To harm criminals by a given amount, we have a wide choice of punishment methods. We can fine, dispossess, humiliate, torture, mutilate, enslave, imprison, exile, or kill. We can forbid them to go particular places, see particular people, or do particular things. The main considerations in choosing a punishment are: degree of harm, cost to impose, protect from future crimes, rehabilitation, and signaling our “civility.”
Now comparing these various options, the striking thing is that we most often choose prison, which is usually the most expensive way to create any given level of harm. No one believes prison rehabilitates, and we can prevent future crime just fine via exile, death, enslavement, or ankle monitors. But we’ve told ourselves that uncivilized people enjoy non-prison punishments too much, so we must signal our civility by harming criminals via prison. And not just any prisons mind you, but we think the only civil prisons are very expensive ones like we have, not those cheap dingy prisons you find in the third world. (Expensive prisons where most folks think rape is common, but never mind that.)
Of course poor nations can’t afford to punish via expensive prisons like ours – one source says we pay $22K/yr per prisoner. So our standards ensure poor nations simply cannot enter the realm of “civilized” nations, entitling us to treat those nations as uncivilized in other ways, such as by invading them as needed. I see little reason to believe that our use of prisons to punish criminals shows us to be more “civilized” in any other way than being more rich. But clearly most rich folks have found it in their interest to think otherwise.
Hanson está a favor de esclavizar a los criminales (subastarlos como mano de obra) para abaratar su coste de manutención. Yo también, pero para restituir a las víctimas.
