1.

Record Nr.

UNISA996248224603316

Autore

Gottschalk Marie

Titolo

The prison and the gallows : the politics of mass incarceration in America / / Marie Gottschalk [[electronic resource]]

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Cambridge : , : Cambridge University Press, , 2006

ISBN

0-511-22396-X

1-107-16938-0

1-280-54141-5

0-511-79109-7

0-511-22646-2

0-511-22589-X

0-511-22461-3

0-511-31639-9

0-511-22528-8

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (xiii, 451 pages) : digital, PDF file(s)

Collana

Cambridge studies in criminology

Disciplina

365/.973

Soggetti

Prisons - United States

Imprisonment - Government policy - United States

Capital punishment - United States

Prisoners - Civil rights - United States

United States Politics and government

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 05 Oct 2015).

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. 379-427) and index.

Nota di contenuto

The prison and the gallows : the construction of the carceral state in America -- Law, order, and alternative explanations -- Unlocking the past : the nationalization and politicization of law and order -- The carceral state and the welfare state : the comparative politics of victims -- Not the usual suspects : feminists, women's groups, and the anti-rape movement -- The battered women's movement and the development of penal policy -- From rights to revolution : prison activism and the carceral state -- Capital punishment, the courts, and the early origins of the carceral state, 1920s-1960s -- The power to punish and execute : the political development of capital punishment,



1972 to today -- Conclusion : whither the carceral state?

Sommario/riassunto

The United States has built a carceral state that is unprecedented among Western countries and in US history. Nearly one in 50 people, excluding children and the elderly, is incarcerated today, a rate unsurpassed anywhere else in the world. What are some of the main political forces that explain this unprecedented reliance on mass imprisonment? Throughout American history, crime and punishment have been central features of American political development. This 2006 book examines the development of four key movements that mediated the construction of the carceral state in important ways: the victims' movement, the women's movement, the prisoners' rights movement, and opponents of the death penalty. This book argues that punitive penal policies were forged by particular social movements and interest groups within the constraints of larger institutional structures and historical developments that distinguish the United States from other Western countries.