WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.879 Before that I'd spent the last year researching 00:00:03.019 --> 00:00:05.554 prison systems and general entities, 00:00:05.694 --> 00:00:08.475 so I thought I'd take you on a journey through what I've found. 00:00:08.615 --> 00:00:11.484 At the end I would like you to celebrate with me the fact that I can now leave 00:00:11.624 --> 00:00:15.092 this disgusting, horrible, painful, dangerous system behind me; 00:00:15.232 --> 00:00:18.125 and we'll all go out and have a drink and celebrate the fact that we, 00:00:18.265 --> 00:00:22.211 ourselves, actually can leave it behind unlike some. 00:00:22.351 --> 00:00:24.787 Fyodor Dostoevsky once said that one can measure 00:00:24.927 --> 00:00:28.117 the degree of civilization in society by entering its prisons. 00:00:28.257 --> 00:00:30.741 While this may be true, I think that in all senses 00:00:30.881 --> 00:00:34.972 we see prison as separate from society, parallel to society, 00:00:35.112 --> 00:00:39.252 not a product of that society but a neighbouring entity. 00:00:39.392 --> 00:00:43.611 This is partly a product of the nature of the modern imprisonment paradigm: 00:00:43.751 --> 00:00:46.738 a delineation of walls, barricades, 00:00:46.878 --> 00:00:49.890 halted access in circumscription of its structures, 00:00:50.030 --> 00:00:53.989 its necessary opaque methods of administration. 00:00:54.129 --> 00:00:57.673 The anatomy of a prison system comes into existence 00:00:57.813 --> 00:01:01.034 or is defined by its separation from its surroundings; 00:01:01.174 --> 00:01:03.003 it's cut off from the external. 00:01:03.542 --> 00:01:06.002 At the same time, these institutions we wish to understand 00:01:06.142 --> 00:01:10.597 and the system as a totality, house what is seen by the general public 00:01:10.737 --> 00:01:15.482 as an alternative population, a branch of humanity that has transgressed 00:01:15.622 --> 00:01:19.919 whatever that society has placed into the paradigm of legal activity. 00:01:20.059 --> 00:01:23.171 This perception aids us in divorcing the prison system 00:01:23.311 --> 00:01:28.158 and the whole concept of the imprisonment system from our daily lives too. 00:01:28.298 --> 00:01:31.385 Few problematic consequences arise, I think, from this. 00:01:31.525 --> 00:01:34.645 First off, it has become very hard to criticize the prison system. 00:01:34.785 --> 00:01:38.688 You are less likely to see the root causes and consequences of social issues 00:01:38.828 --> 00:01:41.028 and the effect of social pressures on the people 00:01:41.168 --> 00:01:44.242 who ultimately become inmates in the prison system 00:01:44.382 --> 00:01:48.673 if you don't see the prison system as a product of a certain kind of society. 00:01:48.813 --> 00:01:50.969 It's not independently involved, 00:01:51.109 --> 00:01:54.049 and yet we quietly slip into the habit of this impression. 00:01:54.189 --> 00:01:57.698 More specifically, and as I want to argue, all attempts at social criticism 00:01:57.838 --> 00:02:01.575 of the method of imprisonment need to flow from an understanding 00:02:01.715 --> 00:02:04.805 of the historical precedence that came to produce the prison. 00:02:05.649 --> 00:02:10.276 This is rarely done academically and never in mainstream media. 00:02:10.416 --> 00:02:13.917 This notion of separation also allows for the methods of the prison system 00:02:14.058 --> 00:02:17.542 to be transferred to a general society whilst maintaining a certain doublethink 00:02:17.682 --> 00:02:19.874 that these methods are not being used. 00:02:20.014 --> 00:02:22.284 Ever-increasing and ever-powerful surveillance 00:02:22.424 --> 00:02:24.828 is quite an embedded part of life now, 00:02:24.968 --> 00:02:29.096 and yet it goes unnoticed by many because we are 'outside the prison', 00:02:29.236 --> 00:02:31.623 therefore we must be free. 00:02:32.454 --> 00:02:37.236 Comparisons of the school system with a prison are met with a priori cynicism 00:02:37.376 --> 00:02:41.311 and are mostly made half jokingly by students who are only quietly aware 00:02:41.451 --> 00:02:45.422 that the school system much more closely resembles the coercive organization 00:02:45.562 --> 00:02:48.927 of prison than people would comfortably admit. 00:02:49.067 --> 00:02:52.610 But, the reinforcer is there: You are not in a prison, you are outside; 00:02:52.750 --> 00:02:55.835 and even though you may be in another social institution, 00:02:55.975 --> 00:02:58.066 the logic and methods of the prison system 00:02:58.206 --> 00:03:01.215 in your life are made to appear non-overlapping. 00:03:01.355 --> 00:03:03.666 You should be thankful that you are not in prison. 00:03:03.806 --> 00:03:08.730 This is a powerful enforcer against critical engagement with prison as well. 00:03:09.481 --> 00:03:13.108 The 3rd and final effect of dividing up prison and society I want to dwell on 00:03:13.248 --> 00:03:15.905 concerns the reform movement towards prison. 00:03:16.045 --> 00:03:18.120 While it may seem an odd thing to say, 00:03:18.260 --> 00:03:21.236 the debate against prisons' various failings or successes 00:03:21.376 --> 00:03:26.032 is automatically framed as an argument for increasing its abilities. 00:03:26.172 --> 00:03:30.253 The demand for reform, improvements, inspections, accountability 00:03:30.393 --> 00:03:34.757 are all impulses of the same core values that gave birth to the prison itself. 00:03:34.897 --> 00:03:37.732 Thus we easily slip into solving the problems of prisons 00:03:37.872 --> 00:03:42.329 with a debate framed within the assumptions of creating more imprisonment, 00:03:42.469 --> 00:03:45.663 in a sense that the attributes of surveillance, structured administration 00:03:45.803 --> 00:03:50.484 and the demand for improvement and tracking of a subject that we see in the prison 00:03:50.624 --> 00:03:54.199 are all reasserted on the prison itself, magnifying it more. 00:03:54.905 --> 00:03:58.536 Let's give prison the context we need in order to understand it. 00:03:58.676 --> 00:04:00.924 What came before the practice of the prison? 00:04:01.065 --> 00:04:06.128 What happened to people caught in transgressions of the law in pre-carceral days? 00:04:06.268 --> 00:04:08.925 What were the development pressures of imprisonment, 00:04:09.065 --> 00:04:11.619 and how have they continued up to the present day? 00:04:11.759 --> 00:04:14.253 What does it actually mean, in social terms, 00:04:14.393 --> 00:04:17.570 to be living in a society that makes use of a prison system? 00:04:18.245 --> 00:04:21.113 In his book 'Discipline and Punish | The birth of the Prison' 00:04:21.254 --> 00:04:25.393 Michel Foucault recalls a famous case of public execution in 1757 00:04:25.533 --> 00:04:28.133 of a regicide named Robert-François Damiens. 00:04:28.273 --> 00:04:30.112 On the 1st of March, 1757, 00:04:30.252 --> 00:04:33.567 Damiens the regicide was condemned to make the 'Amende Honorable' 00:04:33.707 --> 00:04:37.053 before the main door of the church of Paris, where he was to be taken 00:04:37.193 --> 00:04:40.058 and conveyed in a cart wearing nothing but a shirt, 00:04:40.198 --> 00:04:43.010 holding a torch of burning wax weighing two pounds. 