Resolved: Rehabilitation ought to be valued above retribution in the United States criminal justice system.

Resolved: Rehabilitation ought to be valued above retribution in the United States criminal justice system. .......................................................................................................................................................... 1 SHORT ESSAY................................................................................................................................................. 3 DEFINITIONS.................................................................................................................................................. 4 AFFIRMATIVE ................................................................................................................................................ 6 Section 1: Sample Affirmative Case .......................................................................................................... 7 Section 2: Affirmative Evidence .............................................................................................................. 10 Rehabilitative Justice Lowers Recidivism ............................................................................................ 11 Retributive Justice Leads To High Prison Populations ........................................................................ 12 Retributive Justice Doesnt Work........................................................................................................ 13 Rehabilitative Justice Benefits Victims................................................................................................ 14 Rehabilitation Saves Offenders ........................................................................................................... 15 Rehabilitation Is Cost Effective ........................................................................................................... 16 NEGATIVE .................................................................................................................................................... 17 Section 1: Sample Negative Case ............................................................................................................ 18 Section 2: Negative Evidence .................................................................................................................. 21 Retribution Is Popular ......................................................................................................................... 22 Retribution A Key Part Of Punishment ............................................................................................... 23 Retribution Is Inherently Just .............................................................................................................. 24 Rehabilitation Studies Are Flawed ...................................................................................................... 25 Rehabilitation Undermines Punishment ............................................................................................. 26 Rehabilitation Programs Dont Work .................................................................................................. 27

SHORT ESSAY
This resolution asks debaters to interrogate an important element of domestic policy: the criminal justice system, which includes everything leading up to the arrest of a perpetrator through to their eventual punishment (often imprisonment), and whether or not the driving focus of criminal justice should be retribution or rehabilitation. Before we can begin to compare the two, we must first determine what each term means and entails within a system of law. Retribution essentially refers to the philosophy of an eye for an eye. Those who favor retribution wish to see criminals be punished proportionate to the damage they inflicted upon society and their victims. Retribution is distinct from restraint and deterrence, though it often results in them both. It is a very natural impulse to wish to harm an individual who brings harm to you, and the principle of vengeance has existed long before codified criminal justice systems. Rehabilitation, on the other hand, is much more willing to forgive criminals and instead works to reform them. The goal of rehabilitation is to remove the criminal element from a criminal and change them into a functioning, helpful member of society. This not only protects society from future harm, but also adds to society through additional good citizens. Rehabilitation in the criminal justice system can take many forms, ranging from drug counseling to education programs to vocational training in hopes of preparing inmates for jobs in the real world. Historically, the U.S. criminal justice system was organized around principles of rehabilitation from the early 1900s until the 1970s. Then, in the aftermath of the Vietnam War and the beginning of the War on Drugs, and as a result of studies showing that rehabilitation was unsuccessful as a strategy, it became politically and socially popular to advocate for a tough on crime approach. The shift to a retributive model of justice resulted in soaring incarceration rates. The United States now has the highest incarceration rate of any nation in the world, with over 1.5 million inmates in federal and state prisons. The majority of these inmates are young black males, and many of them are functionally illiterate. This means rehabilitation programs would be wise to focus on basic education programs. The prison population also poorly reflects the demographics outside of prison. On the affirmative, debaters will be well served by stressing that inmates are humans too, and deserve second chances and the opportunity to live a good, productive life. Many studies have been published suggesting that rehabilitation is an effective tool for many inmates, and not only reduces recidivism but also is able to reform prisoners into productive members of society. Another possibility is to focus on the potential damages of retributive justice. As the last 30 years have been the purview of retributive justice, it is not difficult to find experts and politicians arguing that retribution is a flawed method of punishment. It leads to high rates of recidivism and likely does not act as an effective deterrent either. Be ready to explain what type of rehabilitative programs you are advocating for, or at least have some idea of how you will fund all of this as programs tend to be very expensive in the short term and negative teams would be wise to ask. On the negative, one is fighting something of an uphill battle. An interesting strategy would be to critique the usage of value classifications using the philosophies of Nietzsche, suggesting that buying into values causes us to be slaves to dominant morality and removes value to life. In a more substantive vein, one should note that the negative neednt argue that retribution should be valued above rehabilitation, just that rehabilitation shouldnt be valued above retribution. Arguing that each should be valued equally will allow you to steal many of the positive benefits of the affirmatives defense of rehabilitation while advocating for a more balanced system. Then, you need only prove that retribution is in some way a positive part of the criminal justice system to win the debate. Retribution is beneficial for a number of reasons: it is publically popular, it removes criminals unfair advantages, and it affirms that individuals are responsible for their actions.

DEFINITIONS
Given that some terms in this debate have different definitions outside of a criminal justice context than in the abstract (i.e. rehabilitation, retribution), it is important to be very clear in your definitions and to pay close attention to the other sides in order to ensure there is no confusion in the debate round, and your point gets across as you intend it. Be sure you have a robust explanation of exactly what you mean by rehabilitation and retribution. Following are four terms that can and should be defined, followed by a discussion of their usage in the round. Ought Definition: used to express justice, moral rightness, or the like Source: Dictionary.com Definition: That which should be done, the obligatory; a statement using ought, expressing a moral imperative Source: Oxford English Dictionary Definition: used to express obligation Source: Merriam-Webster Discussion: The meaning of the term ought does not frequently change in most LD debates, but these different definitions can yield very different cases. The affirmative on this topic should consider choosing the first or second definition as the language is stronger and more easily tie in with a value of justice or a case that stresses the moral imperative of not subjecting prisoners retribution. The negative will likely be better served by the third definition as the language is less strong, though s/he should be able to argue within either of the other definitions as well.

Rehabilitation Definition: to restore to a former state (as of efficiency, good management, or solvency) Source: Merriam-Webster Definition: to restore to a condition of good health, ability to work, or the like Source: Dictionary.com Discussion: Either of these definitions would work fine in the debate round, but it is important to clarify exactly what you mean by rehabilitation within the context of debate. That may mean providing examples of what rehabilitation programs look like, or how a criminal justice system would go about providing more of these services. Have some idea of what the world will look like after your case goes into effect as you will likely be asked by the other side. Retribution

Definition: requital according to merits or deserts, especially for evil. Source: Dictionary.com Definition: something given or exacted in recompense; especially : punishment Source: Merriam-Webster Discussion: Again, either of these definitions would work fine, but you should clarify what retribution means within the context of the criminal justice system. Explain that retribution means a focus on punishment. It may be helpful to define rehabilitation and retribution, then discuss the two in opposition to each other for clarity.

Criminal justice system Definition: a series of organizations involved in apprehending, prosecuting, defending, sentencing, and jailing those involved in crimes - including law enforcement, attorneys, judges, courts of law, prisons Source: Dictionary.com Discussion: This definition may not be entirely necessary, but it is important to note that the criminal justice system encompasses more than just the prison system, and includes all elements of the arrest, trial, and incarceration processes.

