Prison system in socialism

[OnFire]

Comrades, I have been thinking what prisons should look like in a progressive future.

First of all, people would only be locked away for crimes where they damage other people, e.g. assault, murder or rape. No punishments for drug addicts or thieves, as they do not damage other people but rather damage themselves or the property of others and need rather therapy or economic help than punishment. Professional career criminals like Mafia members or reoffenders hsould also be sent to prison if they still commit crimes despite therapy and help programs.

Nevertheless, Prisons should not be the hellholes they are now, but rather mandatory reeducation facilites. Convicts should not be locked away in dirty cell blocks, they should have their own single houses or rooms with access to TV and books and own showers. Focus of the prisons would be qualification, social/anti aggression training and rehabilitation. No SHU torture and abusive guards, the inmates would look up to the staff as friends and guides.The prisons would be there to help the delinquents to become better members of society and guide them to a live without crime.

Work is voluntary and paid as it would be in the outside world, with apprenticeships and useful skills teached. Also every inmate would have access to psychological and medical help 24/7 and has the right at all time to have visitors and make phone calls. The food offered would be very healthy and sports programs are offered to keep everyone fit.

What do you think about htis concept? Do you think it will work and help cons to live a crime free life after their stay?

[Rudolf]

Do you think it will work and help cons to live a crime free life after their stay?

Will it balls.

you can call a cage a "hospital" a "prison" a "reeducation facility" but it remains a cage. It is not an environment to create free men and women with compassion and mutual aid, it can only exacerbate any latent anti-social tendencies.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Prisons in socialism? Property in socialism? Paid work in socialism? Um... no? That's not what we stand for at all.

[Tim Cornelis]

Maffia in socialism? How does that work?

[bricolage]

the inmates would look up to the staff as friends and guides.
yeah good luck with that.

[DOOM]

Guise Guise just call it the people's prison

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Or the community prison if you're so inclined.

We also apparently need the people's or community police, the people's court, hell, why not the people's gallows? Where else do you propose we hang the people.

[BIXX]

What would prisons even be used for?

Protecting the peoples property? Oh OK I didn't realize the revolution was waged to usher in a new capitalism

[RedWorker]

Letting alone the confusion about property still being a problem under communism, I think this is a relevant topic. I have argued elsewhere that murder, though very reduced, will still exist under communism. Society would probably also still require rules, and some form of problem-solving in order to avoid reactionary "vigilante justice" rising up.

[Bala Perdida]

Letting alone the confusion about property still being a problem under communism, I think this is a relevant topic. I have argued elsewhere that murder, though very reduced, will still exist under communism. Society would probably also still require rules, and some form of problem-solving in order to avoid reactionary "vigilante justice" rising up.In other words you want police in communism.

[Rafiq]

In other words you want police in communism.

Well no, because police have a very different role in present day society than merely enforcing the "rules" of the commons. Firstly, police at least in the United States possess a high degree of authoritative autonomy, and they emerged as basically an organized strike-breaking force. In the US, typically, murders of the eccentric type (I.e. Street violence, for one, would likely disappear) are largely dealt with on a Federal level. If the prison problem were "just about" these kinds of murders, serial killers, and so on, there would be absolutely no need for prisons and such problems would be conceived as being of a medical nature. The reason we found that prisons were over-flowing in the USSR during the 30's, for example, was owed to collectivization and the very real peasant resistance, the turmoil, chaos that followed in the state apparatus - etc.

The reality is that, if we're speaking in hypothetical terms, before we're ever forced to face such questions, a mega centralized state with an extensive - yes - "internal security apparatus" would be necessary on a global scale, which would undoubtedly deal with murders in the same vein that it would counter-revolution.

There were many problems with both the Cheka and later the NKVD, but what many forget is that exercising state terror was only one of the many functions of both. The Cheka, for example, engaged in a massive campaign against child homelessness, the NKVD oversaw a number of public duties, fire-fighting, and so on.

Something akin to a state-security apparatus that exercises control over such functions answerable to one authority - which in turn would be politically transparent and under the direct political control of the proletarian dictatorship would be expected.

[Red Guardian]

Hold on a second, what RedWorker is saying sounds valid to me. There likely will still be violent crimes, sexual crimes, murders, and all the rest of it even in a communist society. So the question of how we ought to respond and what to do with the people in question is a legitimate and valid one. I agree with OP that there need to be rehabilitation centers for people (especially in light of the fact that most people who commit crimes like this suffer from serious psychological issues, which should be treated as illnesses rather than crimes).

[Hatshepsut]

Prison in Das Kapital is largely relegated to the footnotes: Chap. 7 n. 15 quotes Martin Luther in reference to the fact that not all which we call service or benefit actually serves or benefits anyone. Chap. 10 n. 72 observed the temptation to use prison for social infractions; that time it was breaking the Sabbath. In Chap. 15 he compared the employment of boys as doorkeepers under “labor reform” to being in jail. Prisoners finally come out on top in Chap. 25 when it turned out they were eating better than a labor that had sunk so low in England.

I’m realist enough to know that communism will have to address the issue of persons who must be confined for some reason, perhaps because in an agitated or angry state that presents danger to neighbors. Security details and lockups will remain necessary until better technology for maintaining public safety is available. Acknowledging this may be unpopular on a leftist forum, but dodging the issue relies on the assumption that violence, disorder, and greed will magically disappear if our society converts to socialist political relations. I think a socialized economy, while having fewer aggression problems than we deal with now, will still have occasional crimes or acts of interpersonal violence.

When things like that do happen, we’ll have to face relatives of homicide victims who want revenge and other messy situations. We’ll still need ways to curb those who would chisel the system or seek to exploit its workers.

Nonetheless any form of imprisonment is highly suspect. A socialism worth its name cannot countenance penal courts that hand down “sentences” as punishment, much less the barren overcrowded chambers we lock people into today. Restraining a person’s physical liberty should probably be in a hospital-type setting or group home, and continued only long enough to restore self-control of behavior.

