PRISON

Women Bear the Electoral Brunt

Friday, 14 November 2008. The Guardian ran a piece, “What are prisons in Norway really like?” by Erwin James. James is an interesting character. His Guardian profile begins, “Erwin James served 20 years of a life sentence before his release in August 2004. In prison he took a degree course with the Open University, majoring in history, and graduated in 1994”. Interesting, right? And Norway is a whole other place. Inmates have internet access … in their cells. James contrasts Norway’s prison to those in the U.K.: “Even with the enlightened attitudes and abundance of facilities this place is still a prison. And it is not meant to be ’easy.’ But at least here the prisoners are treated like men and provided with a constructive and meaningful regime.” James has been tracking the penal excesses of the U.K. The Guardian has been tracking Scandinavia of late. A month ago, they ran a piece, by David Wilson, “Prison: the Scandinavian exception,” in which the low numbers of incarcerated prisoners and the more humane treatment of prisoners, compared to the United Kingdom, was credited to what might be called a politics of mutual social recognition. Prisoners are not monsters, they are neighbors and citizens. They continue to vote, they continue to live; they do not enter a black box, they are not thrown into a black hole.

Speaking of prisoners in the United Kingdom, The Independent reported at the end of October that the number of babies born in prison since Labour came to power has doubled. Why has the number doubled? “The number of women in jail has nearly doubled in the past decade and stands at more than 4,500. Most women are in for non-violent offences.” The lead editorial rightly called this situation a scandal and a shame … on everyone. The numbers are actually worse than 4,500: “Most of these women serve only brief sentences, usually less than six months, for non-violent offences such as petty thieving, handling stolen goods and selling drugs. This is why the annual intake of women into prisons is actually far higher than the total figure for any one year. In 2006, for example, a staggering 11,950 women were sent to prison.” 12,000 women sent to prison. A national scandal, a shame on everyone. The Norwegians would agree with that assessment.

I’ve been thinking about prisons, and about women and prisons, for the last week. On Thursday, 6 November 2008, Magodonga Mahlangu and Jenni Williams, of Women of Zimbabwe Arise, WOZA, were released from prison, after three long weeks. They described conditions inside as horrible. Women suffer violation of their rights and persons, everyone suffers. But then, IRIN reported, 31 October 2008, “A recent report has warned that the nation’s 55 prisons have become “death traps”, with conditions deteriorating rapidly and diseases spreading even faster.” And it wasn’t so great before, as A Tragedy of Lives: Women in Prison in Zimbabwe, edited by Chiedza Musengezi and Irene Staunton (Weaver Press, 2000), would suggest. A national scandal, a shame on everyone.

Speaking of scandal and shame, in California Proposition 8, which codified and established bans on same-sex marriage, passed. You know what propositions didn’t pass? Statewide, 60% of the electorate voted No on Proposition 5, “which promised treatment as an alternative to incarceration for nonviolent drug offenders”. In San Francisco, 58% of the electorate voted No on Proposition K, which “would have barred local authorities from investigating, arresting or prosecuting anyone for selling sex.” As Antonia Zerbisias, columnist for the Toronto Star Living section wrote, 14 November 2008, it’s the law, the rule of law as well as the implementation and enforcement of laws, that puts sex workers at risk. Not sex. From the human zones of Norway’s prisons to the unfriendly streets of San Francisco, it’s been a busy Friday indeed.

Prison is about men, women, children, communities, land. As Silvia J.A. Talvi, author of Women Behind Bars: The Crisis of Women in the U.S. Prison System (Seal Press: 2007), recently noted, “Right now, Latinos are the largest ethnic group in men’s prisons in California, followed by African Americans.” What are the particularities of women’s incarceration in California’s golden gulag? Writing in Alternet about Proposition 5, Talvi suggests that the distance between Zimbabwe and California is not so great, that the distance between the United Kingdom and California is not so great, that the distance between Norway and California is immense: “Among both men and women, at least 80% have some kind of substance abuse history. More specifically, nearly 30% of women doing time in the state prison system are in because of a drug-related offense. (For men, that figure is just under 20%.) Many addicts, it has long since been known, end up committing non-violent property crimes in order to support their habits. So, when drug offense-related and property crime-related crimes are added together, we find that over 60% of women are incarcerated for one or the other. Over the years, the women (and men) I’ve interviewed behind prison walls have spoken consistently of their need for substance abuse treatment, in tandem with the ability to obtain their G.E.D’s (or even just learn to read basic sentences); counseling for histories of sexual, physical, and mental abuse; and vocational training. While behind bars, however, most never get anything of the sort: by the CDCR’s own admission, only 5% of prisoners receive substance abuse treatment while they’re locked up.” A national scandal, a shame on us all.

Now, about Guantanamo . . . .

This piece was written by Dan Moshenberg. If you have any questions or comments, please contact Dan at dmoshenberg@gmail.com.