AFFIRMATIVE

Section 1: Sample Affirmative Case

Hello ladies and gentlemen. I would like to begin by extending a quick round of thank yous to all involved. Today we are debating the resolution: Resolved: Rehabilitation ought to be valued above retribution in the United States criminal justice system. Before presenting my value, criterion, and contentions, I will clarify a few of the key terms in todays debate. I define ought as used to express justice, moral rightness, or the like, and criminal justice system as a series of organizations involved in apprehending, prosecuting, defending, sentencing, and jailing those involved in crimes - including law enforcement, attorneys, judges, courts of law, prisons Rehabilitation and retribution have distinct meanings within the criminal justice system. Rehabilitation refers to a system of justice whose primary goal is to reform a criminal into a functional member of society. Retribution is perhaps best defined by the axiom an eye for an eye, that is to say, the purpose of retribution is to enact punishment on an individual in proportion to the wrong they have committed. Value: humanitarianism My value for todays debate round is humanitarianism. I believe the only way for society to progress peacefully is for every individual to put a personal emphasis on humanitarianism. Whichever team best upholds an attitude that professes, within reason, understanding and compassion for their fellow man should win this debate. This is especially true on this topic, as we are discussing the treatment of living individuals. Criterion: utilitarianism My criterion for this debate round is utilitarianism, essentially, cost-benefit analysis. Whichever team is able to provide the greatest amount of good for the greatest number of people should win this debate round. Contention 1: Retributive Justice Doesnt Work For far too long, this country has been locked in an outdated mindset that espouses the benefits of retributive justice. In the 1970s, a major shift in the criminal justice system occurred, switching away from rehabilitation towards a tough-on-crime stance. This has resulted in a massive increase in prison populations and no reduction in the crime rate: Etienne Benson, Monitor Staff, July 2003 Rehabilitate or Punish? American Psychological Association Volume 34, No. 7, p. 46 http://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug03/rehab.aspx Until the mid-1970s, rehabilitation was a key part of U.S. prison policy. Prisoners were encouraged to develop occupational skills and to resolve psychological problems--such as substance abuse or aggression--that might interfere with their reintegration into society. Indeed, many inmates received court sentences that mandated treatment for such problems. Since then, however, rehabilitation has taken a back seat to a "get tough on crime" approach that sees punishment as prison's main function, says Haney. The approach has created explosive growth in the prison population, while having at most a modest effect on crime rates. As a result, the United States now has more than 2 million people in prisons or jails--the equivalent of one in every 142 U.S. residents--and another four to five million people on probation or parole. A higher percentage of the population is involved in the criminal justice system in the United States than in any other developed country.

It is clearly time for a change. The current model of prison system is destructive. It creates more crime than it prevents, as it crowds more and more people into an environment that should be reserved for the very worst among us. Instead, it allows these worst people to mingle with those who could be reformed and allows the latter to learn additional criminal tactics and behaviors. This causes the American public to label all prisoners as unsavory elements of society, to be locked away and forgotten. But these prisoners come back out into society, and do even more damage, as the majority of prisoners will re-offend. This does not serve humanitarian ends, it only serves to break down communities and create victims. Contention 2: Rehabilitation Lowers Recidivism Luckily, there is another way. Focusing the criminal justice system on rehabilitation will allow the American public, and its criminal justice system, to see prisoners as people, not monsters, and allow them to successfully reintegrate into society as productive members. In rehabilitation programs, prisoners are able to learn new skills that will let them get jobs so when they are released from prison, they do not need to return to a life of crime. In Norway, when the prison system shifted to rehabilitative justice, the decline in recidivism was whopping William Lee Adams, Time Reporter, May 10 2010 Norway Builds the World's Most Humane Prison, Time Magazine http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1986002,00.html#ixzz1XqPuw1nI Halden, Norway's second largest prison, with a capacity of 252 inmates, opened on April 8. It embodies the guiding principles of the country's penal system: that repressive prisons do not work and that treating prisoners humanely boosts their chances of reintegrating into society. "When they arrive, many of them are in bad shape," Hoidal says, noting that Halden houses drug dealers, murderers and rapists, among others. "We want to build them up, give them confidence through education and work and have them leave as better people." Countries track recidivism rates differently, but even an imperfect comparison suggests the Norwegian model works. Within two years of their release, 20% of Norway's prisoners end up back in jail. In the U.K. and the U.S., the figure hovers between 50% and 60%.

This model could easily be followed in the United States. Lower recidivism means less people committing crimes, which means less danger to the safety of the American people. Additionally, rehabilitation has the ability to benefit communities by adding productive members John Hayes, British Minister of State Department for Business Innovation and Skills, and Crispin Blunt, Undersecretary of State Department of Justice, May 2011 Making Prisons Work: Skills For Rehabilitation, Ministry of Justice Report, http://www.bis.gov.uk/assets/biscore/further-education-skills/docs/m/11-828-making-prisons-workskills-for-rehabilitation.pdf As the changes to the way prisoners work come on stream, they will bring major opportunities. A prison that is a place of work and industry will instil in offenders the disciplines of working life: order, timekeeping, working to deadlines, being managed and overseen. These are skills that employers want for they comprise the elements of responsibility which make lives normal. When allied to vocational skills, ex-offenders who have gained these life-skills the fabric of responsibility - become more attractive potential employees and better husbands, parents, neighbours and friends.

This serves humanitarian ends by building communities and reducing crime rates. Contention 3: rehabilitation is cost effective Many opponents of rehabilitation argue that it is prohibitively expensive. This is untrue. What IS prohibitively expensive is the current system, because not only do prisoners need to be arrested, processed, and held once, the majority of them come through the system two, three, or four times. This puts a massive burden on taxpayers. A study in Britain showed massive savings possible by shifting to rehabilitative programs John Hayes, British Minister of State Department for Business Innovation and Skills, and Crispin Blunt, Undersecretary of State Department of Justice, May 2011 Making Prisons Work: Skills For Rehabilitation, Ministry of Justice Report, http://www.bis.gov.uk/assets/biscore/further-education-skills/docs/m/11-828-making-prisons-workskills-for-rehabilitation.pdf Re-offending blights lives and communities, as well as carrying significant social and economic costs: the National Audit Office assessed the cost of re-offending by recent prisoners in 2007-08 as between 9.5 billion and 13 billion a year. Around half of all crime is committed by people who have already been convicted of a criminal offence. Improving the skills of offenders, focussed on the requirements of real jobs, is critical to reducing re-offending, alongside addressing other factors that drive crime such as substance misuse, mental health issues, poor accommodation, family issues and poverty. Evidence shows that prison education and vocational interventions produce a net benefit to the public sector ranging from 2,000 to 28,000 per offender (or from 10,500 to 97,000 per offender when victim costs are included): we are determined to secure those savings for the public purse.