[BIXX]

Prison in Das Kapital is largely relegated to the footnotes: Chap. 7 n. 15 quotes Martin Luther in reference to the fact that not all which we call service or benefit actually serves or benefits anyone. Chap. 10 n. 72 observed the temptation to use prison for social infractions; that time it was breaking the Sabbath. In Chap. 15 he compared the employment of boys as doorkeepers under “labor reform” to being in jail. Prisoners finally come out on top in Chap. 25 when it turned out they were eating better than a labor that had sunk so low in England.

I’m realist enough to know that communism will have to address the issue of persons who must be confined for some reason, perhaps because in an agitated or angry state that presents danger to neighbors. Security details and lockups will remain necessary until better technology for maintaining public safety is available. Acknowledging this may be unpopular on a leftist forum, but dodging the issue relies on the assumption that violence, disorder, and greed will magically disappear if our society converts to socialist political relations. I think a socialized economy, while having fewer aggression problems than we deal with now, will still have occasional crimes or acts of interpersonal violence.

When things like that do happen, we’ll have to face relatives of homicide victims who want revenge and other messy situations. We’ll still need ways to curb those who would chisel the system or seek to exploit its workers.

Nonetheless any form of imprisonment is highly suspect. A socialism worth its name cannot countenance penal courts that hand down “sentences” as punishment, much less the barren overcrowded chambers we lock people into today. Restraining a person’s physical liberty should probably be in a hospital-type setting or group home, and continued only long enough to restore self-control of behavior.

But the entire premise of prison or "behavioral reform" is the problem- coercing someone to act as society sees fit rather than them. Your idea is that everyone can have freedom as long as what they choose to do with it is acceptable to society, which isn't freedom at all.

[Tim Cornelis]

And your freedom is libertine in nature? Of course your freedom is going to be restricted by the community. Unless you believe in the freedom to take a shit on my front porch. There's no absolute, individualist freedom.

[Redistribute the Rep]

There may be some people who are too dangerous and need to be separated from mainstream society; however, I don't think there will be prisons resembling what we have today. Also, emphasis will probably be put on preventing such occurrences from happening in the first place.

[BIXX]

So, tell me, what is the minimum punishable offence under socialism then? What is the smallest thing I wouldn't be allowed to do, without threat of violence from society?

[Tim Cornelis]

Probably shitting on my front porch. Nah, I don't know the specifics. I know communism will be based on customary law, and that this will be reflective of the egalitarian and libertarian values, but I'm not sure if it will encompass customary criminal law. And of course, people are going to get hung up on the word "law", but whatever. I'm going to read some Thom Holterman and Louk Hulsman before being able to address these questions more specifically.

[RedWorker]

I think a system of democratically elaborated rules and social coercion will be used until a stage is reached in which it can wither away - which I do not see possible in the foreseeable future. This has caused the people who unfailingly defend every atrocity of the Bolsheviks and their police forces to accuse me of supporting a "socialist police." (and I really think this 'contradiction' is relevant in understanding this issue)

At the point society can function without rule and coercion, they will wither away. But until that point we'd better use a system based on principles worthy of the new society, no?

[Rafiq]

For one, it's important that a Communist society would be one that entails not only economic association between free producers, but a society that is in association even on a - for lack of a better word - spiritual level. Meaning the paranoia of liberals about the "collective tyranny over the individual" are perfectly accurate, this is Communism. The independent, petty bourgeois life would be non-existent (And economically, is largely non-existent today - no one actually lives in a way that is independent from others) - a Communist society would undergo extensive socialization on a cultural level, with mass-based organs of collective power, energetic mobilizations, etc.

Of course, the individual would still exist as such, but there would be no hypocrisy or artifice about it - it would be ingrained in action and behavior that each particular member of a community is only the particular expression of a wider force.

[Tim Cornelis]

Democratically established rules are unnecessary. When you play football with your friends, there's no formal voting procedure to establish the rules. The rules are established through custom. This is sufficient. And yes, conflict can arise. And we'll deal with it.

[RedWorker]

Democratically established rules are unnecessary. When you play football with your friends, there's no formal voting procedure to establish the rules. The rules are established through custom. This is sufficient. And yes, conflict can arise. And we'll deal with it.

Serious matches are played under written rules. And in practice, "just dealing with it" without an established system prepared to deal with such things (which doesn't mean that we have to blueprint it now) would probably have terrible results. One possible example being vigilante justice rising up if society is just expected to resolve its problems spontaneously without planning or social organs.

[Rudolf]

There may be some people who are too dangerous and need to be separated from mainstream society; however, I don't think there will be prisons resembling what we have today. Also, emphasis will probably be put on preventing such occurrences from happening in the first place.


Evidently these communist prisons share fundamental characteristics as all prisons hence the term prison. They will be like what we have today.

What i find saddening is that the logic of separating someone from society is left unchallenged. These people you deem too dangerous... you may as well kill them as you're actively hindering their social instinct by removing them from society at large thus exacerbating the problem.

It's not like said people will be a sizeable minority, we could easily reduce their ability to be a danger through supervision within society.

[BIXX]

Evidently these communist prisons share fundamental characteristics as all prisons hence the term prison. They will be like what we have today.

What i find saddening is that the logic of separating someone from society is left unchallenged. These people you deem too dangerous... you may as well kill them as you're actively hindering their social instinct by removing them from society at large thus exacerbating the problem.

It's not like said people will be a sizeable minority, we could easily reduce their ability to be a danger through supervision within society.

I think for a society there needs to be prisons, but the issue at hand for me is that society is violent inherently.

[StromboliFucker666]

I have an honest question, how would violent people be handled? If someone has an untreated mental issue, they may do something violent. If they do anything violent, how should they stopped? Would it just be vigilante justice? Would someone just come up and shoot the murderer or rapist?