00:04:43.150 --> 00:04:45.872 Then, in said cart, to the place de Grève 00:04:46.012 --> 00:04:48.959 where on a scaffold that will be erected there, the flesh will be torn 00:04:49.099 --> 00:04:54.339 from his breasts, arms, thighs and cleaved with red-hot pincers, 00:04:54.479 --> 00:04:58.471 his right hand holding the knife with which he committed the said parricide, 00:04:58.611 --> 00:05:02.350 burnt with sulphur; and on those places where the flesh will be torn away 00:05:02.490 --> 00:05:04.876 poured molten-lead, boiling oil, 00:05:05.016 --> 00:05:08.238 burning resin, wax and sulphur melted together, 00:05:08.378 --> 00:05:10.898 and then his body drawn and quartered by four horses, 00:05:11.038 --> 00:05:14.315 and his limbs and body consumed by fire, reduced to ashes 00:05:14.455 --> 00:05:16.767 and the ashes thrown to the wind. 00:05:18.387 --> 00:05:21.417 The account covers in detail the final moments of this goring. 00:05:21.557 --> 00:05:24.375 Then the executioner, his sleeves rolled up, took the steel pincers 00:05:24.515 --> 00:05:26.606 which had been especially made for the occasion 00:05:26.746 --> 00:05:30.194 and were about a foot-and-a-half long, 00:05:30.334 --> 00:05:33.029 pulled first the calf of the right leg, 00:05:33.169 --> 00:05:37.070 then of the thigh, and from there, the two fleshy parts of the right arm, 00:05:37.210 --> 00:05:39.532 then, at the breasts. 00:05:39.672 --> 00:05:42.991 Though a strong, sturdy fellow, the executioner found it so difficult 00:05:43.131 --> 00:05:46.318 to tear away the pieces of flesh that he set about the same spot 00:05:46.458 --> 00:05:49.167 two or three times, twisting the pincers as he did so; 00:05:49.307 --> 00:05:53.154 and what he took away formed at each part a wound about the size 00:05:53.294 --> 00:05:55.893 of a 6-pound crown piece. 00:05:56.674 --> 00:05:59.296 Stories like the one of Damiens are extremely common 00:05:59.436 --> 00:06:03.365 for this time period and for the hundreds to thousands of years before it. 00:06:03.505 --> 00:06:06.482 Indeed, in the pre-modern era we often find stories 00:06:06.622 --> 00:06:09.049 of the beheaded, treasonous characters from history 00:06:09.189 --> 00:06:12.184 having their heads placed on London Bridge's entrance. 00:06:12.324 --> 00:06:15.784 The stories of Henry VIII, his misadventures towards his wives, 00:06:15.924 --> 00:06:18.185 the methods by which Guy Fawkes was placed on the rack 00:06:18.325 --> 00:06:21.883 and then ultimately hanged: These are common to our historical understandings. 00:06:22.023 --> 00:06:24.756 I think it is with seemingly great relief 00:06:24.896 --> 00:06:28.246 that many parts of the world have now abandoned public torture and execution. 00:06:29.287 --> 00:06:32.876 On the face of it, this has been a humane move, 00:06:33.016 --> 00:06:36.196 informed by design, not to see wanton, visceral bloodshed 00:06:36.336 --> 00:06:38.750 performed by the State on its own people 00:06:38.890 --> 00:06:43.200 in those societies that have abandoned either the death penalty 00:06:43.340 --> 00:06:45.829 or any other overt public torture or execution. 00:06:45.969 --> 00:06:49.746 However, before we move away from staged state violence, 00:06:49.886 --> 00:06:53.766 the following points need to be made which help us understand this transition. 00:06:53.906 --> 00:06:56.547 Public executions are just that: public. 00:06:56.687 --> 00:06:59.569 As a spectacle, the event consists of a singular criminal 00:06:59.709 --> 00:07:03.461 or defined set of criminals usually raised on a stage for better viewing, 00:07:03.601 --> 00:07:06.197 surrounded by gazes of the onlookers. 00:07:06.337 --> 00:07:09.898 In fact, there are historical precedence of crowds of expectant onlookers 00:07:10.038 --> 00:07:13.666 rioting because a certain execution was held in private 00:07:13.806 --> 00:07:16.918 or organized with limited or obstructed viewing. 00:07:17.058 --> 00:07:21.792 Such was the expectation of the public to have a visible event. 00:07:22.710 --> 00:07:25.605 Events were also explicitly ordered for 00:07:25.745 --> 00:07:28.274 and performed by agents of the state. 00:07:28.414 --> 00:07:32.314 The hanged man is not an aggressor so much as the showman for the crowd 00:07:32.454 --> 00:07:34.747 and an employee of the state. 00:07:34.887 --> 00:07:39.137 As is particularly the case with treason, the crimes that have been committed 00:07:39.277 --> 00:07:42.049 are seen as against the monarch or the head of state. 00:07:42.189 --> 00:07:46.156 The violence retribution that takes place is at once the expunging of the crime, 00:07:46.296 --> 00:07:49.704 often symbolically as with Damiens whose hand held the knife 00:07:49.844 --> 00:07:52.663 with which the attempted murder of the king was made. 00:07:53.202 --> 00:07:56.956 It's also a reassertion of the power of the monarch or state head, 00:07:57.096 --> 00:07:59.820 which has been undermined by the transgression of one of the laws 00:07:59.960 --> 00:08:02.777 that the monarch has made, and which defines the power 00:08:02.917 --> 00:08:05.879 to which the serfs are indeed subject. 00:08:06.019 --> 00:08:08.651 The sovereign's power is acted out physically on the subjects 00:08:08.791 --> 00:08:11.822 and the gaze of the onlookers at once empowers the event as theatrical, 00:08:11.962 --> 00:08:14.300 noteworthy and central, whilst one would think 00:08:14.440 --> 00:08:18.063 also forming a strong negative reinforcement to the witnesses. 00:08:18.203 --> 00:08:21.702 This is what happens if you disobey the laws of the land. 00:08:21.842 --> 00:08:24.140 To move away from this kind of punishment 00:08:24.280 --> 00:08:27.670 to an organization of corrective institutionalization and surveillance 00:08:27.810 --> 00:08:30.838 is often considered as one driven by the enlightenment 00:08:30.978 --> 00:08:34.514 or a new set of human-based values and understandings towards human behaviour 00:08:34.654 --> 00:08:36.687 or the nature of what we call 'evil'. 00:08:36.827 --> 00:08:39.212 It is seen predominantly as the melioration 00:08:39.352 --> 00:08:42.900 of the viciousness of the punitive mechanisms of the social order, 00:08:43.039 --> 00:08:48.597 a more humane form of interaction between society and the criminal individual. 00:08:48.737 --> 00:08:52.263 Indeed, the move from torture to punishment and imprisonment 00:08:52.403 --> 00:08:56.833 as the main corrective function occurred in Europe in under 80 years, 00:08:56.973 --> 00:09:01.281 making it a very speedy and almost sudden move in the force of punishment. 00:09:01.421 --> 00:09:05.072 It demonstrates that large changes in the social organization can happen, 00:09:05.212 --> 00:09:08.375 but in this case the move was not driven predominantly 00:09:08.515 --> 00:09:11.617 by these values at all, but by something else. 00:09:11.757 --> 00:09:16.532 The morphing of societal methods of treating transgressions occurred in tandem with 00:09:16.672 --> 00:09:18.769 the development of an economy more closely founded 00:09:18.909 --> 00:09:21.582 on the ideas of private property and ownership. 