These savings could be put into other programs, such as schools or health care, that would benefit humanitarian aims of communities far more than incarceration. Because retribution simply doesnt work, rehabilitation offers an effective second chance for offenders and is cost effective, I urge an affirmative ballot in todays debate.

Section 2: Affirmative Evidence

Rehabilitative Justice Lowers Recidivism

Norways Rehabilitation Focus Leads to Low Recidivism William Lee Adams, Time Reporter, May 10 2010
Norway Builds the World's Most Humane Prison, Time Magazine http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1986002,00.html#ixzz1XqPuw1nI Halden, Norway's second largest prison, with a capacity of 252 inmates, opened on April 8. It embodies the guiding principles of the country's penal system: that repressive prisons do not work and that treating prisoners humanely boosts their chances of reintegrating into society. "When they arrive, many of them are in bad shape," Hoidal says, noting that Halden houses drug dealers, murderers and rapists, among others. "We want to build them up, give them confidence through education and work and have them leave as better people." Countries track recidivism rates differently, but even an imperfect comparison suggests the Norwegian model works. Within two years of their release, 20% of Norway's prisoners end up back in jail. In the U.K. and the U.S., the figure hovers between 50% and 60%.

Comprehensive Review of Metaanalyses Confirms Rehab Lowers Recidivism Francis T. Cullen, Distinguished Research Professor of Criminal Justice with the University of Cincinnati, and Paul Gendreau, Director, Centre for Criminal Justice Studies, 2000.
Assessing Correctional Rehabilitation: Policy, Practice, and Prospects, Criminal Justice, http://learn.uci.edu/media/SP06/99015/Assess%20Rehab%20Cullen%2003d.pdf Losel has conducted the most comprehensive assessment of the metaanalyses of offender rehabilitation programs. In a review of 13 meta-analyses published between 1985 and 1995, Losel found that the mean effect size ranged from a low of 0.05 to a high of 0.18. This finding has been confirmed in an updated review by Redondo, Sanchez-Meca, and Garrido. The consistency of the positive effect of treatment in these meta-analyses is important because it suggests that this result, at least in broad terms, is not dependent on the sample of studies selected and coding decisions made by individual authors. Indeed, even meta-analyses conducted by scholars unsympathetic to rehabilitation produced positive effects (see Whitehead and Lab 1989). Losel estimates that across all the meta-analyses, the mean effect size of all assessed studies probably has a size of about 0.10. Using Rosenthals BESD statistic, this would mean that the recidivism rate for the treatment group would be 45 percent, while the rate for the control group would be 55 percent.

No Evidence Rehabilitation Doesnt Work Francis T. Cullen, Distinguished Research Professor of Criminal Justice with the University of Cincinnati, and Paul Gendreau, Director, Centre for Criminal Justice Studies, 2000.
Assessing Correctional Rehabilitation: Policy, Practice, and Prospects, Criminal Justice, http://learn.uci.edu/media/SP06/99015/Assess%20Rehab%20Cullen%2003d.pdf In all cases, a positive effect size was reported. There was a tendency, however, for the treatment effect size for offender interventions to be lower than that for interventions targeting other outcomes for change. The lower effect size may reflect the difficulty of changing antisocial conduct and/or the lower quality of interventions with offenders. Still, it is instructive to reiterate that every meta-analysis of offender treatment indicated that programs, in the aggregate, reduced problem behavior. As such, there is no evidence that offenders cannot be rehabilitated.

Retributive Justice Leads To High Prison Populations

Retribution Switch Increased Populations Etienne Benson, Monitor Staff, July 2003
Rehabilitate or Punish? American Psychological Association Volume 34, No. 7, p. 46 http://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug03/rehab.aspx Until the mid-1970s, rehabilitation was a key part of U.S. prison policy. Prisoners were encouraged to develop occupational skills and to resolve psychological problems--such as substance abuse or aggression--that might interfere with their reintegration into society. Indeed, many inmates received court sentences that mandated treatment for such problems. Since then, however, rehabilitation has taken a back seat to a "get tough on crime" approach that sees punishment as prison's main function, says Haney. The approach has created explosive growth in the prison population, while having at most a modest effect on crime rates. As a result, the United States now has more than 2 million people in prisons or jails--the equivalent of one in every 142 U.S. residents--and another four to five million people on probation or parole. A higher percentage of the population is involved in the criminal justice system in the United States than in any other developed country.

Retribution Often Leads To Greater Juvenile Delinquency William Bradshaw, PhD University of Minnesota, and David Roseborough, MSW University of St. Thomas December 2005 Restorative Justice Dialogue: The Impact of Mediation and Conferencing on
Juvenile Recidivism, Federal Probation Journal Volume 69 No. 2 Traditionally, the juvenile justice system in the United States has been dominated by two different approaches in responding to juvenile offenses, the retributive justice model and the rehabilitation or treatment model. The retributive model defines a juvenile offense as a crime against the state and the state provides suitable punishment to the offender. The assumption of the retributive model is that punishment will deter future offenses. However, the retributive model often creates situations that increase the likelihood of further delinquent activity. The juvenile offender is also at high risk of lowered educational and occupational opportunities and delinquent behavior is a strong predictor that the offender himself will be victimized.

Retribution Increases Likelihood Of Recidivism Russ Fry, retired probation officer and residential counselor, 2010
What Is Corrections For? Back To Basics, National Institute of Corrections, www. community.nicic.gov Furthermore, research suggests that it is not the severity of the penalty involved that creates deterrence in offenders, it is the perception of whether they will be caught or not that swings their decision. Severe punishment does not reduce crime through a deterrence effect. In fact: In brief, if the type and severity of official punishment has any effect on recidivism, it appears to be that less is better than more. (Andrews, D., Bonta, J.) But, what about punishment as a sanction for the violations of correctional rules. Does that work as a deterrent? What the emerging research shows is that swift, certain, consistent and short-term sanctions increase rule compliance. Harsher sanctions, on the other hand, increase compliance temporarily, but tend to result in an escalation in violations, as well as increase the likelihood of eventual recidivism .

