Mass Incarceration in the United States of America (Essay Sample)

Mass Incarceration in the United States of America
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Mass Incarceration in the United States of America
Mass incarceration in the United States has gradually risen since the 1970s and is skewed along racial and class lines. The increased mass incarceration is especially higher amongst African Americans as compared to whites, leading to severe social and economic ramifications for these communities. This essay aims to understand the cause of mass incarceration in the United States, determine how it is impacting society as a whole, and put forward some of the proposed solutions to this problem in the country.
Mass incarceration has become a worrying trend in the United States. This is due to the fact that it is unevenly more prevalent among African Americans and the poorer members of society. According to Western and Muller (2013), African Americans are 6 to 7 times more likely to face incarceration compared to their white counterparts. Furthermore, their research indicates that for those African Americans who drop out of high school the chances of incarceration are 20 times higher (Western & Muller, 2013). In the late 1970s, the rates of incarceration for unschooled black men stood at 12%, as opposed to today where it stands at 35% (Western & Muller, 2013). It is also more likely for black men who have dropped out of high school to be incarcerated than to get gainful employment. Grawert et al., (2019) also reiterate that the rate of incarceration amongst black men is 6 times higher compared to whites, which is creating an injustice towards this societal group and thus has become a civil rights crisis.
The effects of mass incarceration, especially at the social level, have a negative connotation on American society at large. As stated in Western and Muller’s (2013) article, mass incarceration focusing on the black race within the country is ‘the new Jim Crow,’ indicating a racially systematized penal structure. At the statistical level, incarcerating innumerable poor individuals in the society reduces their impact on national social indicator statistics, giving a more optimistic picture of these indicators when the reality is not as good (Western & Muller, 2013). These social indicators are optimistic since they leave out the most socially disadvantaged of society. Overall, it perpetuates racial and economic inequality in the country (Grawert et al., 2019).
The solutions proposed to combat mass incarceration all majorly lie with policymakers at the federal level. One such move was witnessed with the signing of the First Step Act by President Donald Trump in 2018 (Grawert et al., 2019). The Act is meant to reduce the extreme and unjust sentences within the American criminal code. Some further proposals include ending incarceration for lower-level offenses, reducing the time served for those penalized for serious crimes, and reverting ‘unfair’ bills such as the 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act (Grawert et al., 2019). Through such bills, the U.S federal government supported states legally and fiscally to mete out harsher sentencing laws. New bills such as the Reverse Mass Incarceration Act would instead enable the country to apply its financial muscle to more contingent criminal justice goals (Grawert et al., 2019).
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