Community Corrections and Re-entry Article Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Community Corrections and Re-entry - Article Example The article identifies the two crucial labels of community corrections as parole and probation.  As one reads through the article, he,  or she gets to know that parole originated in Europe while probation originated in America in the mid-19th century.  However, these community-based sanctions became assimilated in the U.S. criminal justice system, in the  early  20th century, thanks to the medical model in correctional discourse. Despite all the criticisms, parole and  probation  became rooted in the  country’s correctional system, and by the end of the 20th century, their  growth  was  immeasurable. The failure of the rehabilitation  concept  did not go unnoticed because it  was followed  by the introduction of the new  penal  policy. This  penal  policy contributed to  low  performance  of community corrections  thus, an increase in prison capacity ant the need to reinvent community corrections. Finally, the authors of the articl e took a look at the future of community corrections and the prison  influence  with regards to serving all aspects of community needs and their relationship with  prison  institutions. Questions 1. What is the relationship between prisons and community corrections and how does this relationship influence community corrections? 2. ... However, no  recognizable  attempts  are being made  to reduce prison populations; or rather decarceration is still virgin territory. This article focuses on ways in which prison population in California can be reduced. As such, it concentrates on research on the causes of increased imprisonment during the last 30 years, and recent discussions of and efforts to reduce  imprisonment  in other states. There was a time when California’s prison population reduced. This was in the last two years of  governor  Reagan’s first  term, and the first two years of his second term(1968-1972). During this time, the rate of  imprisonment  in the rest the U.S. increased while that of California dropped. The authors of the  article  came up with  contemporary  explanations of the  imprisonment  reduction which included; the Reagan factor, and  multiple  factors (probation subsidies and changes in parole procedures). To explain the causes of the Reag an-Era Reduction in Imprisonment, they insisted on a drop in crime rates, a  reduction  in arrests, sending offenders to jail and not  prison, fewer admissions to prison, more releases from prison, and fewer parole suspensions. With the increasing population in prisons, the authors delve on the possibility that California can reduce its prison population  again. They  come  up with some of the reasons that make it  hard  for decarceration and they include; impediments to reform, the disappearing public  purse, the reduction in state-level authority, the perils of high visibility, the vanishing  influence  of governmental expertise and the growing influence of direct democracy, and the belief in the efficacy of imprisonment. The article also mentions