Retributive Justice Doesnt Work

Retribution Doesnt Deter Criminals Hal Sperling, chairman of the Crime and Justice Reform Committee in Australia, June 4th 2010
Retribution a failed strategy in cutting crime, The Australian with The Wall Street Journal http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/legal-affairs/retribution-a-failed-strategy-in-cuttingcrime/story-e6frg97x-1225875230627 Imprison X for harming Y and what have you achieved if all you get out of it is retribution? The satisfaction of retributive sentiment, yes, but X, on the stats, will be apprehended for another jailable offence within two years or so of their release. Their imprisonment will have done very little, if anything, to make the community safer. It may have done more harm than good in the long run. And at huge cost (more than $70,000 a year, not counting the capital cost of prisons). It seems retribution does not have such a hold on people as may have been thought. Studies in Britain indicate that people are much more interested in having a fair and transparent criminal justice system, and in offenders making recompense, than they are in punishment. An extensive and visible community service program would go a long way towards satisfying such expectations. A moment's thought is sufficient to know that a heavier regime of sentencing makes no difference in deterring the prospective offender. What offender would know that the likely penalty for housebreaking or stealing a car would, in their case, be four years in jail rather than two years, particularly with 80 per cent of crime being alcohol- or drug-related?

Californias Failure to Stop Crime a Result of Retribution Erich Wilson, Law Student at Northwestern California University, 2010
Revolving Door and the Recidivist - Commentary on the California Justice System, Ezinearticles.com http://ezinearticles.com/?Revolving-Door-and-the-Recidivist---Commentary-on-the-California-JusticeSystem&id=4501674 A vast number of crimes are committed by a small number of felons known as career criminals. California studies have suggested that 60% of persons arrested for robbery have a prior felony conviction. It has been theorized that Section 667 of the California Penal Code is not in harmony with the generally accepted supposition of punishment under the rehabilitation theory; therefore, California's system of law and order hinders rather than aids the assimilation of the recidivist back into society. California's expansive failure in preventing further criminal activity from repeat offenders can be directly attributed to the system of justice based on the retributive theory currently in place.

Get-Tough Policies Empirically Fail Michael S. Gelacak, former Vice Chairman of the United States Sentencing Commission, 2000
Retribution Fails Reality Test, Razorwire Jan/Feb 2000 http://www.november.org/razorwire/rzold/16/16001.html The sad reality is that even in the face of this fantastic economic prosperity, we have more people involved with drugs than we did when we instituted these draconian sentences. That is a simple fact. There is nothing new about get-tough policies. We have tried all this before and only to watch it failjust as it has today. The only thing we are succeeding at is incarcerating greater numbers of our citizens.

Rehabilitative Justice Benefits Victims

Restorative Justice Repairs Breach In Moral Trust Tom OConnor, Doctor, August 31st 2010
Retributive and Restorative Justice, MegaLinks in Criminal Justice http://drtomoconnor.com/3300/3300lect03b.htm A more salient issue is how much support can a victim expect from the criminal justice system? As we've seen, the retributivist approach to criminal offenders is to simply punish them and leave whatever regret or remorse is theirs up to them. A restorative approach would seek for the offender to achieve regret or remorse, and this is precisely the point at which retribution ends and restorative justice begins. Putting victims first, or taking victim's rights seriously, requires restorative justice. Retribution can only go so far, and might only justify limited victim assistance services (such as police escorts to court or police sensitivity training). In the extreme, retributivism might support, albeit reluctantly, victim compensation programs. Restorative justice usually requires the offender and victim confront one another in some way as well as see that the victims obtains some compensation or means of being make "whole" again. The whole idea of restorative justice is to repair the breach in moral trust and establish lasting peace instead of lasting hurt, regret, or conflict.

Rehabilitation Benefits Communities Peter Raynor, Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Swansea University, and Gwen Robinson, Senior Lecturer in Criminal Justice at Sheffield University, 2009
Why Help Offenders? Arguments for Rehabilitation as a Penal Strategy, European Journal of Probation Volume 1 No. 1 http://www.ejprob.ro/uploads_ro/677/PRGR.pdf Such approaches are associated particularly with advocates of restorative justice who believe that reintegrative processes can help offenders to atone for or make reparation for their offences at the same time as helping offenders and victims to learn something of each other. The aim is the restoration or establishment of social bonds that will both offer the offender membership of a community and consequently strengthen informal controls over his or her behaviour. Whilst some of these ideas are more usually found in discussions of restorative justice rather than rehabilitation, the fact that offenders involved in restorative procedures are meant to learn a social lesson which will influence their future behaviour, places them also under the heading of rehabilitation.

Ex-Offenders Gain Life Skills John Hayes, British Minister of State Department for Business Innovation and Skills, and Crispin Blunt, Undersecretary of State Department of Justice, May 2011
Making Prisons Work: Skills For Rehabilitation, Ministry of Justice Report, http://www.bis.gov.uk/assets/biscore/further-education-skills/docs/m/11-828-making-prisons-workskills-for-rehabilitation.pdf As the changes to the way prisoners work come on stream, they will bring major opportunities. A prison that is a place of work and industry will instil in offenders the disciplines of working life: order, timekeeping, working to deadlines, being managed and overseen. These are skills that employers want for they comprise the elements of responsibility which make lives normal. When allied to vocational skills, ex-offenders who have gained these life-skills the fabric of responsibility - become more attractive potential employees and better husbands, parents, neighbours and friends.

Rehabilitation Saves Offenders

Hawaiian Prison System Would Benefit From Rehabilitation Lorenn Walker, reporter, December 21st 2009
Rehabilitation saves lives, money, Honolulu Advertiser http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2009/Dec/21/op/hawaii912210304.html Our prison system faces a crisis and wastes not only financial but human resources. Our current financial crisis could be used to improve our economy, as well as our community's well being, by working to rehabilitate imprisoned people and heal victims of crime. Current recidivism data show that people who serve their entire sentence in our state prisons have higher recidivism rates than people on parole or probation. About 60 percent of the people in prison who serve their whole sentence are back in prison or rearrested within three years, while people paroled and on probation have a recidivism rate of about 50 percent. The recidivism rate for federally supervised probationers is significantly lower than the state's rate. Hawai'i's chief federal probation officer, Rich Crawford, says the lower federal rate is probably because federal probation offices receive funding "to support assessment, treatment and rehabilitation" related to substance abuse, mental health, and sex offenses.

Rehabilitation Builds Strong Community Members, Lowers Recidivism Orson Aguilar, former inmate and reporter, February 18th 2010
Prison Rehab Saved Me, San Francisco Chronicle http://www.greenlining.org/news/in-the-news/2010/prison-rehab-saved-me Rehabilitation programs work. A study of 33 educational, vocational and work programs for prisoners published in 2000 in the Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency found that participants were more than 20 percent less likely to re-offend than non-participants. Prison drug treatment programs have similar success rates. Every prisoner who is helped to become a productive citizen equals saved tax dollars and innocent members of the community who wont become crime victims. But we dont have nearly enough of these programs, even before the new budget cuts. A 2009 grand jury report on the California State Prison Solano in Vacaville found a long list of inmates waiting to get into Prison Industry Authority programs that provide work experience prisoners who want help preparing for legitimate jobs, but who arent receiving it. As a result, California prisoners have the nations highest recidivism rate: 70 percent, more than twice the rate of New York.

