The downside of downsizing: Persistence of racial disparities following state prison reform
| Author | Amy E Lerman,Alyssa C Mooney |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/14624745211006039 |
| Published date | 01 October 2022 |
| Date | 01 October 2022 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
The downside of
downsizing: Persistence
of racial disparities
following state
prison reform
Amy E Lerman and Alyssa C Mooney
University of California, USA
Abstract
Nationwide, prison populations have declined nearly 5% from their peak, and 16 states
have seen double-digit declines. It is unclear, though, how decarceration has affected
racial disparities. Using national data, we find substantial variation in state prison pop-
ulations from 2005–2018, with increases in some states and declines in others.
However, although declines in the overall state prison population were associated
with declines for all groups, states with rising prison populations experienced slight
upticks in prison rates among the white population, while rates among Black and Latinx
populations declined. As a result, greater progress in overall decarceration within states
did not translate to larger reductions in racial disparities. At the same time, we do not
find evidence that a decline in prison populations is associated with a rise in jail incar-
ceration for any racial/ethnic group. In additional exploratory analyses, we suggest that
recent incarceration trends may be driven by changes in returns to prison for probation
and parole violations, rather than commitments for new crimes. Our results make clear
that while efforts to reverse mass incarceration have reduced the size of prison pop-
ulations in some states, they have not yet made substantial progress in resolving the
crisis of race in American criminal justice.
Keywords
county jails, decarceration, mass incarceration, prisons, racial disparities, racial
disproportionality
Corresponding author:
Amy E Lerman, Goldman School of Public Policy, 2607 Hearst Ave, Berkeley, CA 94707, USA.
Email: alerman@berkeley.edu
Punishment & Society
!The Author(s) 2021
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DOI: 10.1177/14624745211006039
journals.sagepub.com/home/pun
2022, Vol. 24(4) 667–691
Introduction
In recent years, America has witnessed something remarkable: a small but prom-
ising reversal of the trend towards mass incarceration. Since its peak in 2009, the
nation’s prisoner population has declined nearly 5%, and 16 states have seen
double-digit declines. States like Connecticut, Michigan, Mississippi, Rhode
Island, and South Carolina have reduced their prison populations by as much as
14–25% from their peaks in 2006–2008. Other states saw smaller, but still notable,
declines (The Sentencing Project, 2017). This is no small development. The growth
of imprisonment is one of the defining aspects of American public policy over the
latter part of the 20th century, and its many and varied harms to both individuals
and communities are well documented (e.g. Lerman and Weaver, 2014; Mauer and
Chesney-Lind, 2003; Pattillo et al., 2004).
One of the most troubling features of mass incarceration is the racial disparity
evident at every stage of the process leading to incarceration, from police stops and
arrest to adjudication and sentencing (Alexander, 2012). As a result, Black
Americans make up about a third of the U.S. prisoner population, and are incar-
cerated at more than five times the rate of whites (NAACP, 2020). Scholars have
amassed a great deal of evidence showing racial biases helped catalyze and sustain
the trend toward mass incarceration (for a thorough review, see Alexander, 2012).
It is not immediately obvious, though, whether and how reform efforts aimed at
reversing that trend have affected the racial composition of America’s prisons and
jails (Friedman, 2015; Mauer and Ghandnoosh Center, 2014).
1
In this paper, we aim to answer three related questions: First, has decarceration
changed the racial composition of state prisoners?
2
Second, have local criminal
justice agencies responded to state-level reforms in ways that reduce or expand
racial disparities? Finally, what policies or practices might help explain recent
trends in state incarceration? Our analyses show little evidence that prison down-
sizing has reduced overall racial disproportionality. Despite sizable variation in the
extent of downsizing across states, as well as different strategies adopted by states
to reduce the incarcerated population, racial disparities remain stubbornly intact.
As a result, while downsizing efforts have reduced the size of some state prison
populations, they have done little to resolve the crisis of race in American criminal
justice.
Downsizing American prisons
Beginning in the 1970s, the rapid growth of incarceration represented a substantial
break with the norms and practices of other developed democracies, as well as with
America’s own history of punishment (Lerman and Weaver, 2014). A long line of
research has outlined dynamics related to crime rates, state budgets, social unrest,
partisan politics, changing urban economies, and income inequality, which togeth-
er help explain this rise in imprisonment (for a review, see Travis et al., 2014).
Along with these factors, the role of race in America emerges as central to nearly
668 Punishment & Society 24(4)
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