Entrepreneurs of punishment

Privatization of corrections is problematic in large part because advocates claim that private contractors can provide the same or better services at less cost than public agencies. This article argues that there is another, even more important issue: privatization is fostered by entrepreneurs who do much more than provide alternative sources of services; they create demand for and then supply new forms of social control. Indeed, the history of modern criminal justice is to some extent the history of the success of entrepreneurs in generating new or significantly expanded forms of social control. The article examines the history of entrepreneurs in establishing transportation in the 18th century and the modern prison in the 19th, and then draws parallels to contemporary efforts to provide private prisons, ‘community-based’ juvenile facilities, and electronic monitoring programs.