Carceral State and Mass Incarceration

Workhouse

• Institutions from the 18th century, part of the custodial poor relief system.
• Functioned as disciplinary training for capitalist production through forced labor.
• Aimed to break working-class resistance and compel laborers to accept exploitative conditions.

Correctional Training

• Element of the Discipline technology of power within the Arc of Discipline.
• Focused on replacing bad habits with virtuous ones, creating utility and docility.
• Incorporates the Panopticon model that emphasizes surveillance and individual accountability.

Primitive Accumulation

• A concept from Marx explaining the transition of social means of production into capital.
• Historical process that dispossessed laborers, marking the pre-historic stage of capital.

Panopticon

• A model representing the disciplinary technology of power.
• Features continuous surveillance, correctional training, and a focus on individual accountability.

Idleness

• Considered a threat to property and order; equated with criminality.
• Punishment was seen as a means to instill virtuous habits by targeting idleness.
• Cited by Patrick Colquhoun as a path leading to crime and necessity-driven actions.

Eastern State Penitentiary

• Associated with the silent system; key model of a penitentiary during the 19th century.
• Faced opposition particularly against total solitary confinement methods.

Auburn Penitentiary

• Another primary penitentiary model known as the Congregate model.
• Allowed prisoners to work and socialize during the day but restricted to cells at night.

Infiernillos

• Spanish term meaning “little hells,” referring to jails in Peru closed during reform efforts.

Recidivism

• Defined as the tendency of convicted individuals to reoffend.
• Increasing recidivism is often seen as a problem rather than a failure of the rehabilitation discourse.
• Probation aims to reduce recidivism with evidence-based strategies.

Convict Leasing

• A system where convicted individuals were sold to private employers for forced labor.
• Proportionately affected Black people, preserving elements of slavery under a different guise post-13th Amendment.
• Associated with high mortality rates due to harsh conditions and labor.

Racial Threat

• A myth correlating demographic changes in power, particularly among Black populations, to increased public safety risks.
• The punitive nature of law enforcement was framed as a response to perceived threats from racial groups.

Resistance in Prisons

• Manifested through actions such as escapes, riots, and organized strikes.
• Notable events include the San Quentin and Attica uprisings, indicating prison crisis.

Eugenics

• Early 20th-century ideology linking hereditary traits to criminality, influencing systems like probation and parole.
• Methods of control included sterilization, segregation, and urban surveillance, with anti-Black racism intertwined.

Degeneracy

• A concept within Eugenics identifying individuals and families deemed biologically or morally inferior.
• Linked to notions of hereditary crime and moral decay.

Experimentation in Prisons

• Facilities such as San Quentin, under figures like Dr. Leo Stanley, became sites for medical trials, raising ethical concerns about consent and prisoner rights.

Indeterminate Sentencing

• A non-fixed sentencing style where sentence length is decided by a parole board's assessment of rehabilitation.

George Jackson

• A revolutionary figure, Black Panther Party member, and critic of the capitalist prison system, advocating for prisoner reform and rights.

Hands-Off Doctrine

• Era (1830-1960) when courts avoided interfering with prison administration, treating prisoners as state property.

Social Movements

• Movements advocating for prisoners' rights reflect significant shifts in the narrative surrounding criminal justice and incarceration issues.

Prison Litigation Reform Act

• 1996 legislation constraining prisoners’ access to federal courts, hindering reform efforts.

Bureaucratization of Prisons

• Increase of formal administrative structures in response to the prisoners' rights movement and court interventions.

Mass Incarceration

• Identified as a critical institution within the Arc of Expulsion, showcasing significant shifts from rehabilitation to punitive measures since the 1980s.
• Marked by punitive sentencing, solitary confinement practices, high racial disparities in incarceration.

Brown v. Plata (2011)

• Supreme Court ruling addressing medical neglect in California prisons, reinforcing the dignity of prisoners and countering mass incarceration.

Prison Fix

• Concept describing how California's prison system evolved from various societal surpluses, reshaping penal practices.