Kansas City Program Saved Offenders, Forces Them To Take Responsibility Lewis Duguid, reporter, June 2012
Program helps prisoners turn their lives around, Kansas City Star http://voices.kansascity.com/entries/program-helps-prisoners-turn-their-lives-around/ Burton, who emceed the gathering last month and plans to study at St. Pauls School of Theology, was among the men who stressed the programs three cost savings: It kept ex-offenders from returning to prison, saved the state the cost of their re-incarceration and it prevented society from having to care for new victims. The Intensive Therapeutic Community works because it isolates the men from the rest of the population, adds regime and discipline to their day, forces the men to take ownership for their problems and those that they caused, and treats their criminal mentality as much as their addiction.

Rehabilitation Is Cost Effective

California Could Save Millions With Rehab Programs Nancy Vogel, Times Staff Writer, June 20th 2007
Rehab in prison can cut costs, report says, LA Times http://articles.latimes.com/2007/jun/30/local/me-prisons30 Until California eases prison overcrowding, it can't slow the revolving prison doors that return roughly 70% of freed inmates within a year, national experts reported to the Legislature on Friday. Their analysis of why California is among the worst in the nation at keeping ex-convicts out of prison concludes that jam-packed conditions prevent prison officials from offering drug and alcohol addiction treatment, anger management classes and job training -- steps to help keep felons from committing more crimes.*+ If California were to follow all of the report's recommendations, according to the authors, the state could eventually save between $561 million and $684 million a year on a reduced inmate population. California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation Director James Tilton embraced the report. He says that he doesn't have the money in his budget to do all it suggests but that he intends to launch pilot programs in a few prisons to prove that targeted rehabilitation programs work. The public assumes, Tilton said, that "inmates go to prison, they sit on a bunk out in the desert somewhere and never come back." "That's not the facts," he said. "People come back. Over 90% of these inmates come back to communities.... And we can do a better job."

British Studies Show Major Savings From Education In Prisons John Hayes, British Minister of State Department for Business Innovation and Skills, and Crispin Blunt, Undersecretary of State Department of Justice, May 2011
Making Prisons Work: Skills For Rehabilitation, Ministry of Justice Report, http://www.bis.gov.uk/assets/biscore/further-education-skills/docs/m/11-828-making-prisons-workskills-for-rehabilitation.pdf Re-offending blights lives and communities, as well as carrying significant social and economic costs: the National Audit Office assessed the cost of re-offending by recent prisoners in 2007-08 as between 9.5 billion and 13 billion a year. Around half of all crime is committed by people who have already been convicted of a criminal offence. Improving the skills of offenders, focussed on the requirements of real jobs, is critical to reducing re-offending, alongside addressing other factors that drive crime such as substance misuse, mental health issues, poor accommodation, family issues and poverty. Evidence shows that prison education and vocational interventions produce a net benefit to the public sector ranging from 2,000 to 28,000 per offender (or from 10,500 to 97,000 per offender when victim costs are included): we are determined to secure those savings for the public purse.

Costs of Delinquent Youth Minimized Francis T. Cullen, Distinguished Research Professor of Criminal Justice with the University of Cincinnati, and Paul Gendreau, Director, Centre for Criminal Justice Studies, 2000.
Assessing Correctional Rehabilitation: Policy, Practice, and Prospects, Criminal Justice, http://learn.uci.edu/media/SP06/99015/Assess%20Rehab%20Cullen%2003d.pdf In short, when lumped together, interventions reduced criminal involvement; and when the best programs were singled out, the crime savings were substantial. According to Lipsey and Wilson, the reduction in recidivism is an accomplishment of considerable practical value in terms of the expense and social damage associated with the delinquent behavior of these juveniles.

NEGATIVE

Section 1: Sample Negative Case

Hello ladies and gentlemen, I would like to begin by thanking my opponent and the judge for being here today. I am here to negate the resolution: Resolved: Rehabilitation ought to be valued above retribution in the United States criminal justice system. Before I present my value, criterion, and contentions, I have a few words of resolutional analysis. The debate resolution clearly reads that rehabilitation ought to be valued above retribution. It is therefore the burden of the affirmative to prove that rehabilitation is more valuable than retribution. It is not the negatives burden to prove the reverse is true, only to prove that rehabilitation should not be valued above retribution. In todays debate round, I will argue that both rehabilitation and retribution are valuable components of the criminal justice system, and neither should be sacrificed for the other as the affirmative suggests.

Value: Justice My value in todays debate round is justice. At the core of the principle of justice is the idea that every individual should be meted out his or her just deserts. When an individual chooses to break a law, they are violating codified moral standards agreed upon by society. It is only just that they receive some form of punishment for their actions. Criterion: Utilitarianism My criterion in todays debate round is utilitarianism. Whichever debater can provide the greatest amount of good to the greatest number of people through their value should win this debate round. Contention 1: Rehabilitation undermines punishment When one violates a law, it is expected and correct that they be punished. A system based entirely on rehabilitation removes personal responsibility from the criminal by assuming there is something wrong with them that needs to be cured by the state so they can return to society as fully functioning individuals. This removes any disincentive to commit crimes, as criminals know they will enter into a program where they are taught new skills and learn new things. It is important to have some elements of retribution in any prison system to provide this deterrent and reinforce that what criminals did was wrong. Rehabilitation also strips individuals of their autonomy, only retribution allows people to be responsible for what they did: Charles H. Logan, University of Connecticut, and Gerald Gaes, Federal Bureau of Prisons, June 1993 Meta-Analysis and the Rehabilitation of Punishment, Justice Quarterly Volume 10, No. 2 http://www.bop.gov/news/research_projects/published_reports/cond_envir/oreprlogangaes.pdf As punishment, imprisonment conveys an important cultural message, but if the official mission of a prison is defined simultaneously as both punishment and rehabilitation conflicting and confusing messages are transmitted both inside and outside the prison walls. Inside the walls, such a definition conveys a message of rights without responsibility. When a prison system is mandated in its mission statement to attempt rehabilitation, or even merely to provide opportunities and resources for selfimprovement, that mandate creates for inmates a legitimate claim (a right) to personally beneficial services. At the same time, it undermines inmates' accountability by defining them, like children, as insufficiently developed and disadvantaged persons for whose future behavior society must take

some responsibility. Whereas imprisonment as punishment defines inmates as responsible for their past behavior, and whereas discipline within prison defines inmates as accountable for their current behavior, rehabilitation as a goal of the system defines inmates as not fully responsible for their future behavior. Rehabilitation teaches a prisoner that it is really the fault of society that they turned out the way they did. More structure than that is needed, and for that I urge that justice be served and retribution be included equally in the prison system.