[RedWorker]

It would be treated and if there is an imminent danger of any significant violence they'd be locked up. Edit: except if locking them up is shown to be counter-productive. The decision would be left to science and experts.

[Hatshepsut]

But the entire premise of prison or "behavioral reform" is the problem- coercing someone to act as society sees fit rather than them. Your idea is that everyone can have freedom as long as what they choose to do with it is acceptable to society, which isn't freedom at all.


And your freedom is libertine in nature? Of course your freedom is going to be restricted by the community. Unless you believe in the freedom to take a shit on my front porch. There's no absolute, individualist freedom.

Yet if someone's behavior is violent, or highly asocial as in shitting on porches, do we allow them to continue until one of their intended victims stops them? That's basically what behavior restriction by the community is, and it can be as ugly as anything professional police do, or worse in most cases since ordinary citizens aren't trained to control their own anger while handling a person who are acting out.

I'm well aware that police forces as currently constituted are bourgeois tools for oppression. Any community security arrangements will need close supervision by local soviets (or whatever community councils will be called), with participation by the citizens who are being policed. We don't have that now; we have police bureaucracies accountable only to a few government officials, with decisions made behind closed doors. I don't think it has to be that way, however.

And again, it's hard for me to pretend this issue won't crop up. It needs to planned for if we want social justice served. Ideally I think first interventions should come with the young, before they've been neglected and progressed to more serious behaviors. Yet some degree of social control is still entailed, and some people who get into trouble don't respond to informal counseling or other reason-based approaches.

[StromboliFucker666]

It would be treated and if there is an imminent danger of any significant violence they'd be locked up.
What if no one knows? It can't be treated if no one knows. Some people here said they would not be locked up.

[RedWorker]

What if no one knows? It can't be treated if no one knows.

Then the same thing that happens in capitalism would occur. Communism doesn't give psychic powers. That said, there would be much less social alienation in communism and caring for everyone's mental health would be seen as a public health issue, with psychologists and mental health care being available for everyone, as well as issues being made visible and people invited to voluntary mental health checks and improvement exercises through school, public campaigns, etc., so the situation would be much more unlikely.


Some people here said they would not be locked up.

Disagreement is natural; especially since we can't be united in support of the status quo. "Truth will be found through debate", V. Lenin stated.

[StromboliFucker666]

Then the same thing that happens in capitalism would occur. Communism doesn't give psychic powers. That said, there would be much less social alienation in communism and caring for everyone's mental health would be seen as a public health issue, with psychologists and mental health care being available for everyone, as well as issues being made visible and people invited to voluntary mental health checks and improvement exercises through school, public campaigns, etc., so the situation would be much more unlikely.



Disagreement is natural; especially since we can't be united in support of the status quo. "Truth will be found through debate", V. Lenin stated.

Yeah help would definitely be more available to everyone so it would reduce this kind of thing, however we cannot have a 100% guarantee that people will seek this help. Some people that are mentally ill, do not even realize there is anything "wrong" with them. And not all parents see the signs when the mentally ill person is still a child.

I understand disagreement is natural, I was just asking the people that say there should be no prisons at all.

[Hatshepsut]

Some people here said they would not be locked up...

I think that's because many folks on the Left aren't comfortable with such issues. I don't like them either, nor can I claim to know the best solutions. But keeping peace on the streets without harming or killing people is a skilled task which requires organized provisions; I doubt it just happens naturally.


I think for a society there needs to be prisons, but the issue at hand for me is that society is violent inherently.

If that turns out to be true - and it could - then communism is impossible. I have faith that consciousness in humans will evolve away from violence under a socialist program. That will take time, likely centuries given it took that long for capitalism to emerge from the manor societies. No human achievement is perfect either. Perhaps we can learn collectively how to socialize 99% of children to become non-violent adults who don't harbor greed or dominance impulses.

There will still be a 1% or less who won't be able to adapt. They'll have to be kept apart from the rest. I don't believe that means the incognito lockdowns that mesmerize American corrections; visits from the outside world are possible, as are better material conditions and access to a premises they can move about in.

Of course there's the question of who's wise enough to judge a neighbor. No one is; it has to be a collective decision to do this to anyone, made with formal process but without the penal concept of sentences for years we have now. If a person who is confined appears to have changed, they can be released as soon as that change occurs.

[OnFire]

Norwegian prisons are a good model to start with.First off, no solitary confinement; even ignoring the unethical status of torture, it's simply pointless since it does nothing but damage the victim's mental health, making it harder and more costly to see to their needs in prison and to reintegrate. Criminals who have proven themselves violent and a danger to others should be re-socialized so they can integrate; this means that they might need to be more isolated at first, but never completely alone for length and in featureless rooms.
Prisoners generally should be given rooms with decent furniture; a desk, a chair, reading/writing/art materials, sheets, and a decent mattress, and a window to the outside with curtains. They should have free run of most of the prison facility.
The facility itself should have visitor areas, a library, and work and recreational facilities. Inmates should have access to computer/laptop workstations (this is important; computer and online literacy is necessary for successful reintegration into society). The visitor areas should be split between more secure and more relaxed areas. The minority who are extremely violent and/or mentally unstable shouldn't be allowed the opportunity to hurt other inmates or visitors. In America, inmates can't touch visitors and may only speak to them by paying a private organization a fee to use a phone - a prison designed for the social good allows for inmates who are not a danger to visitors to speak without lining some corporations coffers and to hold their loved ones.
IMO a good way to handle education and tradecraft training in prison is to have programs that give opportunities to inmates with qualifications to teach their peers. These programs could supplement a more broad program of outreach to public universities and colleges where grad students and professors could teach classes at the prison.
The food served at the prison should be of high quality; not a choice between disgusting slop or $6 brand-name candy bars and snack packets. Should be part of a program teaching practical cooking skills plus basic home ec, dietary needs, and nutrion, with opportunity for those interested to learn how to be a chef.
This is just the beginnings of some of the basics. Really, all of it is a no-brainer once the reactionary fixation on punishment is abandoned. When it comes to the organization of society, what matters is the health and well-being of society as a whole. What does not matter in the slightest is what a criminal deserves. When we ask questions like "but what if someone murdered your partner, wouldn't you want revenge?" or "haven't rapists given up their right to humanity?", we are not thinking about the health and well-being of society. If someone murdered my partner, I honestly can't say that I wouldn't wish horrible things on them or that I wouldn't hurt or even kill them given the chance - none of this changes the fact that a prison with rehabilitation and social programs is best for the health and well-being of all society. Emotional whims do not represent social justice.

