The Sentencing Project, 2005). See The Sentencing Project’s Web site. See also, Sentencing and Resources.

Citation Guide