00:09:21.722 --> 00:09:25.289 A reorganization of power occurred that relocated the point of application of power 00:09:25.429 --> 00:09:28.820 from the body whose physicality was tied up in a more agricultural 00:09:28.960 --> 00:09:32.391 and labour-based economy to what people often term as 'the soul' 00:09:32.531 --> 00:09:35.979 or the more inner light of the delinquent products of that society. 00:09:36.119 --> 00:09:39.664 Theft and other property-related crimes belong to the physical, 00:09:39.804 --> 00:09:42.889 but once more ideological crimes come into play, like an up-tick 00:09:43.029 --> 00:09:46.361 in the amount of fraud that occurs as a market-based economy 00:09:46.501 --> 00:09:50.358 and a monetary paradigm begin to dominate, the more the power becomes effective 00:09:50.498 --> 00:09:52.865 if it is relocated to the behavioural 00:09:53.005 --> 00:09:55.576 rather than the physical side of the human being. 00:09:55.716 --> 00:09:58.121 Consequently, we see the following: 00:09:58.261 --> 00:10:00.476 The gallows are largely replaced by handcuffs, 00:10:00.616 --> 00:10:03.624 and the public spectacle that was overt, punitive violence 00:10:03.764 --> 00:10:06.317 and state termination of bodies has now been replaced by 00:10:06.457 --> 00:10:09.637 an inverted spectacle that is worth noting. 00:10:09.777 --> 00:10:13.335 Where once the lone criminal was gazed upon by a multitude, 00:10:13.475 --> 00:10:15.759 by and by the institutional form of correction 00:10:15.899 --> 00:10:20.111 has inverted this model into the modern recognizable prison organization: 00:10:20.251 --> 00:10:25.280 a multitude of prisoners, all confined, separated, a crowd of individuals 00:10:25.420 --> 00:10:29.489 rather than a throng surrounding a central, all-seeing tower 00:10:29.629 --> 00:10:32.034 which allows constant supervision of the inmates, 00:10:32.174 --> 00:10:35.520 but whose watching eye is itself not identifiable. 00:10:35.660 --> 00:10:39.254 It is unseen, invisible. Indeed, as Foucault himself put it: 00:10:39.394 --> 00:10:41.889 "Visibility is a trap." 00:10:42.029 --> 00:10:44.984 This then was the invention of the 'Panopticon' 00:10:45.124 --> 00:10:47.780 by a cheerful chap called Jeremy Bentham (there he is), 00:10:47.920 --> 00:10:52.797 a structured excluding building that would house always-visible criminals; 00:10:52.937 --> 00:10:56.308 and although the Panopticon is most famous for its central tower 00:10:56.448 --> 00:10:59.512 and often round nature of the buildings, 00:10:59.652 --> 00:11:02.744 actually over time surveillance has become digital, 00:11:02.884 --> 00:11:07.012 and as such the ever-present centre can now be aided by CCTV 00:11:07.152 --> 00:11:10.536 and similar measures rather than the need for direct line of sight. 00:11:10.676 --> 00:11:14.206 So, even though today's prisons look rather different to this model of operation, 00:11:14.346 --> 00:11:17.872 we can see how surveillance is the thing that has most empowered itself 00:11:18.012 --> 00:11:21.085 in our punitive measures; and we can also see 00:11:21.225 --> 00:11:24.107 that those measures are totalising, born of a central tower, 00:11:24.247 --> 00:11:27.078 now morphed into a hi-tech control room. 00:11:27.728 --> 00:11:30.334 No longer are the crowd watching the criminal. 00:11:30.474 --> 00:11:34.793 A crowd of criminals is now being watched, isolated independently by cells 00:11:34.933 --> 00:11:38.917 and the larger layout of the prison; 00:11:39.057 --> 00:11:42.635 and yet made uniform by literally, uniforms, 00:11:42.775 --> 00:11:45.118 shared rules and statuses. 00:11:45.258 --> 00:11:49.224 They can be both entirely separated from the world in solitary confinement, 00:11:49.364 --> 00:11:52.798 and yet have every move and behaviour inspected and supervised. 00:11:52.938 --> 00:11:57.061 In fact, the word 'super-vision' has its roots in literally overseeing; 00:11:57.201 --> 00:11:59.763 those two meanings of regulating an event 00:11:59.903 --> 00:12:03.776 as well as having complete views of it are preserved in the modern phrase. 00:12:04.807 --> 00:12:07.714 Such a system is always defended (especially by politicians) 00:12:07.854 --> 00:12:11.964 as something that works in reducing crime and making society safer. 00:12:12.104 --> 00:12:15.502 Indeed, the inbuilt, psychological effect of locking up human delinquents 00:12:15.642 --> 00:12:19.923 is to bestow an ill-conceived feeling of being protected from them, 00:12:20.063 --> 00:12:23.471 and indeed this feeling of needing protection itself becomes an engine 00:12:23.611 --> 00:12:26.741 for the maintaining of such a system of punitive function. 00:12:26.881 --> 00:12:30.688 Incarceration is also broadly characterized in two ways 00:12:30.828 --> 00:12:34.543 which maintain its persistence as an accepted function in society. 00:12:34.683 --> 00:12:37.190 One is the negative reinforcement: 00:12:37.330 --> 00:12:39.567 People believe that peoples' experience of prison, 00:12:39.707 --> 00:12:42.465 of being deprived of liberty, should correct that behaviour 00:12:42.605 --> 00:12:45.697 so that upon their release they will integrate with that society, 00:12:45.837 --> 00:12:48.158 or others exclaim "Some are just so bad 00:12:48.298 --> 00:12:50.726 that you should just lock 'em up and throw away the key!" 00:12:50.866 --> 00:12:53.595 This view essentially chooses to see the prison system 00:12:53.735 --> 00:12:57.348 as a permanent container for the permanently dangerous. 00:12:57.967 --> 00:13:01.218 It is maintained in the pro-imprisonment rhetoric 00:13:01.358 --> 00:13:03.894 that prisons ought to be pacifying the criminals, 00:13:04.034 --> 00:13:07.871 to be normalizing them so they can be potentially released in most cases. 00:13:08.011 --> 00:13:09.837 This, of course, presupposes 00:13:09.977 --> 00:13:13.279 that they be non-violent enough to be trusted with freedom. 00:13:13.419 --> 00:13:16.638 One of foundations of being able to coexist with the wide population 00:13:16.778 --> 00:13:19.648 is the curbing of violent behaviour towards the self and others; 00:13:19.788 --> 00:13:24.551 such an impulse and tendency should be implicitly generated by a system 00:13:24.691 --> 00:13:28.923 that is built to be the normalizer of human beings for social coexistence. 00:13:29.063 --> 00:13:32.027 Yet, I want to impress upon you the following: 00:13:32.167 --> 00:13:35.667 The prison system, its structure, its foundational ideology of punishment 00:13:35.807 --> 00:13:40.676 through negative reinforcement, its governing legal mechanisms, 00:13:40.816 --> 00:13:43.502 and its criminal, administrative and interpersonal hierarchies 00:13:43.642 --> 00:13:46.263 are implicitly those that instill, promote, 00:13:46.403 --> 00:13:49.346 require, enable and affect violence. 00:13:49.486 --> 00:13:51.670 It is no longer the priority of the prison, 00:13:51.810 --> 00:13:54.053 nor was it likely ever the main priority 00:13:54.193 --> 00:13:57.124 to sustainably and correctly adjust human beings 00:13:57.264 --> 00:14:00.625 to a society in a cooperative manner; and even if it were, 00:14:00.765 --> 00:14:03.305 the main, actual effect of prison is in large part 00:14:03.445 --> 00:14:06.015 the worsening of human social integrity. 