Speaking for Himself: Professor Loic Wacquant Corrects My Characterization of His Critique of the Concept of the Prison Industrial Complex

Last June, I sent a memo to participants in a PIC Communiversity Course that my organization sponsored. In it, I made this argument regarding discussions about the term “prison industrial complex.”

We spent the first two sessions trying to understand the history of prisons and how the PIC operates. One area of debate that we did not broach is whether the term “Prison Industrial Complex” is a good construct to explain the expansion and encroachment of surveillance and incarceration over the past 30 years. There is a pitched battle of ideas in the academic community about whether the PIC is a useful way to describe mass incarceration. Sociologists like Loic Wacquant contend that the PIC is a misguided frame as an explanatory construct for mass incarceration. For information about Wacquant’s critique, you should read his book “Prisons of Poverty.” This is the shorter, more reader-friendly version of his book “Punishing the Poor.” Chris Parenti is another person who is a critic of the term “Prison Industrial Complex.” He contends that prison spending is much less than that of the “military-industrial-complex.” As such, he takes issue with the term. He has other criticisms that he has offered as well.

Finally, in the past couple of years, some have begun to use the term “Corrections-Industrial Complex” instead of PIC. These people contend that since the fastest growing segment of carceral supervision today in the U.S. is probation, it makes more sense to think of this phenomenon as the CIC instead. Former inmates are often still under some form of supervision once they leave the walls of prisons (GPS tracking, intensive parole, etc…). Others who come into contact with the criminal legal system are not incarcerated but are given probation and come under the surveillance of the state too.

We have not discussed these debates in this course because of the limited amount of time that was available to us. I did however want to bring this to your attention in case you are interested in reading more from some of the academics that I mentioned earlier.

Personally, I continue to find the term “Prison Industrial Complex” to be a good frame for discussing the issues that we have over the past five months. This is why I continue to use it. In particular, I rely on Critical Resistance’s definition:

“Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) is a term we use to describe the overlapping interests of government and industry that use surveillance, policing, and imprisonment as solutions to what are, in actuality, economic, social, and political ‘problems’.”

I received an e-mail today from Professor Loic Wacquant.  As a sociologist myself, I greatly value engaged dialogue about ideas.  I reached out to Dr. Wacquant and asked if I could post his response here. He graciously agreed.

Read the full post at US Prison Culture

Panel on Mental Health and the PIC

Adler's Institute on Public Safety and Social Justice invites you to a Symposium: What happens to people with mental illness when they encounter the criminal justice system?  Innovations in Illinois.  The event information is on the flier below.  Please feel free to pass on to other interested parties!  If you have any questions please let me know.  You can RSVP to this FREE event at ipssj@adler.edu.

Resource on the PIC and Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming People

Our friends at the Transformative Justice Law Project shared these amazing resources detailing how the PIC and access to resources creates pipelines for trans and gender non-conforming folks into prison.  I'll have full audio of the presentation up shortly.

Readings for Final Session

This reading from the Defending Justice Toolkit offers insight around issues of prison abolition and reform including some organizing advice.

http://www.defendingjustice.org/pdfs/chapters/organizing.pdf

Please also check out these following websites from local Chicago groups that are addressing PIC-related issues:

TAMMS Year 10 -- http://www.yearten.org/

Chicago Legal Advocacy for Incarcerated Mothers -- http://www.claim-il.org/

Illinois Campaign for Telephone Justice -- http://www.illinoistelephonejustice.com/

John Howard Association of Illinois -- http://www.thejha.org/

Midwest Books to Prisoners -- http://www.midwestbookstoprisoners.org/

Chicago Books to Women in Prison -- http://chicagobwp.org/

An Essay on the ICE Raid at Postville

We haven't spent a lot of time focusing on the experience of immigrant groups with the PIC.  This essay discusses the massive raid of a meatpacking plant in Postville, Iowa by Immigrations and Custom Enforcement in 2008.

Unfinished Business

As we approach the final session of the 2010 Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) Communiversity course, I wanted to take a moment to underscore some of the areas that we haven’t really been able to cover in our time together.  We are in our fifth session today and will end in June with a focus on specific organizing efforts aimed at dismantling the PIC. 

This course was intended to provide a basic overview of some of the key issues around the prison industrial complex.  It was not meant to be exhaustive.  This topic is so broad and complex that it would take a lifetime to unpack all of its nuances.