[BIXX]

Norwegian prisons are a good model to start with.First off, no solitary confinement; even ignoring the unethical status of torture, it's simply pointless since it does nothing but damage the victim's mental health, making it harder and more costly to see to their needs in prison and to reintegrate. Criminals who have proven themselves violent and a danger to others should be re-socialized so they can integrate; this means that they might need to be more isolated at first, but never completely alone for length and in featureless rooms.
Prisoners generally should be given rooms with decent furniture; a desk, a chair, reading/writing/art materials, sheets, and a decent mattress, and a window to the outside with curtains. They should have free run of most of the prison facility.
The facility itself should have visitor areas, a library, and work and recreational facilities. Inmates should have access to computer/laptop workstations (this is important; computer and online literacy is necessary for successful reintegration into society). The visitor areas should be split between more secure and more relaxed areas. The minority who are extremely violent and/or mentally unstable shouldn't be allowed the opportunity to hurt other inmates or visitors. In America, inmates can't touch visitors and may only speak to them by paying a private organization a fee to use a phone - a prison designed for the social good allows for inmates who are not a danger to visitors to speak without lining some corporations coffers and to hold their loved ones.
IMO a good way to handle education and tradecraft training in prison is to have programs that give opportunities to inmates with qualifications to teach their peers. These programs could supplement a more broad program of outreach to public universities and colleges where grad students and professors could teach classes at the prison.
The food served at the prison should be of high quality; not a choice between disgusting slop or $6 brand-name candy bars and snack packets. Should be part of a program teaching practical cooking skills plus basic home ec, dietary needs, and nutrion, with opportunity for those interested to learn how to be a chef.
This is just the beginnings of some of the basics. Really, all of it is a no-brainer once the reactionary fixation on punishment is abandoned. When it comes to the organization of society, what matters is the health and well-being of society as a whole. What does not matter in the slightest is what a criminal deserves. When we ask questions like "but what if someone murdered your partner, wouldn't you want revenge?" or "haven't rapists given up their right to humanity?", we are not thinking about the health and well-being of society. If someone murdered my partner, I honestly can't say that I wouldn't wish horrible things on them or that I wouldn't hurt or even kill them given the chance - none of this changes the fact that a prison with rehabilitation and social programs is best for the health and well-being of all society. Emotional whims do not represent social justice.

Theere shouldn't be any prisoners.

[Armchair Partisan]

I'm glad this discussion sprung up once again, because it really seems to me like the revolutionary left has not yet been able to decisively solve the question. And perhaps we need to see the rise of some kind of workers' state and how material conditions are changed within it before we can figure out how to get rid of prisons and other containment facilities altogether.

In another thread where I had an ongoing discussion with Xhar-Xhar about the same issue that I eventually forgot about, it seemed like the stance that "communities will have to protect themselves" is quite prevalent. I find that worrying, but even more worrying is the line that certain anarchists take: "the community will have to ostracize or persuade the criminal to stop". And of course, another regular line: "there will be no criminals in communism because somehow mental illnesses will go away" (I admit that the financial causes will cease), which is just a creative way to dodge the problem.

I'm extremely skeptical of the idea that all crime will go away eventually. If we don't have any better way to deal with criminals than "humane prisons", then we can't do full prison abolition. Because really, there only have to be a few outliers and there is a big problem. Without prisons, what do you do with a successful serial killer (let's just please assume that at least one will exist in a socialist society at some point) who is too skilled to be caught by some average vigilante gang?

[BIXX]

I'm glad this discussion sprung up once again, because it really seems to me like the revolutionary left has not yet been able to decisively solve the question. And perhaps we need to see the rise of some kind of workers' state and how material conditions are changed within it before we can figure out how to get rid of prisons and other containment facilities altogether.

In another thread where I had an ongoing discussion with Xhar-Xhar about the same issue that I eventually forgot about, it seemed like the stance that "communities will have to protect themselves" is quite prevalent. I find that worrying, but even more worrying is the line that certain anarchists take: "the community will have to ostracize or persuade the criminal to stop". And of course, another regular line: "there will be no criminals in communism because somehow mental illnesses will go away" (I admit that the financial causes will cease), which is just a creative way to dodge the problem.

I'm extremely skeptical of the idea that all crime will go away eventually. If we don't have any better way to deal with criminals than "humane prisons", then we can't do full prison abolition. Because really, there only have to be a few outliers and there is a big problem. Without prisons, what do you do with a successful serial killer (let's just please assume that at least one will exist in a socialist society at some point) who is too skilled to be caught by some average vigilante gang?

Why not abolish crime then that seems way more humane and shit

[Antiochus]

Because when the local serial killer gets caught I don't really give a shit if he is "separated from society". I mean, my god. Everyone here is, I assume, ok with revolutionary violence, but you are so tied up with this liberal fetishism that no one should be deprived of their "rights"?

So yes, murderers and rapists can be sent to mental health clinics where psychiatrists can ascertain whether they are a danger to other people. If they still are, oh well, keep them separated.

And yeah off course there will still be crime, any notion that it will disappear is a fantasy. Theft will be reduced and murders linked to organized crime will probably cease, but your average Zodiac killer will still loom at large. If you want "live with them" or "persuade them" to change their ways, be my fucking guest :laugh:

Let me guess though, you won't willingly lock yourself in a room with him/her without a revolver? You know, to convince him that crime is over.