00:14:06.155 --> 00:14:09.140 I'll break this down into the following subheadings: 00:14:09.280 --> 00:14:12.442 1) Prison's meta-social effects 00:14:13.231 --> 00:14:16.147 This is the evidence of prison's negative effect upon all inhabitants 00:14:16.287 --> 00:14:19.479 including the guards, whether they are criminals or not 00:14:19.619 --> 00:14:21.709 (that's a key point that I'll explain in a moment). 00:14:21.849 --> 00:14:24.515 2) Decisions and governing methods 00:14:24.655 --> 00:14:28.000 The methods by which decisions are arrived at within the correctional body; 00:14:28.140 --> 00:14:32.434 that body, including the legal system, the courts and their associated costs, 00:14:32.574 --> 00:14:35.525 the rehabilitative organizations that work in tandem with the prison 00:14:35.665 --> 00:14:38.500 during the release and transition of prisoners back home, 00:14:38.640 --> 00:14:41.363 and the hardware, nutrition, 00:14:41.503 --> 00:14:43.889 buildings, telephony and everything else. 00:14:44.029 --> 00:14:46.690 This sounds distant from the topic at hand, but you'll see shortly 00:14:46.830 --> 00:14:50.577 that all of these considerations lie at the heart of what correction actually means, 00:14:50.717 --> 00:14:53.029 how we run it, and in what direction. 00:14:53.169 --> 00:14:54.924 What are we building in there? 00:14:56.151 --> 00:14:58.694 1) Prison's meta-social effects 00:14:59.144 --> 00:15:02.693 James Gilligan, head of the Harvard University Department 00:15:02.833 --> 00:15:06.656 for the Study of Violence, spent decades working in prisons. 00:15:06.796 --> 00:15:10.895 He has stated amongst many others than prisons are, in fact, engines of violence 00:15:11.035 --> 00:15:13.279 which can turn non-violent criminals into violent ones 00:15:13.419 --> 00:15:16.006 right in time for their release. 00:15:16.146 --> 00:15:19.319 Several factors play into this effect, one key element being 00:15:19.459 --> 00:15:24.086 the implicit shame and debasement of becoming subjected to overt coercion. 00:15:24.712 --> 00:15:28.138 Playing into this for some prisoners is the social stigma of being a criminal: 00:15:28.278 --> 00:15:31.444 You are opposed to the social structure as an individual. 00:15:32.058 --> 00:15:35.592 Indeed, the ordered and structured communal nature of prisons 00:15:35.732 --> 00:15:38.930 establishes a powerful educational environment for criminals: 00:15:39.070 --> 00:15:42.174 a school of crime, which spits out shamed, deprived 00:15:42.314 --> 00:15:46.113 and dangerous individuals into a society that understands neither them 00:15:46.253 --> 00:15:49.053 nor the institutions from which they emerge. 00:15:49.541 --> 00:15:52.839 Equally, those sent to prison leave on the outside families 00:15:52.979 --> 00:15:55.964 that are more greatly impoverished by the loss of a breadwinner, 00:15:56.104 --> 00:15:58.507 thus there is the built in downgrading of social cohesion 00:15:58.647 --> 00:16:02.627 at the very point of which the system of punishment meets society. 00:16:02.767 --> 00:16:04.889 Further crime and the psychosocial effects 00:16:05.029 --> 00:16:08.427 of the shame of an imprisoned family member greatly distort an already 00:16:08.567 --> 00:16:12.643 very likely problematic and stressful background of that same family. 00:16:13.225 --> 00:16:15.781 Of course, we abhor violence 00:16:15.921 --> 00:16:19.110 precisely because it generates more violence, 00:16:19.250 --> 00:16:22.632 but closing off many violent people within a confined space 00:16:22.772 --> 00:16:24.935 produces violent effects. 00:16:25.075 --> 00:16:27.262 To quote Gilligan from 'Psychiatric Quarterly' 00:16:27.402 --> 00:16:29.824 describing the Massachusetts' prison system: 00:16:29.964 --> 00:16:32.605 "By the 1970s, the Massachusetts' prison 00:16:32.745 --> 00:16:35.736 had degenerated into a virtual war zone. 00:16:35.876 --> 00:16:39.012 In addition to riots within the maximum security prison alone, 00:16:39.152 --> 00:16:41.912 there were periods in which there was an average of a murder a month 00:16:42.052 --> 00:16:45.671 and one suicide every six weeks in a 600-man prison. 00:16:46.222 --> 00:16:49.873 The decade as a whole ended with a total of more than 100 violent deaths 00:16:50.013 --> 00:16:53.552 in one prison alone, and throughout the prison system as a whole, 00:16:53.692 --> 00:16:56.661 there was an epidemic of riots, arson, hostage taking, 00:16:56.801 --> 00:17:00.609 murder followed by suicide and other violence in which inmates, 00:17:00.749 --> 00:17:05.643 prison staff and even visitors were being killed, raped and injured. 00:17:05.782 --> 00:17:07.961 The federal court investigation that followed 00:17:08.101 --> 00:17:11.968 determined that much of this violence was precipitated by untreated, 00:17:12.108 --> 00:17:17.430 undiagnosed mental illness. Much of it was itself precipitated 00:17:17.569 --> 00:17:20.895 or at least exacerbated by conditions within the prison." 00:17:21.412 --> 00:17:24.747 Gilligan, who found himself placed in charge of this chaos, 00:17:24.887 --> 00:17:27.646 instigated over 10 years of psychological treatment 00:17:27.787 --> 00:17:30.337 and therapies that encouraged and nurtured self-respect 00:17:30.477 --> 00:17:32.395 through positive reinforcement. 00:17:32.535 --> 00:17:35.208 It was a value shift in the approach of rehabilitation. 00:17:35.348 --> 00:17:38.736 He reported "During the first 5 years of our program there were no riots 00:17:38.876 --> 00:17:42.162 at any prison, though there were two serious hosting taking incidents 00:17:42.302 --> 00:17:45.255 both of which we were able to resolve without any deaths. 00:17:45.395 --> 00:17:47.413 No staff members or visitors were killed, 00:17:47.553 --> 00:17:50.204 though 7 inmates throughout the prison system as a whole 00:17:50.344 --> 00:17:52.268 died from homicide or suicide. 00:17:52.408 --> 00:17:55.872 During the second five years there were no riots, no hostage taking, 00:17:56.012 --> 00:17:58.454 one homicide and two suicides. 00:17:58.971 --> 00:18:03.351 That is, there were some entire years with no violent deaths." 00:18:04.170 --> 00:18:06.633 Gilligan's project was unfortunately unraveled 00:18:06.773 --> 00:18:09.761 after 10 years with the refocusing of the new governor 00:18:09.901 --> 00:18:13.774 on reintroducing prisoners to the joys of busting rocks. 00:18:14.293 --> 00:18:17.510 We see the system resetting down to its origins 00:18:17.650 --> 00:18:22.399 with a greater focus on structural violence regardless of provable outcome, 00:18:23.271 --> 00:18:25.377 but for this assertion to be valid, 00:18:25.517 --> 00:18:28.593 that the prison system is itself inherently a nurturer of violence, 00:18:28.733 --> 00:18:32.984 one would have to see non-violent people turn violent in a prison, for one; 00:18:33.124 --> 00:18:36.523 but most helpful would be to see that the encouragement of violence 00:18:36.663 --> 00:18:40.731 might also manifest in a controlled scenario with non-criminals. 00:18:40.871 --> 00:18:45.167 For the first point, that non-violent people may become violent, 00:18:45.307 --> 00:18:49.096 the US prison population is now at some two million people in strength. 