This post is part 3 of a 3 part series. Part 1: Recidivism: Is It a Real Thing? Part 2: Desistance from Crime: Is It a Real Thing?

“[S]ecuring long term change depends not just on how one sees oneself but also on how one is seen by others.” Fergus McNeill, Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research, University of Glasgow

Conventional American models of pathways out of crime emphasize recidivism and desistance — that is, attitudes, choices and behaviors of individuals who have been caught up in the criminal justice system. These emphases obscure the power of policies and institutional structures to criminalize people of color, low-income Americans, and men and women who live with mental health challenges, disabilities or physical, emotional or sexual abuse.

Drawing on my ongoing work with criminalized Massachusetts women — nearly all of whom struggle with poverty, illness and abuse, I believe that we need to move beyond assessing individuals in terms of recidivism or desistance from crime. Instead, it is time to turn local and national attention to policy steps that that can have positive consequences for the millions of people harmed by decades of mass incarceration.

In the following paragraphs I outline some of the steps I see as fundamental to shifting attention away from punishing individual failures to broadening access to the rights and opportunities that strengthen all families and communities.

Expunge Criminal Records

Criminal records create barriers to jobs, housing and student loans; that is, to nearly every opportunity to build a maneageable and satisfying life for oneself and one’s family. However, relatively few people manage to arrange to expunge their criminal records. Expungement practices vary from state to state, and often involve high costs and bureaucratic hurdles. As a consequence, only a minority of Americans who are eligible actually succeed in having their records expunged.

In the wake of decades of policies that have criminalized entire communities, we must move to making expungement the automatic, default practice. It should be free and should not require legal assistance. In particular cases where expungement may not be appropriate, the case against expungement should be based upon evidence presented by diverse community stakeholders and adjudicated by the court in a clear and transparent process. (For more on this issue see “Carceral Citizenship“).

De-criminalize Substance Mis/use

Mass incarceration in the United States has been powered by the so-called war on drugs (actually a war on certain subsets of drug users.) In order to end this shameful period in American history, substance mis/use must be de-coupled from the criminal justice system.

De-coupling necessarily involves public acknowledgement that substance mis/use (including alcohol mis/use) is a national problem requiring social and economic responses, long-term and evidence-based assistance for those who want and need it, elimination of practices such as constant urine-testing that set people up for probation or parole violation. De-coupling also must include eliminating “kinder” practices such as civil commitment, drug courts (where judges hold unchallenged power over participants) and hiring social workers to serve (typically in subordinate roles) in police departments.

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Most important, de-coupling must involve serious national soul searching into the reasons why so many Americans experience levels of pain and despair often associated with initiation of substance mis/use, and how we can enact policies that will counter this epidemic of pain and despair.

Housing and Jobs

Secure housing is a necessary platform for caring for one’s family, holding down a job, taking care of one’s health and planning for the future. A national commitment to providing all people with housing as a human right also reduces the vulnerability to violence and police attention arrest experienced by the women we have come to know and by millions of other Americans who lack safe, stable housing.

Secure housing and expungement of criminal records will make it possible for many people to participate in the labor market and pursue career advancement. Concurrently, development of large-scale jobs corps initiatives can offer opportunities for financial autonomy and a dignified role in community life for men and women whose personal circumstances do not fit current workforce standards or who struggle to find jobs during periods of high unemployment.

For those who cannot participate in the labor force, Social Security should provide sufficient funds to eliminate the need to augment government assistance checks with shoplifting or other illicit activities that keep many Americans in cycles of criminalization and recidivism.

The Right to Vote

At the current time, some six million Americans are disenfranchised because of former or current contact with the criminal justice system. In many cases, they have been stripped of their right to vote. In other cases, they may not know that they can vote or they may be afraid to vote due to (reasonable) reluctance to make themselves visible to government authorities.

(Re)enfranchisement of these Americans likely will encourage state and federal governments to abolish the policies that criminalize millions of Americans, locking them and their families and communities into long-term poverty and second-class status.

I am heartened to see increasing use of the designation “returning citizens” in place of stigmatizing terms such as “ex-con” or “former offender”. The City of Boston, for example, recently named a “Returning Citizens Department” to provide assistance to previously incarcerated people. At this time, it’s not yet clear whether this name change is cosmetic or foundational, but I am cautiously optimistic.

With a momentous election coming up in November, now is the time to pro-actively facilitate the true return to citizenship of the millions of Americans disenfranchised by poverty, racism and the misguided war on drug users.

For more on these issues see my recent article “Diminished Citizenship in the Age of Mass Incarceration“