Contention 2: Rehabilitation Doesnt Work Rehabilitation, while it sounds good, simply wont work on the broad scale that the affirmative advocates. The majority, if not all, of the studies they quote espousing the benefits of rehabilitation are measuring recidivism after VOLUNTARY rehabilitation programs. When the entire system favors rehabilitation, it means every inmate will be brought through a rehabilitation program, not just those who have already chosen the path of reformation. This will skew recidivism statistics and confer benefits on individuals who have no desire to actually reform. Additionally, rehabilitation programs fail to target the root cause of crime: John Del Rosario, reporter, August 11th 2010 Diagnosing crime: The failures of rehabilitation in the justice system, Borderzine.com http://borderzine.com/2010/08/diagnosing-crime-the-failures-of-rehabilitation-in-the-justice-system/ Cortez, 23, is a rare exception to rehabilitation. Currently back in El Paso, he attributes his recovery to the strong support he has from his family. He says that a large part of recidivism lies in certain factors of prisoners lives that the justice system can do very little, if anything, to control. He refers to an anxiety of living a normal life, saying, You try and go back to society and you get tired of the same thing. You find the easy way out. You make $1,500 selling dope. When you get out, theres no luck finding a job. Many prisoners, upon release, have no other choice but to return back to where they were before being incarcerated: the same environment, the same people, the same habits.

Criminals will be released, expected to be safe, and return to their old habits. This is not just as it will lead to even greater damages to an unsuspecting community of law-abiding citizens. Why should those citizens have to pay for a faulty system? Contention 3: Retribution is a key part of punishment Retribution helps to level the playing field. After a crime is committed, there is an unfair imbalance created by one individual having wounded another without having to pay for their crime. Retribution allows the balance sheet to return to zero: Miriam Rodgers, Doctorate of Philosophy Candidate at Oxford University, October 2009 On Retributive Justice, Oxford.academia.edu, http://oxford.academia.edu/MiriamRodgers/Papers/112975/On_Retributive_Justice Alternatively, the imposition of punishment on a deserving wrongdoer might satisfy a debt the wrongdoer owes society for the unfair advantage he secured for himself over the other members of society by his wrongdoing, which disrupted the just distribution of advantages and disadvantages in society. Proponents of this view argue that a criminal necessarily secures an unjust gain by permitting himself an excessive freedom of choosing and in the illicit satisfactions which the unsuccessful have

never had, and that that gain disrupts the previously just distribution of advantages and disadvantages in society. A criminals unfair gain is unfair or unjust , not merely to his victim, but to all those who have been obedient. According to this view, retributive justice then aims to correct this injustice and restore the fair balance of advantages and disadvantages in society which crime disturbs. The state can purportedly restore this fair balance by imposing punishment on criminals, ensuring they do not profit by their crimes and thereby adjusting criminals positions relative to their fellows. Retribution is the only way to correct the initial injustice. Otherwise, the injustice is allowed to stand, and even accepted by the state as an unfortunate precursor to a productive life. This simply is not the way it should be. For these reasons, I urge a negative ballot in todays debate round.

Section 2: Negative Evidence

Retribution Is Popular
Justice Has Great Normative Force Miriam Rodgers, Doctorate of Philosophy Candidate at Oxford University, October 2009
On Retributive Justice, Oxford.academia.edu, http://oxford.academia.edu/MiriamRodgers/Papers/112975/On_Retributive_Justice I have argued that justice is a virtue, a moral excellence that agents ought to exhibit. On all accounts, a cry for justice has great normative force. We vehemently object to perceived injustices, both on our own behalf and on the behalf of others. We rightly recognize that victims of injustice have been wronged in a special way. The raison dtre of justice is to prevent or correct injustice, and thus, doing justice makes the world a better, or at least no worse, place. To the extent that the intended consequence of some agents purportedly just act makes the world worse, the agent does not exhibit virtue and his conduct cannot properly be described as just.

Americans Support Death Penalty Pew Research Center, January 6th 2012
Continued Majority Support for Death Penalty, Pew Research Center for the People and the Press http://www.people-press.org/2012/01/06/continued-majority-support-for-death-penalty/ A survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press and the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, conducted Nov. 9-14, 2011, among 2,001 adults, finds that 62% favor the death penalty for people convicted of murder while 31% are opposed. That is generally in line with polling on the death penalty over the past several years. During the mid-1990s, when the Pew Research Center first surveyed on this issue, support for the death penalty was at a historic high point. In 1996, 78% favored capital punishment for people convicted of murder. Support for the death penalty subsequently declined, falling to 66% in 2001 and 62% in late 2005. Since then, support has mostly remained in the low-tomid-60s, though it dipped slightly (to 58%) in October 2011.

Popular Opinion Supports Prisons and Punishment Morgan Reynolds, National Center for Policy Analysis, October 2nd 2000
"Does Punishment Work To Reduce Crime," testimony before the House Committee on the Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=9444 The answer is obvious to most Americans -- yes, of course punishment reduces crime. Punishment converts criminal activity from a paying proposition to a nonpaying proposition, at least sometimes, and people respond accordingly. We all are aware of how similar incentives work in our lives, for example, choosing whether or not to drive faster than the law allows . . . Incentives matter, including the risks we are willing to run. This is only a commonsense observation about how people choose to behave . . . . Public opinion strongly supports the increased use of prisons to give criminals their just desserts. The endorsement of punishment is relatively uniform across all groups. More than three-quarters of the public see punishment as the primary justification for sentencing. More than 70 percent believe that incapacitation is the only sure way to prevent future crimes, and more than three-quarters believe that the courts are too easy on criminals. Three-quarters favor the death penalty for murder.

Retribution A Key Part Of Punishment

Retribution Removes Criminals Unfair Advantage Miriam Rodgers, Doctorate of Philosophy Candidate at Oxford University, October 2009
On Retributive Justice, Oxford.academia.edu, http://oxford.academia.edu/MiriamRodgers/Papers/112975/On_Retributive_Justice Alternatively, the imposition of punishment on a deserving wrongdoer might satisfy a debt the wrongdoer owes society for the unfair advantage he secured for himself over the other members of society by his wrongdoing, which disrupted the just distribution of advantages and disadvantages in society. Proponents of this view argue that a criminal necessarily secures an unjust gain by permitting himself an excessive freedom of choosing and in the illicit satisfactions which the unsuccessful have never had, and that that gain disrupts the previously just distribution of advantages and disadvantages in society. A criminals unfair gain is unfair or unjust , not merely to his victim, but to all those who have been obedient. According to this view, retributive justice then aims to correct this injustice and restore the fair balance of advantages and disadvantages in society which crime disturbs. The state can purportedly restore this fair balance by imposing punishment on criminals, ensuring they do not profit by their crimes and thereby adjusting criminals positions relative to their fellows.