00:18:49.236 --> 00:18:51.935 This population quadrupled in the 1980s 00:18:52.075 --> 00:18:55.530 fueled by the war on drugs' mandatory minimum sentencing, 00:18:55.670 --> 00:18:59.453 which prolongs sentences on average to a preset term or longer, 00:18:59.593 --> 00:19:02.084 and by 'truth-in sentencing' which more or less eliminates 00:19:02.224 --> 00:19:06.301 the ability for rewarding better behaviour with parole or similar programs. 00:19:06.441 --> 00:19:08.898 The 'three strikes' law also ensured that repeat offenders 00:19:09.038 --> 00:19:12.054 for crimes including drug-related crimes (non-violent ones) 00:19:12.194 --> 00:19:15.882 would see a quicker jail time now, as well as they'd be in for longer. 00:19:16.564 --> 00:19:20.284 Around half of US convicts are in [prison] for non-violent offences 00:19:20.424 --> 00:19:22.443 (around 20% drug offences); 00:19:22.583 --> 00:19:25.067 but as James Gilligan reminds us, most prisons do more 00:19:25.207 --> 00:19:28.071 to stimulate violence and crime than they do to prevent it. 00:19:28.211 --> 00:19:30.423 Prisons have often been termed 'Schools of Crime'; 00:19:30.563 --> 00:19:33.045 I'd call them 'Graduate Schools of Crime'. 00:19:33.185 --> 00:19:35.891 People often have to become violent in order to survive in them; 00:19:36.031 --> 00:19:38.747 or even if they're not attacked by others, 00:19:38.887 --> 00:19:42.192 they are subjected to conditions of degradation, humiliation, intimidation 00:19:42.332 --> 00:19:45.967 and threats that I think might drive the most saintliest of people 00:19:46.107 --> 00:19:48.723 to become more violent in response. 00:19:48.863 --> 00:19:52.947 But, what if there's no criminals in prison but simply ordinary people? 00:19:53.087 --> 00:19:55.571 Does the problem of violence disappear? 00:19:55.711 --> 00:19:58.875 The theory that prison precipitates violence would predict 00:19:59.015 --> 00:20:03.010 that ordinary people should become distorted by the institution. 00:20:03.150 --> 00:20:06.454 Thankfully, this has been tested and proven valid, 00:20:06.594 --> 00:20:09.423 most notably by Dr. Philip Zimbardo 00:20:09.563 --> 00:20:12.620 and his Stanford Prison Experiment. 00:20:12.760 --> 00:20:16.193 Making use of a disused cellar wing of [a] Stanford University building, 00:20:16.333 --> 00:20:19.331 he and some colleagues constructed a rudimentary cell block 00:20:19.471 --> 00:20:22.277 with locks on the door and secret audio surveillance so that inmates 00:20:22.417 --> 00:20:26.500 could be monitored for their reactions to the environment and other inmates. 00:20:26.640 --> 00:20:29.229 An ad was placed in the paper asking for paid volunteers 00:20:29.369 --> 00:20:33.580 to take part in a 7-14 day experiment at $15 per day. 00:20:34.800 --> 00:20:38.136 Those chosen for the experiment were picked for their mental stability: 00:20:38.276 --> 00:20:41.613 non-aggressive and non-dominant characteristics. 00:20:43.550 --> 00:20:45.443 24 local males in all 00:20:45.583 --> 00:20:48.565 were randomly assigned to be either prisoners or guards. 00:20:48.705 --> 00:20:51.328 Prisoners were stripped of their name and given a number. 00:20:51.468 --> 00:20:54.416 They were given hairnets and other ways of shaming them, 00:20:54.556 --> 00:20:58.151 and they were deloused. There wasn't real delousing powder; 00:20:58.291 --> 00:21:02.819 in fact, that whole delousing process is mostly to shame them on the way in. 00:21:02.959 --> 00:21:05.859 The rules stated: A guard's orders must be obeyed; 00:21:05.999 --> 00:21:08.672 timetables must be kept; house rules were enforced 00:21:08.812 --> 00:21:13.107 and learnt by rote for public recitation, either in order or in part. 00:21:13.679 --> 00:21:17.205 The resulting outcome of this was a practical 'reign of terror' 00:21:17.345 --> 00:21:20.947 by the guards who began with tiresome and deliberately tedious exercises 00:21:21.087 --> 00:21:25.532 such as reciting their prisoner numbers backwards, forwards, in reverse, etc. 00:21:26.283 --> 00:21:29.859 But, as these mentally stable, ordinary boys 00:21:29.999 --> 00:21:33.310 slipped further into their roles as domineering or the domineered, 00:21:33.450 --> 00:21:35.647 more cruel results became apparent. 00:21:35.787 --> 00:21:39.404 Clashes between inmates and guards, hunger strikes, disobedience, 00:21:39.544 --> 00:21:42.982 destruction of prison property and inter-prisoner unrest 00:21:43.122 --> 00:21:45.960 soon gave rise to essentially forms of torture, 00:21:46.100 --> 00:21:48.863 cruelty, sleep deprivation and more. 00:21:49.003 --> 00:21:53.693 One inmate folded after two days of subjection and was replaced. 00:21:53.833 --> 00:21:55.971 All forgot it was an experiment. 00:21:56.111 --> 00:21:59.559 One of the rules even stated that it would not be referred to as such. 00:21:59.699 --> 00:22:02.859 Even Zimbardo (as a fictional prison superintendent) 00:22:02.999 --> 00:22:07.258 ended up seeking snitches, convincing upset prisoners to stay on 00:22:07.398 --> 00:22:09.691 and subject themselves further, etc. 00:22:09.831 --> 00:22:12.260 The experiment collapsed after five days, 00:22:12.400 --> 00:22:14.284 and does it remind you of anywhere? 00:22:14.424 --> 00:22:16.154 Google thinks so: 00:22:16.642 --> 00:22:18.487 It says Abu Ghraib. 00:22:19.432 --> 00:22:21.970 Hand-in-hand with Zimbardo's experiment 00:22:22.110 --> 00:22:25.764 comes the direct association with Stanley Milgram, whom we've had mentioned today; 00:22:25.904 --> 00:22:28.871 and indeed Milgram and Zimbardo were at one time high school friends. 00:22:29.011 --> 00:22:31.496 Milgram's experiment showed that over 90% of people 00:22:31.636 --> 00:22:34.377 who were placed in the experiment would apply what they believed 00:22:34.517 --> 00:22:37.458 to be mortally dangerous electric shocks to unseen victims, 00:22:37.598 --> 00:22:41.675 when commanded to do so by a white-coat-uniformed head of the experiment. 00:22:41.815 --> 00:22:44.494 Zimbardo shows us that ordinary people within a prison structure 00:22:44.634 --> 00:22:46.462 can produce tension and violence. 00:22:46.602 --> 00:22:49.768 Depersonalization runs right through the whole schema of command, 00:22:49.908 --> 00:22:53.049 and coercion, and power administration within a structure. 00:22:53.189 --> 00:22:57.900 We turn the ordinary into exactly the kind of distorted creature 00:22:59.443 --> 00:23:01.874 by treating them in a distorted way. 00:23:02.014 --> 00:23:06.457 Milgram, on the other hand, shows us how people can be led to punish others. 00:23:06.597 --> 00:23:10.095 As such, we have to decode the behaviour of the brutal prison guards, 00:23:10.235 --> 00:23:12.920 not as one of corruption of the prison methodology, 00:23:13.060 --> 00:23:16.327 but in fact another symptom of its effect on human beings 00:23:16.467 --> 00:23:19.345 regardless on which side of the law they stand on. 00:23:19.895 --> 00:23:22.399 Part ll: Decisions and Governance 00:23:22.539 --> 00:23:26.662 What steps are we taking to adapt prison? What are we adapting it towards? 