Essay On Mass Incarceration

The present day problem of mass incarceration occured because of many events that occured during and post 1968 but as well as events leading to 1968 such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the end of the Civil Rights movement to the start of globalization, the era of late-capital and the era of neoliberalism. After connecting all of these we should have a better understanding why people of color and working class people get often incarcerated and why is it a huge problem in today’s society. As well as how the Black Panther Party involvement and how it went to an organization were their first goal was to help their communities by creating programs that were beneficial for poor people in the community to a supposed criminal organization that

federal government's campaign to reduce the illegal drug trade but in this case we are focusing on The War on Drugs that mainly happened in 1968 during President Nixon presidency where many tactics were created, where the Fourth Amendment played a big role and where the SWAT was created as a response as a way to fight The War on Drugs. The War on Drugs plays a big part on of the mass incarceration that we have today. “The focus on War on Drugs is simple, Convictions for drug offenses are the single most important cause of the explosion in incarceration rates in the United States. Drug offenses alone account for two-thirds of the rise in the federal inmate population and more than half of the rise in state prisoners between 1985 and 2000.1 Approximately a half-million people are in prison or jail for a drug offense today, compared to an estimated 41,100 in 1980—an increase of 1,100 percent.2 Drug arrests have tripled since 1980” (Alexander, 60). This is important to class because we can see how The War on Drugs was suddenly implemented and how suddenly it took over black and brown neighborhoods which created many criminals, specially people of color from impoverished neighborhoods. Many convicts, specially people of color and working class people are in prison because of drug related