[Armchair Partisan]

Why not abolish crime then that seems way more humane and shit

Go ahead. I guess one decree will suffice? You are right, if crime is... 'abolished', prisons will be absolutely unnecessary.

[StromboliFucker666]

Why not abolish crime then that seems way more humane and shit
So murderers and rapists can just run around doing it without consequences? No thanks.

[willowtooth]

shouldn't the question be what would a stateless classless moneyless prison look like?

what would you want done to your father if he murdered your mother? Would you confine him in a cage in your basement for the rest of his life, and feed him moldy food, and let him be raped every few days? would you give him job training?

what would you do? too much of our decisions about prisons or punishments or what defines crime are centered around classism and thats something that needs too change

[Hatshepsut]

Because when the local serial killer gets caught I don't really give a shit if he is "separated from society". I mean, my god. Everyone here is, I assume, ok with revolutionary violence, but you are so tied up with this liberal fetishism that no one should be deprived of their "rights"?

Revolutionary violence and prisons are both corrosive. The revolutions in Russia and China both went corrupt, with both places suffering much higher mortality from violence over their histories than the USA did. (Though we shouldn't forget that the USA mitigates violence by offshoring it, seizing resources abroad to placate the domestic population with consumerism. Whereas China and Russia have had to field their internal conflicts at home.)

This leads to a paradox: No socialism is likely in a place like the U.S. without a revolution. And the need to remove antisocial people from the streets exists everywhere in the world.

I don't believe future communist society will be Utopia, free of all human conflict or bad behavior, even on part of its workers' soviets. It just leads us in the direction I think we're evolving toward in the long run, and will bring the world's first economic system not based on greed and class privilege.

[BIXX]

So murderers and rapists can just run around doing it without consequences? No thanks.

If you think abolishing crime means rapists running around everywhere you're an idiot.

[StromboliFucker666]

If you think abolishing crime means rapists running around everywhere you're an idiot.
If you abolish crime, nothing is illegal. You can abolish the actions that could be considered crime in a society with rules but to abolish all the rules about crime would mean exactly what I said. Murderers and rapists just doing what they want until someone kills them.

[VivalaCuarta]

In socialism there will be no state.

[BIXX]

If you abolish crime, nothing is illegal. You can abolish the actions that could be considered crime in a society with rules but to abolish all the rules about crime would mean exactly what I said. Murderers and rapists just doing what they want until someone kills them.

Why does something need to be illegal to be opposed? We oppose capital but it is very legal. We oppose police but they are the ultimate expression of law. We oppose alienation even though the law doesn't even consider it formally.

If you think we need the law to oppose something then your revolution is just gonna usher in new police who protect community assets and seek to control the existence of all beings. Why bother with a revolution in that case? Capitalism is doing the job just fine.

[StromboliFucker666]

Why does something need to be illegal to be opposed? We oppose capital but it is very legal. We oppose police but they are the ultimate expression of law. We oppose alienation even though the law doesn't even consider it formally.

If you think we need the law to oppose something then your revolution is just gonna usher in new police who protect community assets and seek to control the existence of all beings. Why bother with a revolution in that case? Capitalism is doing the job just fine.
Okay, that's fine. However just getting rid of laws will not make everyone become an intelligent person. I am saying we need an alternative to police and prisons because we simply cannot expect every unstable person to get treatment before they harm someone.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

This is a pretty fundamental communist/anarchist dilemma. On one hand, there is the idea that a community or state, to imprison or detain violent people, must use coercion and power. On the other is the fact that assault, rape, torture, kidnapping and murder are themselves coercive, violent and oppressive. Either way, violent oppression is occurring.

There is certainly no short-term solution. The proletariat won't want people with violent anti-social tendencies running around free from coercive power - certainly, the early USSR did not do anything like disbanding the police or abolishing prisons, and even anarchist movements have used collective coercion to deal with people. Will women want a society where rapists or violent/jealous partners face no threat of coercion? Will the weak want a society where the strong can use physical force to victimize them? Of course, prisons do contradict the political and economic equality of all humans in the "final stage" of communism, but at the same time, we cannot rule out the possibility that the people themselves will demand or institute protection from themselves. The question isn't whether or not to abolish prisons, but how we can make prisons obsolete.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

There is certainly no short-term solution. The proletariat won't want people with violent anti-social tendencies running around free from coercive power - certainly, the early USSR did not do anything like disbanding the police or abolishing prisons, and even anarchist movements have used collective coercion to deal with people.

Correct - the early USSR didn't abolish the police because the police had already been abolished in name by the Provisional Government, bowing to the sheer hatred the workers felt for the police (this of course goes against the "oh but 'the people' will want a police" - where will you find people who want a police force? most workers in the real world loathe the cops, for good reason). The Bolshevik government made that a reality. The nominal replacement, the Workers' and Peasants' Militia, wasn't really organised until the early twenties. The USSR, of course, wasn't a socialist society but a revolutionary dictatorship. There is quite a difference.

What do people imagine the police do? Do people honestly think that if someone tries to kill them, they can just call the police and the police will come and save them? More likely they'll come to photograph your corpse and file the required documentation then forget about it. And if they manage to convict someone, who might not have anything to do with your murder, what, are you going to spring back to life when they're sent to prison? And don't give me that deterrence crap, if that was true crime rates would fall with increased policing and they demonstratively don't.

[Hatshepsut]

And don't give me that deterrence crap, if that was true crime rates would fall with increased policing and they demonstratively don't.

I would say maybe, maybe not. Crime rates & deterrence involve more than just police and prison, but it would be a mistake to assume that security arrangements such as a police force have nothing to do with it.

We note that formal police only become necessary when a society is large enough that people don't know each other as they do in small villages. In a big city, it is possible to rape or murder anonymously, and get away with it if not caught in the act.