00:23:26.802 --> 00:23:28.929 What governs the development of prison now? 00:23:29.069 --> 00:23:32.844 Many would contend that it would still be the eradication of criminal behaviour 00:23:32.984 --> 00:23:36.326 or the paying of a social debt in some way. 00:23:36.466 --> 00:23:40.348 Since my claim is that the culture is what births the prison, 00:23:40.488 --> 00:23:42.851 we should also be able to predict the following: 00:23:42.991 --> 00:23:47.204 A culture in society rooted to a great extent in the profit mechanism 00:23:47.344 --> 00:23:50.792 should see its prison system reflect this tendency 00:23:50.932 --> 00:23:53.507 of profit before every other consideration, 00:23:53.647 --> 00:23:57.273 i.e., collusion, fraud, and so on, in a similar manner. 00:23:58.424 --> 00:24:00.211 So, it comes as no surprise 00:24:00.351 --> 00:24:03.026 that we do find the evolution of privately-run prison 00:24:03.166 --> 00:24:06.874 as a powerful dominant force in the system of correction today. 00:24:07.014 --> 00:24:11.635 American entities Wackenhut and CCA (the Correction Corporation of America) 00:24:11.775 --> 00:24:14.773 and their international subsidiaries in Australia and elsewhere 00:24:14.913 --> 00:24:18.755 are now prominent, but much well less known than one would think, 00:24:18.895 --> 00:24:23.163 sold into society as 'cheaper alternatives' than state-run institutions, 00:24:23.303 --> 00:24:26.535 but being more 'efficient' because of corporate backing. 00:24:26.675 --> 00:24:30.796 CCA, for example, is now at the point where an offer is on the table 00:24:30.936 --> 00:24:33.252 to run the entire correctional apparatus 00:24:33.392 --> 00:24:36.433 in the 48 states of the United States. 00:24:36.871 --> 00:24:38.861 A key element of the offer 00:24:39.001 --> 00:24:43.015 is the promised occupancy rate of at least 90%. 00:24:43.938 --> 00:24:47.952 In other words, we are now measuring the success of the prison system 00:24:48.092 --> 00:24:50.804 by economic indicators that run counter 00:24:50.944 --> 00:24:53.965 to the welfare of the inmates and the wider population. 00:24:54.105 --> 00:24:58.526 It is now valued by its larger size rather than its smaller size. 00:24:58.666 --> 00:25:03.455 It is valued by the money it saves, not the lives it saves. 00:25:04.106 --> 00:25:07.219 The maintenance of at least a stable prison population 00:25:07.359 --> 00:25:10.538 and at best a growing prison population 00:25:10.678 --> 00:25:14.808 has become built into the welfare of thousands of satellite industries. 00:25:14.948 --> 00:25:17.633 Two million prisoners eat six million meals a day, 00:25:17.773 --> 00:25:20.983 meaning literally a captive audience for catering services. 00:25:21.123 --> 00:25:23.983 The telephony company Sprint has made large contracts with prisons 00:25:24.123 --> 00:25:26.933 to provide communication services. Inmates get sick, 00:25:27.073 --> 00:25:30.922 allowing for private health companies to thrive servicing the population. 00:25:31.062 --> 00:25:34.275 Wackenhut and CCA trade their stock on Wall Street 00:25:34.415 --> 00:25:36.715 based on the size of the prisoner population, 00:25:36.855 --> 00:25:39.856 the larger the better for the economy. 00:25:39.996 --> 00:25:42.737 Now, I already mentioned the 3 US laws: 00:25:42.877 --> 00:25:46.670 the Three Strikes Law, Truth in Sentencing, Mandatory Minimum Sentencing, 00:25:46.810 --> 00:25:49.194 all of which have an effect on prison population. 00:25:49.334 --> 00:25:52.707 It's interesting to note that these laws and many like them 00:25:52.847 --> 00:25:55.851 are actually drafted by an organization called 00:25:55.991 --> 00:26:00.484 the American Legislative Exchange Council (amusingly ALEC, for short). 00:26:00.624 --> 00:26:03.831 Hundreds of state laws are passed each year 00:26:03.971 --> 00:26:09.014 under the banner of being the 'Unsung Heroes' of American public policy. 00:26:09.817 --> 00:26:11.857 ALEC states that its agenda is to: 00:26:11.997 --> 00:26:16.631 promote free markets, small governments, state rights and privatization. 00:26:16.771 --> 00:26:18.602 During these closed meetings, 00:26:18.742 --> 00:26:22.340 hundreds of delegates from the prison industrial complex like Wackenhut 00:26:22.480 --> 00:26:27.601 pay large dues to sit at the table together and eek-out pre-written templates 00:26:27.741 --> 00:26:30.835 for state laws, that are then brought back by the state reps 00:26:30.975 --> 00:26:33.515 to their own states, where they're then dressed up 00:26:33.655 --> 00:26:36.635 and passed as the conclusions of that state representative 00:26:36.775 --> 00:26:39.939 instead of the corporation gaining off their passage into law. 00:26:40.079 --> 00:26:43.634 Do you now see why I don't trust the idea of government? 00:26:45.029 --> 00:26:47.068 It's built in! 00:26:47.208 --> 00:26:49.262 [Applause] 00:26:51.590 --> 00:26:54.940 Truth in Sentencing and widely spread Mandatory Minimum Sentencing 00:26:55.080 --> 00:26:59.424 and the Three Strikes Law have all been promoted heavily into acceptance 00:26:59.564 --> 00:27:02.957 by ALEC's Criminal Justice Task Force, which included CCA 00:27:03.097 --> 00:27:06.234 (which now claim as of last year to have left ALEC), and others 00:27:06.374 --> 00:27:09.870 in a bid to insure a growing and robust prison population 00:27:10.010 --> 00:27:15.281 which in turn insures the viability of the private prison enterprises involved. 00:27:15.421 --> 00:27:19.190 Further (it gets better), forced labour, either for a pittance 00:27:19.330 --> 00:27:22.927 or no pay at all, means that companies now regularly use prison labour 00:27:23.067 --> 00:27:26.514 to produce the products more cheaply in order to sell at a higher cost 00:27:26.654 --> 00:27:29.536 (or greater profit) to the non-imprisoned population. 00:27:29.676 --> 00:27:33.035 There's only a mild difference there, isn't there? 00:27:33.175 --> 00:27:36.913 This is more economically efficient if profit is your guiding light, 00:27:37.053 --> 00:27:39.806 not if we're talking about the viability of prison 00:27:39.946 --> 00:27:42.667 as a tool for social rehabilitation. 00:27:42.807 --> 00:27:46.779 This should be termed what it is, Ladies and Gentlemen: Slavery 2.0! 00:27:46.919 --> 00:27:50.287 It is the wholesale refocusing of the measure of success 00:27:50.427 --> 00:27:53.800 of this system into economic indicators that are based on deprivation, 00:27:53.940 --> 00:27:56.794 restricted access and control in the first place. 00:27:56.934 --> 00:28:00.913 It has spread to corporate prisons in the UK, Australia and beyond. 00:28:01.053 --> 00:28:03.307 If prison is a microcosm of the society 00:28:03.447 --> 00:28:06.185 as James Gilligan has stated in his book 'Preventing Violence' 00:28:06.325 --> 00:28:10.099 and which Dostoyevski essentially alludes to in my opening quotation of him, 00:28:10.239 --> 00:28:13.981 then we can expect this to magnify as our paradigm becomes more predatory 00:28:14.121 --> 00:28:17.202 and as the dominant for-profit forces seek to own 00:28:17.342 --> 00:28:20.316 and deflect media attention and influence policy 00:28:20.456 --> 00:28:23.096 as we have come to expect from every other avenue 00:28:23.236 --> 00:28:26.202 which has been taken, and profitized, and commodified, 00:28:26.342 --> 00:28:29.380 and altered into a machine for economic viability 00:28:29.520 --> 00:28:32.003 instead of viability. 