All of my responses, of course, come from the observations and experiences I’ve had as a long-term prisoner. I’ve also learned a lot from hundreds of interviews I’ve conducted with other prisoners. Taken together, I have come to the conclusion that the goal of corrections was not to rehabilitate offenders. The buzzword of rehabilitation has not had a meaningful relationship to the management in prisons where I’ve been confined over the past 21 years.

The purpose of prisons, from my experience and observation, is to isolate offenders from society for the duration of their sentences. The prisons are effective at reaching this goal. Prisons do not allow many escapes, and the rules administrators use to govern them erect many barriers to separate prisoners from society in emotional, social, and spiritual ways as well as physical ways. They limit telephone and visiting access; they place restrictions on each prisoner’s ability to correspond or nurture community ties.

Those restrictions are a part of the prison experience, and they contribute to the effectiveness of isolating prisoners from society. The goal is to protect the security of the institution, not to prepare offenders for law abiding lives upon release. Those who staff prisons are very effective at maintaining security by isolating offenders. Those policies, however, are not effective at correcting human behavior. The high recidivism rates and high operating costs of prison management validate my findings.

Certainly, many of the people who choose to build careers working for the prison system have noble aspirations of helping offenders emerge as successful citizens. The culture of confinement, however, can extinguish those goals. Prison staff members cannot advance their careers by helping those in prison nurture family and community ties. Doing so would interfere with the security of the institution, and it likely would result in ostracism from colleagues. A staff member advances his career by focusing on security of the institution, not on preparing prisoners for success upon release.

I hope my response is helpful, though I invite further discussion. I appreciate opportunities to share what I have learned as a long-term prisoner. 

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