One of the biggest challenges that the current criminal justice system faces is that there has been an increase in the number of incarcerated individuals. The number has been on the rise consistently over the past few decades. It is even more disturbing to note that incarceration has done little or no help as a correction process. Instead, incarceration has mostly been a form of punishment and little has been done to ensure that ex-convicts have a successful reentry in society. After being released from prison, ex-felons face a difficult time when reentering back into society. One of their greatest challenges is in finding employment. This paper aims to analyze the problems that incarcerated individuals and ex-felons face by focusing on their challenges of stigma and reentry.
Summary of Article
The article that was chosen for the analysis was titled “In Search of the Felon-Friendly Workplace”. The article sought to analyze the problem reentry through the difficulties in finding employment that ex-felons face. The center of the story was about a program that focuses on hiring individuals that were from prison. The identified program functioned as an employment agency that strived to equip ex-felons with skills that would help them find employment. However, the program faced several challenges as it faced difficulties in assisting employers to find employment. Employers were difficult to convince in order to employ ex-felons (Obbie, 2016). Despite these challenges, they had still made some progress with improving the employment rate of ex-felons and reducing their recidivism rate.
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Concepts and Theories from the Weekly Readings
Reentry into Society
One of the concepts from the weekly readings was that incarcerated individuals faced a great challenge in their reentry into society. Before prison, incarcerated individuals were more likely to be poor, mentally ill, uneducated, abused drugs, and members of a minority group. After being incarcerated, these individuals have more challenges with difficulties in finding housing and employment. The story specifically addressed the issue by observing that there are approximately 700,000 people that are released from prison. However, more than half of them are more likely to go back to prison after they have encountered several challenges with finding legal employment (Obbie, 2016). This shows that ex-felons face the challenge of reentry into society which is usually caused by the lack of employment.
Stigma and Employment
The concept of stigma that incarcerated individuals faced and challenges with employment was discussed in the weekly readings. Incarcerated individuals were found to be discredited by employers and the legal system from being employed. The story observed that convicted felons were three times less likely to be employed compared to the average local worker. The stigma was also evident in the statement that about three out of four of prospective employers were not interested in hiring ex-felons. There was also the issue of the lack of trust that ex-felons from employers (Obbie, 2016). In the weekly readings, a survey of employers in five large cities showed that 65% will not hire an ex-convict knowingly. ( “A stigma that never fades”, 2002) . All these factors showed that ex-felons were stigmatized by employers making it difficult for them to find employment.
Further Understanding of Criminology
The course readings and story provided further understanding of the issue of criminology and the challenges that ex-felons face. One of the biggest challenges that ex-felons face which was addressed is that of unemployment. Lockwood et al. (2016) studied 3,869 released offenders in a 5-year follow-up study and established that post-release employment was one of the most influential factors that impacted recidivism. Offenders had a relatively high unemployment rate and the recidivism rate was 60 percent among offenders that did not gain employment. The reason for the high recidivism was that the individuals may choose to engage in crime because they have no other choice. With the current legal system disfavoring hiring ex-felons and encounters from stigma, this showed that ex-convicts were in a vicious circle where they would struggle with dealing with unemployment and going back to prison.
The course readings and the article also provided an understanding of why the criminology system is failing. Some policies were put forth in the past few decades such as reducing the number of incarcerated individuals that went through parole. Additionally, some reentry management and rehabilitation programs had been scrapped off because they were perceived as ineffective. Taylor (2016) identified that there is a need to end the punishment cycle by reducing the length of sentences and to consider evidence-based reentry practices. The story provided an example of a program that assists ex-felons and works. The employment agency specifically for ex-felons was found to have had a positive outcome such as reduced recidivism. This showed that rehabilitation programs are an example of an evidence-based practice that is effective in reducing recidivism. Policies in criminology should thus focus on having evidence-based policies to improve the current state of correction and rehabilitation.
Support and Conflicts of Information from Readings
The details in the article supported all the information from the readings. It was identified that felons and ex-felons faced an increasingly huge amount of challenges both before prison and after prison. Both the course reading and the article agreed that unemployment is a big challenge for incarcerated individuals as they face stigma from employers and the law prohibits some of them from getting employed.
The importance of programs that advocated for the needs of ex-felons were identified as important in both the readings and story. In the story, the program had assisted to help ex-offenders find employment and their unemployment rate had shifted from 12 percent to 6 percent. Their recidivism rate was also 15 percent and this could be compared to the 38 percent national recidivism rate (Obbie, 2016). Both articles thus revealed that one of the ways that ex-felons could be assisted is through having programs that focus on improving their welfare.
One of the contradictions that were observe in the article and the course readings was in the portrayal of probation officers and programs that assist ex-felons. After reading the weekly reading, one could have the perception that probation officers are not doing much to help ex-felons. The effectiveness of such programs were analyzed and not found to be effective. Probation officers were discussed in the story by showing the attitude of probation officers through the views of an ex-felon. Probation officers were observed as being good guys. The story also provided a case study which showed that programs that focus on improving the employability of ex-felons are highly effective.
Discussion Questions
What are the ways that the criminal justice system can be improved to reduce the recidivism rate, reduce stigma, and improve the reentry process of ex-felons?
How do the challenges of employment and reentry impact the recidivism rate?
How has felon disenfranchisement impacted the current political system?
Link to Story
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/26/business/in-search-of-the-felon-friendly-workplace.html
In conclusion, it was identified that there are several challenges which ex-felons face. Employers were also found to have a stigma of employing ex-felons and a large percentage of them chose not to employ ex-felons. This created several challenges for ex-felons and made their reentry process difficult. The story provided an example of a program that functioned as an employment and thus improved employment rate for ex-felons and reduced recidivism. This showed a need to have policies that would focus on improving the welfare of ex-felons.
References
“ A stigma that never fades”. (2002). Retrieved from https://www.economist.com/united-states/2002/08/08/a-stigma-that-never-fades
Lockwood, S. K., Nally, J. M., & Ho, T. (2016). Race, education, employment, and recidivism among offenders in the United States: An exploration of complex issues in the Indianapolis metropolitan area. International Journal of Criminal Justice Sciences , 11 (1), 57.
Obbie, M. (2016). In Search of the Felon-Friendly Workplace. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/26/business/in-search-of-the-felon-friendly-workplace.html
Taylor, C. J. (2016). Ending the punishment cycle by reducing sentence length and reconsidering evidence-based reentry practices. Temp. L. Rev. , 89 , 747.