Drug Offenders Need Punishment Rachel Hutzel, prosecutor, June 23rd 2009
Many drug offenders need punishment, not just treatment, Dayton Daily News http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/community/springboro/opinion-many-drug-offenders-needpunishment-not-just-treatment-174599.html Treatment, without punishment, is unfair to victims of drug-motivated crimes, such as that committed by Roxie Luff in a Warren County nursing home recently. Luff stole pain medication from elderly patients who suffered needlessly as a result of her drug addiction. Further, treatment is ineffective to deal with dealers such as Nicholas Lozier, convicted of dealing cocaine and ecstasy in Warren County. Many drug dealers like Lozier are businessmen, who profit enormously from the addiction of others. Lozier is a criminal who was, and should be, punished by the criminal justice system. Stanley Hall caused permanent brain damage to 2-year-old Marilyn while using drugs. It is not fair to Marilyn to simply treat her tormentor rather than to punish him. Many drug crimes should continue to be dealt with harshly. The people who are harmed by the selfish, destructive acts of drug users and drug dealers deserve nothing less.

Punishment Affirms Autonomy, Responsibility, and Dignity of the Individual Charles H. Logan, University of Connecticut, and Gerald Gaes, Federal Bureau of Prisons, June 1993
Meta-Analysis and the Rehabilitation of Punishment, Justice Quarterly Volume 10, No. 2 http://www.bop.gov/news/research_projects/published_reports/cond_envir/oreprlogangaes.pdf The stereotype of punishment as inherently cruel and inhumane is false and misleading, as is the stereotype of treatment as benevolent and humane. Those who suppose that rehabilitative treatment is intrinsically more humane than punishment have bought into a false dichotomy between punishment and "humanitarianism." It is precisely within the context of punishment, as opposed to treatment, that humanistic concepts are most relevant. Principled and fair punishment for wrongdoing treats individuals as persons and as human beings rather than as objects. Punishment is an affirmation of the autonomy, responsibility, and dignity of the individual; paternalistic rehabilitative treatment is a denial of all three.

Retribution Is Inherently Just

Retribution Includes Test Of Just Punishment Miriam Rodgers, Doctorate of Philosophy Candidate at Oxford University, October 2009
On Retributive Justice, Oxford.academia.edu, http://oxford.academia.edu/MiriamRodgers/Papers/112975/On_Retributive_Justice The Retributivist claim is that retributive justice calls on a court to punish an individual if he is guilty of committing a crime because criminals deserve to be punished for their crimes; the just punishment claim is that an individuals punishment for a crime can only be just if he is guilty of committing that crime. The two claims are distinct, but compatible. The Retributivist claim is positive and the just punishment claim is negative: the latter recommends that courts punish criminals on the grounds of their negative desert while the former prohibits courts from punishing innocents, irrespective of the reasons that count in favor of punishing. If sound, the Retributivist claim must entail the just punishment claim because negative desert may soundly ground the imposition of punishment on some D only when D deserves to suffer for her wrongdoing.

Retributive Justice Helps Justify Legal Punishment Miriam Rodgers, Doctorate of Philosophy Candidate at Oxford University, October 2009
On Retributive Justice, Oxford.academia.edu, http://oxford.academia.edu/MiriamRodgers/Papers/112975/On_Retributive_Justice when punishment is unjustified, punishment cannot be justly allocated on grounds of negative desert or otherwise. In other words, retributive justice either helps justify legal punishment and grounds its proper allocation, or it does not have anything to do with the justice of punishment. The Retributivist must claim that principles of retributive justice give courts a positive reason to punish criminals for their crimes because they deserve it. In my terminology, Retributivism suggests that retributive justice operates as what this paper will identify as a mode or form of justice, that is, a distinct way agents, including courts, make just judgments.

Rehabilitation Does Not Imply Humane Treatment Charles H. Logan, University of Connecticut, and Gerald Gaes, Federal Bureau of Prisons, June 1993
Meta-Analysis and the Rehabilitation of Punishment, Justice Quarterly Volume 10, No. 2 http://www.bop.gov/news/research_projects/published_reports/cond_envir/oreprlogangaes.pdf Rehabilitation raises the question of whether it is society's obligation to transform the inmate into a law-abiding citizen, not whether it is society's duty to treat the inmate humanely. None of the purposes of punishment directly defines a state's obligation to care for inmates. In fact, almost any justification of punishment might be interpreted to imply conditions that range from the brutal to the benign. Rehabilitation in some of its paternalistic forms is just as coercive as other justifications . Inmates may well be "encouraged," or "persuaded" into treatment against their wishes. Retribution, often associated with harsh treatment, also can imply that a prolonged separation from society, proportional to the crime, is sufficient punishment, but that the prison climate must be safe and must offer enough amenities so that prison life is not inhumane.

Rehabilitation Studies Are Flawed

Meta-analysis Of Same Data Reaches Differing Conclusions Charles H. Logan, University of Connecticut, and Gerald Gaes, Federal Bureau of Prisons, June 1993
Meta-Analysis and the Rehabilitation of Punishment, Justice Quarterly Volume 10, No. 2 http://www.bop.gov/news/research_projects/published_reports/cond_envir/oreprlogangaes.pdf Meta-analysis is a legitimate research tool, but is easy to misuse. To be sure, meta-analysts are not deconstructionists who merely read into the literature whatever they please, but their technique imposes such demanding methodological requirements that it is difficult to conduct a meta-analysis which controls and adjusts for errors in the primary studies without introducing new errors and biases of its own. It is not surprising, then, that separate reviews and meta-analyses of research on the effectiveness of correctional rehabilitation programs reach differing conclusions and criticize each other's validity.

Meta-analysis Is Often Tautological Charles H. Logan, University of Connecticut, and Gerald Gaes, Federal Bureau of Prisons, June 1993
Meta-Analysis and the Rehabilitation of Punishment, Justice Quarterly Volume 10, No. 2 http://www.bop.gov/news/research_projects/published_reports/cond_envir/oreprlogangaes.pdf Separately, studies like these are perfectly legitimate, but they do not prove anything. They are tautological; they explain their results with after-the-fact hypotheses but do not test those explanations. What, then, if a meta-analysis of 100 studies finds, a significant relation between risk or responsivity or needs, on the one hand, and treatment effect, on the other? Could this metaanalysis be regarded as confirmatory--a summary of replications? Not necessarily. If the operational definitions of "risk" and "responsivity" and "needs" (the predictor variables) differ from study to study, we will learn nothing from a meta-analysis showing that treatment effect depends on these factors. Even if "risk" always were based, say, on prior record, at least two problems still could exist. First, the criterion of how long or how serious a record had to be in order to be "risky" still could be defined differently, and ex post facto, for each study; thus "risk" still would be tautological. Second, researchers typically do not report all the interactions they test; they tend to report only those that make a difference. Thus most of the negative evidence showing that treatment effects do not vary by level of risk goes unreported. A bias is thereby created in favor of the conclusion that treatment works , if only for cases in which risk makes a difference and therefore is reported.