Policing is one of those things that show diminishing returns. We have good reason to believe that early big cities that had no police, such as London in the 16th century, were in fact very dangerous places to live. People locked up their houses at night and hired bodyguards if they could afford it. So, having even a few police officers may have a big deterrent effect.

The modern USA already has lots of police. Adding more police may no longer increase deterrence, because you need only enough police to ensure everyone believes a police officer will respond when a crime occurs. Once people believe this, adding more cops doesn't increase deterrence. On the other hand, that doesn't mean we can abolish the entire police force without consequences.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

I would say maybe, maybe not. Crime rates & deterrence involve more than just police and prison, but it would be a mistake to assume that security arrangements such as a police force have nothing to do with it.

We note that formal police only become necessary when a society is large enough that people don't know each other as they do in small villages. In a big city, it is possible to rape or murder anonymously, and get away with it if not caught in the act.

Policing is one of those things that show diminishing returns. We have good reason to believe that early big cities that had no police, such as London in the 16th century, were in fact very dangerous places to live. People locked up their houses at night and hired bodyguards if they could afford it. So, having even a few police officers may have a big deterrent effect.

The modern USA already has lots of police. Adding more police may no longer increase deterrence, because you need only enough police to ensure everyone believes a police officer will respond when a crime occurs. Once people believe this, adding more cops doesn't increase deterrence. On the other hand, that doesn't mean we can abolish the entire police force without consequences.

We have reason to believe cities like London remained relatively dangerous "even" after the introduction of a police force, which was connected to the ongoing process of capitalist accumulation. Some cities, Edinburgh for example, seem to have become more dangerous after the introduction of professional law enforcement (even if we ignore the murderous bourgeois state machine and focus on acts by private citizens). But if deterrence worked, whenever police presence falls to zero, during police strikes for example, we should see a significant increase in the crime rate. We don't, according to all the data I'm aware of.

[Antiochus]

Why does something need to be illegal to be opposed? We oppose capital but it is very legal. We oppose police but they are the ultimate expression of law. We oppose alienation even though the law doesn't even consider it formally.

If you think we need the law to oppose something then your revolution is just gonna usher in new police who protect community assets and seek to control the existence of all beings. Why bother with a revolution in that case? Capitalism is doing the job just fine.

Semantics at their best. Who cares if you label it a crime or not? Who cares if it has any legality? At the end of the day you have to punish rapists and murderers, there is no 'way around that'. And off course it so happens that most of these crimes happen by subterfuge, seldom are they 'proclaimed', so there will be a need for a forensics force to investigate those crimes, ascertain their merit and punish the culprits and so forth. While I don't think a "police" force is great, the above mention will be all that but name, if it hurts your snowflake feelings. I just don't see someone feeling indifferent about being raped or having a loved one killed by someone, regardless of the supposed uselessness of justice.

[BIXX]

Semantics at their best.

Not really, crime cannot exist without a legal system, to which I am opposed.

[Os Cangaceiros]

I think historically most of the anarchists who were faced with this dilemma usually took the "why have four walls when you only need one?" solution to the problem.

I'm not sure how a society of free producers would try and regulate behavior. It would probably be very different from the system we have today, just as the penal code of, say, 1200 is very different than it is today. The entire system of correctional institutions and professional police forces that people commonly base their arguments on in these types of discussions is a relatively recent development.

I do know that any social revolution worth a damn is going to involve the emptying and destruction of prisons on a large scale. Even relatively minor episodes of civil unrest feature this...the events in Tunisia in late 2010 resulted in about half of that country's prison population being released (10,000+ people), for example.

[Hatshepsut]

But if deterrence worked, whenever police presence falls to zero, during police strikes for example, we should see a significant increase in the crime rate. We don't, according to all the data I'm aware of.

The USA doesn't allow police strikes, but Montreal had one in October 1969. It lasted only 16 hours, yet a fair amount of related trouble on the streets does seem to have arisen: Ten banks plus other businesses were held up, and that was with Mounties and troops on their way into the area. The following is a newspaper article, not a statistical study, so no predictions can be made from it. I never subscribed to the "crime wave" hysterias the right wing used to moot fairly often even when no strikes or riots were on. Yet I'd still be nervous in a city if police service were abruptly cut. In a rural area it might be less urgent; nonetheless the vigilante justice element comes in then.

Chicago Tribune, Oct. 9, '69
http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1969/10/09/page/18/article/montreal-cops-forced-back-to-work-after-crime-upsurge

A strike is also of course different than a deliberate termination of regular law enforcement would be. What the latter would be like isn't known since it hasn't happened. We don't even know whether alternative plans would be made. One could look at developing world slums which the state doesn't police (except when they go in to repress things). These places don't have "crime waves" either; instead they have a more or less steady level of disorder. It's not favorable however; towns in Colombia have among the world's highest murder rates.

I just don't advocate amateur public safety by citizens as a solution for a complex society. Human spirit and culture must undergo great change before we are ready for that. Despite their brutality toward minorities, police play a role in protecting them: The lynching era in the U.S. South didn't end due a sudden goodness of heart erupting in the mobs. It ended because federal and state law officers, however grudgingly, put a stop to it.

[OnFire]

We have reason to believe cities like London remained relatively dangerous "even" after the introduction of a police force, which was connected to the ongoing process of capitalist accumulation. Some cities, Edinburgh for example, seem to have become more dangerous after the introduction of professional law enforcement (even if we ignore the murderous bourgeois state machine and focus on acts by private citizens). But if deterrence worked, whenever police presence falls to zero, during police strikes for example, we should see a significant increase in the crime rate. We don't, according to all the data I'm aware of.

Please check out the Montreal riots of '69. Police went on strike, chaos followed:

http://www.adamraskinpi.com/2008/10/montreal-police-strike-1969.html

[Bala Perdida]

Please check out the Montreal riots of '69. Police went on strike, chaos followed:

http://www.adamraskinpi.com/2008/10/montreal-police-strike-1969.html

What the fuck is this?