00:28:33.442 --> 00:28:35.235 [Applause] 00:28:40.725 --> 00:28:42.756 What's the alternative then? 00:28:42.896 --> 00:28:46.341 About two years ago I was speaking with a cab driver (as I'm wont to do) 00:28:46.481 --> 00:28:48.768 about the Utah man sentenced to death, 00:28:48.908 --> 00:28:51.442 who chose to be killed by firing squad, 00:28:51.880 --> 00:28:53.613 in 2010! 00:28:54.270 --> 00:28:57.791 Now, seguewaying into punishment and its effects, I suggested 00:28:57.931 --> 00:29:00.875 that the violence of the penal system encourages the violence of more crime, 00:29:01.016 --> 00:29:04.688 more social division, more social ills. The cab driver replied: 00:29:04.828 --> 00:29:07.832 "What do you want to do then, give 'em all a medal?" 00:29:07.972 --> 00:29:10.457 This dualistic vision of reward and punishment, 00:29:10.597 --> 00:29:12.646 is quite easy to fall into, 00:29:12.786 --> 00:29:15.491 but we are trying to solve the problem of crime, 00:29:15.631 --> 00:29:17.677 not ignore it or celebrate it. 00:29:18.181 --> 00:29:21.829 Solve it, not manage it within a power framework that perpetuates 00:29:21.969 --> 00:29:25.186 the violence that gave birth to the criminal behaviour in the first place 00:29:25.326 --> 00:29:29.682 and foster a society that less provokes crime and violence to begin with, 00:29:29.822 --> 00:29:32.842 not simply extend the prison bandage further. 00:29:33.490 --> 00:29:36.635 As the work of James Gilligan, Wilkinson and Pickett in the book 00:29:36.775 --> 00:29:40.467 'The Spirit Level' and the work of many others now makes it clear: 00:29:40.973 --> 00:29:44.507 to mistreat a human being, to deprive, limit and shame a human being 00:29:44.647 --> 00:29:48.274 is a sure-fire way of developing more aberrant and violent behaviour. 00:29:48.414 --> 00:29:51.549 Shake a glass jar with ants in it and they will fight. 00:29:51.689 --> 00:29:55.926 Shake it as a punishment, they'll just fight some more, ad infinitum. 00:29:56.843 --> 00:29:58.970 So, I took up the cab driver's challenge 00:29:59.110 --> 00:30:02.731 and looked for alternative prisons or other approaches. 00:30:02.871 --> 00:30:06.951 I didn't have to look too far. Nestled in the mountains of Styria in Austria, 00:30:07.091 --> 00:30:11.251 in the little mining town of Leoben, lies a prison so unrecognisable 00:30:11.391 --> 00:30:14.449 that it actually made viral email rounds in 2008. 00:30:14.589 --> 00:30:17.805 Comments to the effect of: "Perhaps I should go and commit some crimes 00:30:17.945 --> 00:30:21.534 so I can get into this holiday camp!" were rife in the description 00:30:21.674 --> 00:30:24.869 and even ended up echoed under the byline of a New York times article 00:30:25.009 --> 00:30:27.698 that described the prison and talked to the architect. 00:30:27.838 --> 00:30:30.320 So, I thought I'd go and have a look at this place 00:30:30.460 --> 00:30:33.389 and ask the prison warden what his thoughts on the feasibility, function 00:30:33.529 --> 00:30:36.670 and the role of prison were. So, Ladies and Gentleman, I went to prison, 00:30:36.810 --> 00:30:39.234 (which I'm sure you're pleased about.) 00:30:39.374 --> 00:30:41.648 Magister Manfred Giessauf and the Chief Guard 00:30:41.788 --> 00:30:44.012 both gave two generous hours of their time, 00:30:44.152 --> 00:30:47.367 allowed me to record our interview and even showed me around the prison! 00:30:47.507 --> 00:30:50.799 It features a library, built-in artworks into the wall-space 00:30:50.939 --> 00:30:53.896 that were designed to be added to by prisoners, exercise rooms 00:30:54.036 --> 00:30:57.761 and outdoor areas which allow prisoners to become used to seeing distance; 00:30:57.901 --> 00:30:59.932 that's something you don't get, and people forget. 00:31:00.072 --> 00:31:01.713 We take distance for granted. 00:31:01.853 --> 00:31:05.848 The whole edifice is glass structured to deliberately allow light in. 00:31:05.988 --> 00:31:08.570 Consequently the prisoners, not shrouded in darkness, 00:31:08.710 --> 00:31:11.446 have at least some chance to feel that they're in an institution 00:31:11.586 --> 00:31:13.763 that is designed for rehabilitation. 00:31:13.903 --> 00:31:16.926 Consequent to the design, the courses on social reintegration 00:31:17.066 --> 00:31:20.939 offer to prisoners the basic foundation of the prison's modus operandi. 00:31:21.079 --> 00:31:24.793 Prisoner violence is much lower, as are the statistics on absenteeism 00:31:24.933 --> 00:31:27.871 for prison guards; it's about a quarter of what absenteeism is 00:31:28.011 --> 00:31:31.641 for guards in normal prisons, so they're also not suffering. 00:31:31.781 --> 00:31:34.462 The basic tenet of this prison is literally unavoidable, 00:31:34.602 --> 00:31:36.687 sandblasted onto the wall, it states: 00:31:36.827 --> 00:31:39.530 "Jeder, dem seine Freiheit entzogen ist, muss menschlich 00:31:39.670 --> 00:31:42.318 und mit Achtung vor dem Menschen 00:31:42.458 --> 00:31:44.712 innewohnenden Würde behandelt werden", 00:31:44.852 --> 00:31:48.561 "All persons deprived of their liberty shall be treated with humanity 00:31:48.701 --> 00:31:52.121 and with respect for the inherent dignity of the human person." 00:31:52.261 --> 00:31:56.412 That comes from the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. 00:31:56.552 --> 00:31:58.066 [Applause] 00:31:58.206 --> 00:32:00.411 Yeah, give them a round of applause! 00:32:05.291 --> 00:32:07.710 (They're lovely people. They didn't even question 00:32:07.850 --> 00:32:10.103 what I was asking them for.) 00:32:10.243 --> 00:32:12.996 Leoben Correctional Center's budget was about €50 million. 00:32:13.136 --> 00:32:14.860 It was completed in 2007, 00:32:15.000 --> 00:32:17.822 and had been commissioned through an architectural contest, actually. 00:32:17.962 --> 00:32:21.128 "But for €50 million," I asked, "why not just build more prisons 00:32:21.268 --> 00:32:23.440 or save money and build a cheaper prison? 00:32:23.580 --> 00:32:26.771 After all, isn't being economical to do with saving money, 00:32:26.911 --> 00:32:30.542 cheapening processes, cutting services, trimming the fat?" 00:32:30.682 --> 00:32:32.235 The answer came: 00:32:32.375 --> 00:32:35.880 "It all depends on if you count in the social cost 00:32:36.020 --> 00:32:39.195 to the social economy. You can always build cheaper prisons. 00:32:39.335 --> 00:32:42.568 You may well build a prison whose edifice is cheaper; 00:32:42.708 --> 00:32:45.290 but if you run a prison like the American Supermax Prisons, 00:32:45.631 --> 00:32:48.440 you build human time bombs. 00:32:48.580 --> 00:32:51.222 They are released at some point too, and who knows 00:32:51.362 --> 00:32:53.965 what the social costs are of such an act. 00:32:54.105 --> 00:32:57.717 At the very least, we cannot release prisoners who are worse 00:32:57.857 --> 00:33:00.418 than they were when we received them." 00:33:00.558 --> 00:33:05.303 I'll admit that Leoben is not a complete test case for prison reform or alteration. 00:33:05.443 --> 00:33:07.558 There are no 'lifers' in this system, 00:33:07.698 --> 00:33:10.036 and highly violent criminals are not sent there. 