Lack of Clearly Defined Purpose Leads to Negative Prison Outcomes

 If you were to ask one hundred Americans what they thought the primary goal of prison was, you would likely receive numerous answers. These would include deterrence, punishment, incapacitation, and rehabilitation or reform. Even legislators don't have consistent beliefs in the primary goal of prison. 

The reality is that the use of prison aims to accomplish multiple goals, but goals which are often competing with each other. Because of this competition for outcomes, prisons are notoriously inept at accomplishing anything but warehousing. In other words, incapacitation becomes the default goal. 

Since the general public, elected officials, and even prison administrators cannot figure out which outcomes are most important, there is very little attention given to the notoriously negative effects of the total institution of incarceration. These negative outcomes are numerous, but include depersonalization, dependency, and loss of initiative.*

Prisons notoriously depersonalize people. When sentenced to prison, people are given a number to identify them, and thereafter, prisoners are known primarily by this number. Prisons also strip people of their identities, give them the same clothes to wear, and treat them the same, regardless of the severity of their crimes. Prisoners serving a short eighteen month sentence for drunk driving are treated the same as prisoners serving longer sentences for violent crimes. 

This loss of identity often results in prisoners losing their sense of self, their sense of belonging and attachment to others, and their belief that they have something unique (and positive) to bring to the world. Prisoners even buy into the system's aim of depersonalization by refusing to let others use their "government name." Nicknames are prolific as prisoners themselves detach from their former lives. 

Prison also teaches gross dependency. Prisons provide many basic necessities, including a place to sleep, three meals a day (despite their horrible quality), and a pre-determined daily routine. Prisoners do not have to wash their own clothes, prepare their own meals, pay monthly bills, work normal jobs, mow their lawns, repair their cars, or any of the other hundreds of things required of citizens. 

Prisoners are often even forced to depend on family and friends to help them with basic expenses as prison jobs barely pay enough for a single visit to medical. Moreover, many prisoners actively plan to continue depending on the government to meet their needs after prison, fully surrendering to the learned helplessness they've been taught in prison. 

Related to their learned helplessness, many prisoners lose initiative while in prison. Any initiative they show is ardently opposed by prison officials who treat anything abnormal with suspicion. And initiative is abnormal in prison. Even other prisoners treat those who show initiative with suspicion, often calling them rats or "police" for demonstrating anything but profound laziness. 

Long-term enculturation in a system that opposes initiative leads many prisoners to adopt laissez-faire attitudes towards anything that will better their condition or prepare them for success after prison. Official opposition towards any attempts prisoners do make to better themselves or their condition often lead to discouragement and eventually to loss of initiative in general. 

With no clear goal for incarceration, it's no wonder these negative effects exist. Both prison officials and prisoners alike have no reason to overcome them. 

(* These points adapted from "The Failure of Reform" by Edgardo Rotman, in The Oxford History of The Prison)