Kevin R. Reitz

Joan Petersilia

This handbook surveys American sentencing and corrections from global and historical views, from theoretical and policy perspectives, and with attention to a number of problem-specific issues.

The Oxford Handbook of Sentencing and Corrections

The idea of American exceptionalism has made frequent appearances in discussions of criminal justice policies--as it has in many other areas--to help portray or explain problems that are especially acute in the U.S., including mass incarceration, retention of the death penalty, racial and ethnic disparities, and the War on Drugs. While scholars do not universally agree that it is an apt or useful framework, there is no question that the U.S. is an outlier, when compared with other industrialized democracies, in its punitive and exclusionary criminal justice policies. This volume of essays deepens the debate of American exceptionalism in crime and punishment through comparative political, economic, and historical analyses, with an orientation toward forward-looking prescriptions for American law, policy, and institutions of government. The chapters expand the literature to neglected areas such as community supervision, parole release, and collateral consequences of conviction; explore claims of causation, in particular the view that the U.S. history of slavery and racial inequality has been a primary driver of crime policy; examine arguments that the framework of multiple governments and localized crime control, populist style of democracy, and laissez-faire economy are implicated in problems of both crime and punishment; and assess theories that cultural values are the most salient predictors of penal severity and violent crime. With an outstanding list of contributors edited by a leading authority on punishment, this volume demonstrates that the largest problems of crime and justice cannot be brought into focus from the perspective of single jurisdiction, and that comparative inquiries are necessary for an understanding of the current predicament in the US.

American Exceptionalism in Crime and Punishment

It is no secret that America's sentencing and corrections systems are in crisis, and neither system can be understood or repaired fully without careful consideration of the other. This handbook examines the intertwined and multi-layered fields of American sentencing and corrections from global and historical viewpoints, from theoretical and policy perspectives, and with close attention to many problem-specific arenas. Editors Joan Petersilia and Kevin R. Reitz, both leaders in their respective fields, bring together a group of preeminent scholars to present state-of-the art research, investigate current practices, and explore the implications of new and varied approaches wherever possible. The handbook's contributors bridge the gap between research and policy across a range of topics including an overview of mass incarceration and its collateral effects, explorations of sentencing theories and their applications, analyses of the full spectrum of correctional options, and first-hand accounts of life inside of and outside of prison. Individual chapters reflect expertise and source materials from multiple fields including criminology, law, sociology, psychology, public policy, economics, political science, and history. Proving that the problems of sentencing and corrections, writ large, cannot be addressed effectively or comprehensively within the confines of any one discipline, The Oxford Handbook of Sentencing and Corrections is a vital reference volume on these two related and central components of America's ongoing experiment in mass incarceration.

Kevin R. Reitz

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