Volume 41, Number 4 · February 17, 1994
The Crime of Punishment
By David J. Rothman
Crime Control as Industry: Towards GULAGS, Western Style?
by Nils Christie
Routledge, 192 pp., $17.95 (paper)
Prison Conditions in the United States
a Human Rights Watch report
108 pp., $10.00 (paper)
Between Prison and Probation: Intermediate Punishments in a Rational Sentencing System
by Norval Morris, by Michael Tonry
Oxford University Press, 283 pp., $9.95 (paper)
A Decade of Sentencing Guidelines: Revisiting the Role of the Legislature
Wake Forest Law Review Summer 1993 issue
181-508 pp., $7.00 (paper)
The least controversial observation one can make about American criminal justice today is that it is remarkably ineffective, absurdly expensive, grossly inhumane, and riddled with discrimination. The beating of Rodney King was a reminder of the ruthlessness and racism that characterize many big city police departments. But the other aspects of the justice system, especially sentencing practices and prison conditions, are every bit as harsh and unfair. Nevertheless, the Clinton administration, Congress, and many state legislatures, claiming they are responding to the public's fears of crime, are determined to promote and strengthen the very policies that make the criminal justice system so bad. Despite repeated failures and inequities of criminal justice, they are asking for more of the same.
Review, 6616 words
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