Resource: How Mainstream Reformers Design Ambitious Reentry Programs Doomed to Fail and Destined to Reinforce Targeted Mass Incarceration and Social Control

Ambitious reentry programs always have been the right and the wise thing to do. That is true, whether you regard yourself as hugely in favor of the "get tough on crime" (and its "War on Drugs") or hugely opposed. Among most militant opponents, and emphatically in my own view, reentry has always been the right and wise thing to do but absolutely never has been or will be a substitute for dramatically and immediately reducing mass incarceration and fundamentally altering the assumptions and aspirations of our criminal justice system. Even if you have come to accept that, "this is just what mainstream reformers do," even if you believe "that's the way the world works," acquiescence in the reproduction of the current state of affairs is its own indecent contribution to brutality. We can do away with mass incarceration and transform the criminal justice system. Even if we cannot, we ought to behave as if we can and contribute sweat equity to trying.