00:33:10.176 --> 00:33:13.095 Ironically, most of the criminals are there for monetary crimes, 00:33:13.235 --> 00:33:16.732 crimes which will most likely be repeated once they're on the outside 00:33:16.872 --> 00:33:19.209 since they're not likely to receive good job prospects 00:33:19.349 --> 00:33:22.948 and most likely have large debts for which they went to prison to begin with. 00:33:23.088 --> 00:33:26.307 It may be a gilded cage, but it is still a cage, 00:33:26.447 --> 00:33:30.080 and still limited in its use and abilities by the overall functioning 00:33:30.220 --> 00:33:34.658 or indeed the dysfunction of the society that ends up populating its buildings. 00:33:34.798 --> 00:33:37.897 It is still a bandage, but a bandage we can learn from, 00:33:38.037 --> 00:33:42.329 whose values come from the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights: 00:33:42.469 --> 00:33:44.635 the rights of human beings, therefore, 00:33:44.775 --> 00:33:47.900 being the starting point from which to work and not profit 00:33:48.040 --> 00:33:51.366 or cheapness or anything so absurdly slavish 00:33:51.506 --> 00:33:55.476 as the US, UK or Australia's private prison enterprises. 00:33:56.605 --> 00:33:58.768 As a species, we have to understand 00:33:58.908 --> 00:34:02.062 that the desire to see others imprisoned is simply the same violence 00:34:02.202 --> 00:34:03.864 that we see in crime. 00:34:04.004 --> 00:34:06.710 The punishment we inflict on prisoners is the same violence 00:34:06.850 --> 00:34:09.536 we claim to be condemning by acting in that way. 00:34:09.676 --> 00:34:11.790 Above all, it needs to be realized 00:34:11.929 --> 00:34:14.860 that prison isn't there to solve any problems. 00:34:15.001 --> 00:34:19.462 It's another outgrowth of violence and systematized power and control. 00:34:19.601 --> 00:34:22.324 To solve crime, to live in a non-violent society 00:34:22.464 --> 00:34:26.137 is to live in a society in which prisons are eradicated. 00:34:26.277 --> 00:34:30.416 We concentrate our efforts on the positive therapies that prevent violence, 00:34:30.556 --> 00:34:32.664 and at the same time strive for a society 00:34:32.804 --> 00:34:35.560 that prevents violence from the outset. 00:34:35.699 --> 00:34:38.763 To do so is to solve the prison issue. 00:34:39.942 --> 00:34:41.713 [Applause] 00:34:46.179 --> 00:34:49.264 To base a physical institution on human rights is to seek 00:34:49.404 --> 00:34:53.541 the physical modification of that edifice in line with human needs: 00:34:53.681 --> 00:34:57.772 sunlight, space, social interaction; to base it on function 00:34:57.912 --> 00:35:01.072 rather than form requires the ignoring of the balance sheet 00:35:01.212 --> 00:35:04.779 in favour of the successful function of the system upon human beings 00:35:04.919 --> 00:35:08.359 and not the bottom line of some corporation that benefits some small section 00:35:08.499 --> 00:35:11.219 of society's populace that happen to be working for them at that time. 00:35:11.359 --> 00:35:13.714 Of course, it's not their fault, is it? The whole point of this 00:35:13.854 --> 00:35:16.851 is that they're also prisoners of the debt system which is then used 00:35:16.991 --> 00:35:19.657 and systematized and creates the prison system. 00:35:19.797 --> 00:35:22.300 Above all, to solve the problem of crime 00:35:22.440 --> 00:35:25.832 is not to build more prisons like is continually said 00:35:25.972 --> 00:35:28.169 on those Question Time things, 00:35:28.309 --> 00:35:30.623 any more than the solution to a disease is to spend 00:35:30.763 --> 00:35:33.716 more time in a hospital building, rather than treat the illness 00:35:33.856 --> 00:35:37.661 that is debilitating, obstructing and undermining the body. 00:35:37.801 --> 00:35:40.292 The solution to disease is the eradication 00:35:40.432 --> 00:35:44.108 or healing of its non-functioning elements. 00:35:44.596 --> 00:35:47.750 The solution to the disease of crime and the illness of society 00:35:47.890 --> 00:35:50.359 is a ground-up reorientation of social function 00:35:50.499 --> 00:35:53.223 to halt the consequences of social malfunction, 00:35:53.363 --> 00:35:55.150 or what we call crime. 00:35:55.290 --> 00:35:58.001 Until then, we change nothing 00:35:58.141 --> 00:36:01.404 until we change ourselves and what we value; and we make it known. 00:36:01.544 --> 00:36:05.735 Currently, we service problems as cheaply and as forcefully as possible. 00:36:05.875 --> 00:36:08.971 As such, prison is a cheap service of a problem 00:36:09.111 --> 00:36:12.176 not a correct fix to our issues of crime. 00:36:12.715 --> 00:36:16.247 Broadly speaking, prison is the social distillation 00:36:16.387 --> 00:36:20.666 of our attitudes to the human mind and the individual. 00:36:21.395 --> 00:36:25.476 One day, if our cultural assumptions and economic principles grow 00:36:25.616 --> 00:36:29.569 to a solution-oriented scenario with respect to social cohesion 00:36:30.182 --> 00:36:33.398 and true sustainability, our future population 00:36:33.538 --> 00:36:36.554 will look back at our era with arguably more horror 00:36:36.694 --> 00:36:39.748 than we now look back on the prior societies of torture 00:36:39.888 --> 00:36:43.528 and brute violence like we did at the beginning of this presentation, 00:36:43.668 --> 00:36:46.788 for we had the scientific understandings of what works 00:36:46.928 --> 00:36:49.046 and we did not act upon them. 00:36:49.603 --> 00:36:53.323 I want you to feel the gaze of future humanity 00:36:53.463 --> 00:36:56.717 looking back onto our era now, looking back onto when you were alive. 00:36:56.857 --> 00:36:59.859 Place yourself in the future and look now, backwards, 00:37:00.000 --> 00:37:02.026 with the horror they will feel. 00:37:02.166 --> 00:37:04.882 Until we become the groundwork for that future population, 00:37:05.022 --> 00:37:08.086 they will not stop looking at us in horror, disbelief 00:37:08.226 --> 00:37:12.338 and with regret and pathos, for they will understand us better 00:37:12.478 --> 00:37:15.062 than we understand ourselves and our prisoners now. 00:37:15.202 --> 00:37:17.739 For them, indeed, we are all prisoners. 00:37:17.879 --> 00:37:20.211 Now, thank you very much, I'd like to thank all the speakers 00:37:20.351 --> 00:37:22.153 who spoke here today. 00:37:22.293 --> 00:37:23.811 [Applause] 00:37:32.209 --> 00:37:34.289 They do it for free! 00:37:35.509 --> 00:37:37.171 They do it because it's fun. 00:37:37.311 --> 00:37:40.705 I'd like to thank all of you for having come along. 00:37:40.845 --> 00:37:44.202 It's very kind of you; it is not taken for granted, ever. 00:37:44.342 --> 00:37:47.127 We are going to go down the road to a pub! Please join us. 00:37:47.267 --> 00:37:50.127 It's only about 300 yards away on the other side of the road; it's on a corner. 00:37:50.267 --> 00:37:53.068 Sorry, I've forgotten the name of it. We'll be there all night, 00:37:53.208 --> 00:37:56.607 drinking and answering questions and asking you questions, as well. 00:37:56.747 --> 00:37:58.248 Thank you again. 00:37:58.388 --> 00:37:59.894 [Applause] 00:38:00.490 --> 00:38:02.029 Thank you, Ben.