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

The USA doesn't allow police strikes, but Montreal had one in October 1969. It lasted only 16 hours, yet a fair amount of related trouble on the streets does seem to have arisen: Ten banks plus other businesses were held up, and that was with Mounties and troops on their way into the area. The following is a newspaper article, not a statistical study, so no predictions can be made from it. I never subscribed to the "crime wave" hysterias the right wing used to moot fairly often even when no strikes or riots were on. Yet I'd still be nervous in a city if police service were abruptly cut. In a rural area it might be less urgent; nonetheless the vigilante justice element comes in then.

Chicago Tribune, Oct. 9, '69
http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1969/10/09/page/18/article/montreal-cops-forced-back-to-work-after-crime-upsurge



The US government doesn't allow police strikes, but they happen, for example the ones in New York in 1971 and 2014. Both times, the city did not experience an increased crime rate. The problem with using Montreal in 1969 as an example is that the crime rate had already increased from normal levels in the months leading up to the strike. In fact the strike was over the increased workload. We're told ten hold-ups happened - some accounts have it at six, mind - but all we're told about the preceding period is that the number of hold-ups over one month averaged "more than 15". That's not particularly helpful. The major event during the police strike was a riot, but riots are not exactly individual crimes, are they? This riot was caused by the rent-a-cops of a company involved in a labour dispute, and would presumably have happened even if the police were not on strike (and I think the Surete of Quebec was on site).

If the police "services" to my city were cut off, I would be quite pleased. That's the part that amuses me, people seem to buy the line that the police are here to Protect the Citizens hook, line and sinker. But recall your own interaction with the police - when was the last time they protected you? I would wager you're more likely to have been harassed by someone in uniform than protected.


A strike is also of course different than a deliberate termination of regular law enforcement would be. What the latter would be like isn't known since it hasn't happened. We don't even know whether alternative plans would be made. One could look at developing world slums which the state doesn't police (except when they go in to repress things). These places don't have "crime waves" either; instead they have a more or less steady level of disorder. It's not favorable however; towns in Colombia have among the world's highest murder rates.

So do highly policed slums like the slums of Johannesburg during the Apartheid era. The crime is due to social conditions, not the absence of police.

And there have been situations where the police force in an area disbanded, Russia after the October Revolution for example.


I just don't advocate amateur public safety by citizens as a solution for a complex society. Human spirit and culture must undergo great change before we are ready for that. Despite their brutality toward minorities, police play a role in protecting them: The lynching era in the U.S. South didn't end due a sudden goodness of heart erupting in the mobs. It ended because federal and state law officers, however grudgingly, put a stop to it.

The same federal and state law officers then proceeded to kill US blacks on a scale that would have aroused the envy of the Imperial Grand Wizard or however KKK leaders are called exactly. And the only reason they stopped lynchings - after using organs nominally targeting the KKK against communists and against radical blacks - was unrest by black workers.

The communist doesn't believe in any goodness of the human heart. They do hold that in making a revolution, the working class changes itself as much as it changes society. Without that, what's the point of the revolution? Are we going to give all authority to some committee of experts and its police force because we're all too stupid and irrational to organise society? That's not what socialists stand for.

[Hatshepsut]

The major event during the police strike was a riot, but riots are not exactly individual crimes, are they?

So, a riot. What a great moment to have all the cops off duty. I can’t argue with your other claims regarding causal linkages between police presence and crime; you haven’t offered citation covering them and for this kind of research I lack time, expertise, or home access to academic databases (e.g. Elsevier, Lexis/Nexis) behind paywalls. Neither of us rest on more than personal opinion here.

While studies on crime are abundant, none are comprehensive. Authors in this field disagree too much with each other to convince me that definitive conclusions have been reached. I’ll observe that we do not know whether crime increased during New York’s police union actions—because having police off duty also discourages reporting of crimes by citizens to dispatch desks unstaffed or overloaded at those times. They didn’t even have the 911 system in 1971.

I haven’t denied the role that other social factors such as poverty, unemployment, and the criminalization of drugs, homelessness, or minority statuses (e.g. black) play in the phenomenon. As well the responses of the oppressed to repressive sweeps by authoritiarian police themselves. Certainly these things matter a great deal. We won’t reduce crime without reducing poverty.



If the police "services" to my city were cut off, I would be quite pleased. That's the part that amuses me, people seem to buy the line that the police are here to Protect the Citizens hook, line and sinker.

I’m glad you’re OK with the idea; I’m not. Of course I don’t credit “Serve and Protect” myths attached to police institutions that protect mainly the bourgeois and its property. Indeed if robbed, cops get involved only afterward. On the other hand, they may remove a robber from the streets before he gets to me. The mere presence of a force that can respond to their activities deters people who are thinking of commiting a crime. Robbers don’t usually act at random. They often plan their heists, casing targets out to determine how much security they face. They will be well aware that absence of a police force favors their plans. The ten bank jobs in Montreal during that 16-hour period represented nearly a whole month’s worth during the summer preceding. Only a social worker’s heart can believe that criminals are totally stupid.



And there have been situations where the police force in an area disbanded, Russia after the October Revolution for example.

The Provisional Government disbanded the police in March 1917, replacing them with a “Public Militia.” For whatever that means. The Bolsheviks instituted the Cheka almost immediately in areas they controlled after November 7. While known for terror, the Cheka also did routine gumshoe work, even spening time to provide relief to street children affected by the chaos.



The same federal and state law officers then proceeded to kill US blacks on a scale that would have aroused the envy of the Imperial Grand Wizard... [T]he only reason they stopped lynching against communists and against radical blacks - was unrest by black workers.

Or maybe because by 1936 they were out of work, too. :lol:



The communist doesn't believe in any goodness of the human heart. They do hold that in making a revolution, the working class changes itself as much as it changes society. Without that, what's the point of the revolution?