In the meantime, here are a few areas that we did not consider in depth over the past five sessions but are critical to gaining a comprehensive view about the PIC and how it operates:

1. Immigration, Detention, and the PIC -- On any given day there are 30,000 immigrants in detention in the U.S. (women and children included). 
2. The “war on terror” and the U.S.’s global prison network (Bagram/Guantanamo) – extending the reach of the PIC outside the U.S.
3. Mental illness and the PIC – two wonderful documentaries highlight how prisons have become warehouses for people with mental illness.  Check out “The New Asylums” and “The Released” if you are interested in this topic. Both are hour-long documentaries produced by PBS’s Frontline.
4. Political Prisoners – We did not address the issue of the imprisonment of dissidents and critics of the state in any depth.
5. The role of the media in promoting and supporting the PIC – We did not discuss in any depth how the media works to criminalize marginalized groups through its coverage of “crime.”

We spent the first two sessions trying to understand the history of prisons and how the PIC operates.  One area of debate that we did not broach is whether the term “Prison Industrial Complex” is a good construct to explain the expansion and encroachment of surveillance and incarceration over the past 30 years.  There is a pitched battle of ideas in the academic community about whether the PIC is a useful way to describe mass incarceration.  Sociologists like Loic Wacquant contend that the PIC is a misguided frame as an explanatory construct for mass incarceration. For information about Wacquant’s critique, you should read his book “Prisons of Poverty.” This is the shorter, more reader-friendly version of his book “Punishing the Poor.”  Chris Parenti is another person who is a critic of the term “Prison Industrial Complex.” He contends that prison spending is much less than that of the “military-industrial-complex.” As such, he takes issue with the term.  He has other criticisms that he has offered as well.

Finally, in the past couple of years, some have begun to use the term “Corrections-Industrial Complex” instead of PIC.  These people contend that since the fastest growing segment of carceral supervision today in the U.S. is probation, it makes more sense to think of this phenomenon as the CIC instead.  Former inmates are often still under some form of supervision once they leave the walls of prisons (GPS tracking, intensive parole, etc…).  Others who come into contact with the criminal legal system are not incarcerated but are given probation and come under the surveillance of the state too.

We have not discussed these debates in this course because of the limited amount of time that was available to us.  I did however want to bring this to your attention in case you are interested in reading more from some of the academics that I mentioned earlier.

Personally, I continue to find the term “Prison Industrial Complex” to be a good frame for discussing the issues that we have over the past five months.  This is why I continue to use it.  In particular, I rely on Critical Resistance’s definition:

“Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) is a term we use to describe the overlapping interests of government and industry that use surveillance, policing, and imprisonment as solutions to what are, in actuality, economic, social, and political ‘problems’.”

Hopefully after the past few months, everyone who has consistently attended these sessions can answer the following questions in his or her own way:

1. What are the historical, social, political, and economic forces that have contributed to the vast expansion of incarceration in the U.S.?
2. How do you define the PIC?
3. Who gets put in prison and who doesn’t?
4. What are the effects of the PIC on individuals, communities, and society?

There are many, many more issues that we could have covered as they relate to the PIC.  I hope that some of you who are interested in continuing your learning around these issues will apply to join the PIC Teaching Collective (July 9^th is the deadline).  For the others, I hope that you will independently continue to expand your understanding of the issues around the PIC in the future. 

Written by Mariame Kaba

Resources for the next session

The top six resources are the recommended ones for May 22nd.

1. Article from San Francisco Guardian about trans women in prison
2. Six minute video clip from the video "Cruel and Unusual" about incarceration of trans women
3. Executive summary of this big report on LGBT youth in the juvenile courts, 7 pages long
4. This is a copy of the Comic Book "Hard Life" which was distributed at our last session.
5. Fact Sheet: How the Criminal Justice System is Anti-Queer.
6. Fact Sheet: How the Criminal Justice System is Anti-Women.

Other resources if you are particularly interested in this topic:

Summary of the Amnesty International report "Stonewalled" about US police abuses of the LGBT community. Can be read or listened to on the website. It has short case information and recommendations and covers a broad range of issues.

This is a video about the issue of shackling pregnant women in prison.

This is a series of pieces written by formerly incarcerated women.

This is a recent piece about incarcerated mothers that is worth reading.

This is an article about the big increase of women in prison.

Corrupting Justice: A Primer for LGBT Communities on Racism, Violence, Human Degradation & the Prison Industrial Complex, [PDF] American Friends Service Committee. 2005.

This is a brand new report from ICJIA titled "Victimization and Help-Seeking Behaviors among Female Prisoners in Illinois."