Review by New York Times Review
MASS INCARCERATION IS synonymous with criminal justice in the United States. We are the world's top jailer, have among the longest sentences, and tolerate shocking racial disparities in imprisonment rates. Baz Dreisinger is an unusual combination of English professor, journalist and documentary producer whose travels to nine countries to meet with their prisoners led to "Incarceration Nations." This journey into what she calls "global hellholes" sets an earnest American on a quest for insight into American criminal punishment, via structured encounters with foreign prisoners in situ. Each country is paired with a reflection on a single strategy, from punishment to its alternatives: South Africa's is truth and reconciliation; Brazil's is solitary confinement; Uganda's and Jamaica's are arts education. Dreisinger meets with groups of prisoners and leads them in icebreakers, role-plays, restorative-justice sessions, creative writing classes and theater workshops. In the midst of it all, she is repeatedly amazed by the intelligence and humanity of the prisoners she meets, as well as by the enormity of the social contexts in which they are victims. She is aware that her project puts her in the "horrible position of ogling human beings," and she remarks on the "unfortunate, too familiar white-savior-of-black-souls dynamic" that abounds in prison programs. Still, her insertion of herself into the narrative as a self-critical expert-naif is distracting and occasionally overwrought, as when she writes sentiments like, "I find my own cluelessness deeply moving." The universality of human suffering, the dehumanization of incarceration and the ineffectual senselessness of punishment are confirmed and reconfirmed in these prison encounters. Surely American reformers can learn about the value of forgiveness from Rwandan prisoners living in the shadow of genocidal atrocities. The lessons apparently flow in both directions, as illustrated by her well-meaning yet somewhat patronizing schooling of a Singaporean on how progressive Americans don't use the word "ex-convict," preferring instead the phrase "formerly incarcerated." A "shock to the system, to unseat basic truths" was Dreisinger's reason for undertaking the journey, and it leads to the conclusion that prisons, like the stocks and the guillotine, will be deemed "another brutal experiment in punishment that's had its time." The book's final chapter features humane Norway, where people who work in corrections can talk fluently about Foucault, philosophy and ethics. She posits that the world needs a healthy dose of Norwegian janteloven, "a condescending attitude toward individuality and personal success." Valuing community cannot mean cruelly punishing another. "Janteloven has no room for mass incarceration." Yet the real driver behind Dreisinger's globe-trotting is not the appeal of abroad, but rather a true love at home: the Prison-to-College Pipeline program, of which she is the founder and academic director. That groundbreaking program provides prisoners with college courses, and then, upon release, admission to the City University of New York to complete degrees. Her maternal turmoil when her students are denied parole, rearrested, shot, deprived of opportunity or go missing, as well as her teacherly pride in their successes, is the genuine heart of the story. She begins to appreciate the approaches she uses with students in her own program, and her world prison tour ultimately returns her home to them. Perhaps her thought was to import some of what she has seen abroad in reimagining what our corrections system could be, but it's hard to avoid the sense that her Prison-to-College Pipeline may be the gold standard for re-entry. The end of Dreisinger's "trek through human stories" makes her feel her "usual post-prison paradox: alienated, alone, and yet, via the lives I'd trespassed on behind bars, supremely connected to others." The hopeful note on which the book ends, a plea for long overdue criminal justice reform, seems in no small part due to the wish that even our harsh system of punishment can explore connections to the world in ways that can push us for the better. To see others in ourselves, ourselves in others, and the little bit of janteloven in all of us. JEANNIE SUK is a professor at Harvard Law School.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [February 21, 2016]
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Dreisinger, founder of the Prison-to-College-Pipeline program, takes readers on a "prison odyssey" across the globe in search of alternatives to the American system's reliance on harsh sentencing, mandatory minimums, and the threat of solitary confinement. This journey begins with a powerful examination of restorative justice practices in Rwanda and South Africa, demonstrating how they shift the emphasis from punishment and retribution to reconciliation and the needs of victims. Dreisinger interrogates failures in modern penal practices, from the dehumanizing use of solitary confinement in Brazil to the overcrowding of Thai prisons filled with nonviolent drug offenders. In her storytelling she provides balanced analysis, reflecting on the limitations of reform and questioning the efficacy of well-intentioned measures such as arts programs. Her glimpses into the sociopolitical and cultural landscapes of each country provides a point for departure and comparison when examining the lessons the U.S. can learn from abroad. For example, she visits a private prison in Australia that, unlike its American counterparts, stresses intensive staff training and programs to prevent recidivism. In her travels, from Africa to Norway, Dreisinger carries out an incisive inquiry into the standards for a just society's humane treatment of its prisoners, concluding that social inequality, racism, and capitalism lie at the root of mass incarceration in the U.S. and abroad. Agent: Zoë Pagnamenta, Zoë Pagnamenta Agency. (Feb.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Covering two years and nine countries in her pilgrimage to prisons worldwide, Dreisinger (English, John Jay Coll. of Criminal Justice) begins her research at home, where "America is the world's largest jailer." Her instinct that "something is very, very wrong" with the U.S. system sends her to experience reconciliation in Rwanda and South Africa, arts education in Uganda and Jamaica, imprisonment of women in Thailand, solitary confinement in the "supermaxes" of Brazil, private prisons in Australia, "reentry" in Singapore, and the "humane" model prisons of Norway. Determined to "minimize the inevitable anthropological rubbernecking," Dreisinger goes into the prisons as volunteer, teacher, or mentor to collect stories. More than just an observer, Dreisinger brings home alternative methods that could change America's system for the better. Narrator Christina Delaine gives earnest voice to Dreisinger's odyssey, moving seamlessly between frustration and joy, setback and progress, recidivism and triumph. VERDICT Libraries looking to enhance their criminal justice collections would do well to acquire this compelling title. ["Recommended for students in criminal justice and public policy courses, including the general reader curious about global prison structures": LJ Xpress Reviews 3/11/16 review of the Other hc.]-Terry Hong, Smithsonian -BookDragon, Washington, DC © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A writer and social activist chronicles her visits to prisons around the globe to gain insight into what works and doesn't work. This anthropological examination by Dreisinger (English/John Jay Coll. of Criminal Justice, CUNY; Near Black: White to Black Passing in American Culture, 2008) wears its agenda proudly, which is not a bad thing given the level of intellectual insight and emotional struggle the author brings to her argument. Though she founded the Prison-to-College Pipeline program in 2011 to help prisoners transition successfully back into society, she still had questions. "I decided I needed a shock to the system, to unseat basic truths, to ask myself what I used to get asked all the time, before my world became overwhelmingly filled with people who shared my passions and premises," she writes. "Why care so passionately about the so-called wrongdoers of the world?" To that end, Dreisinger traversed the globe to speak with genocide survivors in Rwanda, reggae enthusiasts behind bars in Uganda and Jamaica, and imprisoned mothers in Thailand. In Brazil, the author met men broken by the savagery of solitary confinement. "Anything not to be in a cell," one prisoner said. "I will do anything to escape being so alone. All those hours. I believe in lovein love as redemption. There is no love here." Yet while she made a concerted effort to connect on a personal level, her ultimate goal was to understand the big picture. In Australia, she struggled, for example, with whether privatization of incarceration for profit can be humane. Dreisinger's refusal to offer sweeping generalizations or simple directives in the name of restorative justice is bold and as confrontational as her sessions with her students. "I'm not trying to be cryptic; the reality is that there is no pat answer to the big questions around race and crime," she writes. "Humanity is complex and contradictory; any system addressing it must be equally so." An eye-opening, damning indictment of the American prison system and the way its sins reverberate around the globe. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