California Prisons Cannot Evaluate Effectiveness of Rehabilitation Michael Montgomery, reporter, March 15th 2010
State unable to gauge effectiveness of prison rehab, California Watch http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/state-unable-gauge-effectiveness-prison-rehab-1386 The report also sheds light on another perennial problem in the state prison system: The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has no department-wide system to assess the effectiveness of educational and other rehabilitation programs and thus no data on whether specific programs in California can actually cut recidivism. A September 2009 report by the state auditor made a similar point: while Corrections' budget for its academic and vocational programs totaled more than $208 million in fiscal year 2008-09, it confirmed that its system for accessing, processing, and tracking inmate educational data is extremely inadequate, and therefore it is unable to determine the success of its programs in reducing the chance that inmates will return to prison once they are released.

Rehabilitation Undermines Punishment

Rehabilitation Not Purpose Of Criminal Law Miriam Rodgers, Doctorate of Philosophy Candidate at Oxford University, October 2009
On Retributive Justice, Oxford.academia.edu, http://oxford.academia.edu/MiriamRodgers/Papers/112975/On_Retributive_Justice Retributivists maintain that retributive justice is at least part of the point or justifying aim of legal punishment. However, they do not claim that retributive justice is the point or justifying aim of criminal law. The point of criminal law is to announce to society that certain conduct is prohibited, and thereby to inhibit such conduct. Primary criminal laws set standards of conduct prohibiting certain conduct; secondary criminal laws specify what officials or courts must or may do when the primary criminal laws are broken. These secondary laws are conditional norms that only bear on courts in the event that primary laws are violated. The criminal law would be perfectly satisfied if there were no violations of its primary laws, and thus nothing requiring satisfaction as a matter of retributive justice.

Rehabilitation Removes Responsibility of Criminals Charles H. Logan, University of Connecticut, and Gerald Gaes, Federal Bureau of Prisons, June 1993
Meta-Analysis and the Rehabilitation of Punishment, Justice Quarterly Volume 10, No. 2 http://www.bop.gov/news/research_projects/published_reports/cond_envir/oreprlogangaes.pdf As punishment, imprisonment conveys an important cultural message, but if the official mission of a prison is defined simultaneously as both punishment and rehabilitation conflicting and confusing messages are transmitted both inside and outside the prison walls. Inside the walls, such a definition conveys a message of rights without responsibility. When a prison system is mandated in its mission statement to attempt rehabilitation, or even merely to provide opportunities and resources for selfimprovement, that mandate creates for inmates a legitimate claim (a right) to personally beneficial services. At the same time, it undermines inmates' accountability by defining them, like children, as insufficiently developed and disadvantaged persons for whose future behavior society must take some responsibility. Whereas imprisonment as punishment defines inmates as responsible for their past behavior, and whereas discipline within prison defines inmates as accountable for their current behavior, rehabilitation as a goal of the system defines inmates as not fully responsible for their future behavior.

Rehabilitation Programs Confer Benefits on Those Who Dont Deserve Them Charles H. Logan, University of Connecticut, and Gerald Gaes, Federal Bureau of Prisons, June 1993
Meta-Analysis and the Rehabilitation of Punishment, Justice Quarterly Volume 10, No. 2 http://www.bop.gov/news/research_projects/published_reports/cond_envir/oreprlogangaes.pdf Prison rehabilitation programs, especially if they are successful, confer valuable but unearned benefits on the undeserving at the expense of law-abiding taxpayers. To benefit convicts thus on the grounds that they have violated the law and may do so again is, in effect, to reward extortion. As an alternative, one legitimately might argue that prisoners deserve certain kinds of help merely because they are human beings, or because they are citizens toward whom, merely as citizens, society has some obligations and in whom it has some investment. That rationale would be legitimate, but only to the same extent as it would apply to all other citizens. Thus rehabilitation programs are more justifiable outside than inside the criminal justice system.

Rehabilitation Programs Dont Work

California Rehabilitation Programs Ineffective Michael Montgomery, reporter, March 15th 2010
State unable to gauge effectiveness of prison rehab, California Watch http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/state-unable-gauge-effectiveness-prison-rehab-1386 The CDCRs Cate is no stranger to this issue. While at the helm of the inspector generals office in 2007, Cate excoriated the department of corrections over its substance abuse programs. Cate called spending on in-prison treatment since 1989 "a complete waste of money," and said prison officials kept expanding programs even though more than 20 reports said that the programs were failing. A CDCR spokesperson confirmed that the department has no recent data to show whether educational programs have cut recidivism rates. But department officials are defending the new substance abuse programs, pointing to a report from last September that showed a decline in recidivism among inmates who completed in-prison and community-based treatment programs. However, its unclear to what extent the programs conducted behind bars were responsible for the drop in recidivism. Heres why: The same survey also found that inmates who completed only in-prison treatment programs had a higher recidivism rate than the general convict population.

Rehabilitation Creates Cynicism, Resistance To Treatment Charles H. Logan, University of Connecticut, and Gerald Gaes, Federal Bureau of Prisons, June 1993
Meta-Analysis and the Rehabilitation of Punishment, Justice Quarterly Volume 10, No. 2 http://www.bop.gov/news/research_projects/published_reports/cond_envir/oreprlogangaes.pdf Rather than softening the pains of imprisonment, the rehabilitative goal may even add injustice to injury because it encourages individualized treatment, which undermines consistency and fairness . Individualized treatment requires discretion, which lends itself to abuse in the form of arbitrary and capricious distinctions. In pursuit of rehabilitation, offenders who have committed similar wrongs often are treated differently because of differences in personality, background, and social skills. Furthermore, when rehabilitative treatment is defined as an official goal of the agents and institutions of authority, then treatment, too, becomes paternalistic and authoritarian. The result is cynicism and resistance on the part of the intended beneficiaries.

Rehabilitation Fails To Target Root Causes John Del Rosario, reporter, August 11th 2010
Diagnosing crime: The failures of rehabilitation in the justice system, Borderzine.com http://borderzine.com/2010/08/diagnosing-crime-the-failures-of-rehabilitation-in-the-justice-system/ Cortez, 23, is a rare exception to rehabilitation. Currently back in El Paso, he attributes his recovery to the strong support he has from his family. He says that a large part of recidivism lies in certain factors of prisoners lives that the justice system can do very little, if anything, to control. He refers to an anxiety of living a normal life, saying, You try and go back to society and you get tired of the same thing. You find the easy way out. You make $1,500 selling dope. When you get out, theres no luck finding a job. Many prisoners, upon release, have no other choice but to return back to where they were before being incarcerated: the same environment, the same people, the same habits.