We agree that what’s called “human nature” largely results from enculturation, and that a new consciousness will evolve in the proletariat after a revolution. We disagree on how long it will require. I suspect it could take 200 years, with steady improvement in each generation. After all, the capitalist and false consciousnesses we accept for granted today didn’t emerge overnight. The beginnings of capitalist revolution in England were becoming evident after the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381 even though monarchy was next to act, in the Wars of the Roses. We don’t consider England a fully capitalist culture as such until the latter 18th century.

We might do it faster because we have better education and universal penetration of media, along with social interaction by computer now. But we won’t be able to say “home free” the morning after the bourgeois are off stage. As Lenin thought, we’ll have to rely on institutional memory capitalism has developed until new socialist traditions become second nature to us.

[Hatshepsut]

Re: http://www.adamraskinpi.com/2008/10/montreal-police-strike-1969.html


What the fuck is this?

A reactionary blog by Adam Raskin, Private Investigator. Asset searches, among other things. He does say that most cops are drawn from working-class backgrounds, maybe "police" and "army" families who tend to produce cops in more than one generation. And that the strike was, after all, a labor action. Montreal didn't have police unions as late as 1943, he says.

That's all a labor aristocracy issue to me. But it's not easy to be a cop, and while serving bourgeois masters they do incidentally cut down on street-level predation and banditry.

[Sewer Socialist]

Bank robbery? That's great. I mean, it really is. That's precisely the sort of thing I'd hope would happen without police - no respect for private property.

What about anti-social crime, though? Rape, murder, etc.? I bet those things are rarely planned and so did not increase despite a cop strike.

[Hatshepsut]

What about anti-social crime, though? Rape, murder, etc.?

Bank robbery is more antisocial than we think, despite the fact it happens in a bourgeois facility. Customers inside or at the ATMs often get robbed and the bank tellers are traumatized if not shot. Although mugging and smash-grab crimes aren't as elaborate as bank jobs, these aren't totally unplanned: The person wanting to do such a small-time taking chooses a favorable area and time, and chooses targets that look like they might have cash.

Murders often happen in course of other crimes such as robberies or home invasions. I'll concede that rapes aren't too thought out. Yet wife and child beaters and date rapists fear no investigation if there's no police force. We don't live in a society where everyone has friends and neighbors willing to step in: Many women and children facing a man who terrorizes them in the home have nowhere to go. We could provide shelters, which is already done on a limited scale, but that won't keep the man from seeking revenge or trolling for new victims.

After a revolution there are class enemies, another thing police look for. People who will steal from the workers to operate capital businesses on the side. Extortionists and loan sharks. And so on. That's in addition to political plotters who seek to execute a counter-coup to restore the old order.

[Comrade Jacob]

Only for the first few generations to suppress the reactionaries. Old ideas need to die with the old.

[Zwatt]

yeah good luck with that.
He may be a felon with several offenses but he loves authority!

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

Correct - the early USSR didn't abolish the police because the police had already been abolished in name by the Provisional Government, bowing to the sheer hatred the workers felt for the police (this of course goes against the "oh but 'the people' will want a police" - where will you find people who want a police force? most workers in the real world loathe the cops, for good reason). The Bolshevik government made that a reality. The nominal replacement, the Workers' and Peasants' Militia, wasn't really organised until the early twenties. The USSR, of course, wasn't a socialist society but a revolutionary dictatorship. There is quite a difference.


3 points -

(1) At the end of the day, they did organize an armed body of men for the purpose of policing (they called it a "militia" but what did it do? enforce laws and imprison or execute people).

(2) I never said the USSR was a socialist society, I recognize that it is a revolutionary dictatorship, but the point still stands in that a "revolutionary dictatorship" needs to use mechanisms of violence against people to enforce rules.

(3) Do you really think that the revolution would magically end all anti-social activity? I hope it would, but we can't rule out the possibility that it won't, at least not in the short or medium term. That was why I said I hope socialism makes prisons obsolete, in that there would be an end to anti-social activity. However I don't think the revolution would be some panacea which magically solves all social problems, unfortunately.

Also, where do you get this notion that "most workers in the real world loathe the cops"? That seems like an absurdly broad and strong generalization - I don't dispute that many workers dislike cops, but this view is hardly universal, nor does it always reach the level of loathing. I know workers who hate the cops, but describe experiences they had which were bad after they themselves called the police - clearly, the police were violent and prejudiced enough to earn the worker's hatred, but the point is that the worker saw the cop as serving a social function in the first place. What of bus drivers who call the cops on disruptive or threatening passengers? What of teachers who call the cops on disruptive or threatening students? I'm sure some of them are doing so because it's a part of their job duties, but it certainly seems to problematize the claim that "most workers hate cops". Not every worker is some miner locking arms with Arthur Scargill and kicking some pig in the face.

Also the higher you go in the income scale, the more things begin to change. Having myself encountered workers of a variety of incomes, it's definitely noticeable how having something to protect changes one's politics in regard to law enforcement. It also depends on the race of the worker, the town that they live in, and so on.

Lastly, hatred of police does not translate to a desire to wholly abolish that institution. I'm not saying we shouldn't abolish all police forces, but I find the argument that "well workers hate cops" rests on a broad and baseless generalization.



What do people imagine the police do? Do people honestly think that if someone tries to kill them, they can just call the police and the police will come and save them? More likely they'll come to photograph your corpse and file the required documentation then forget about it. And if they manage to convict someone, who might not have anything to do with your murder, what, are you going to spring back to life when they're sent to prison? And don't give me that deterrence crap, if that was true crime rates would fall with increased policing and they demonstratively don't.Lets forget about bourgeois police for a minute, and forget about deterrence. My point has nothing to do with either. You seem to be under the impression that I am trying to defend the police in a Capitalist society. What I'm saying is that it is not unreasonable to want a known rapist to be isolated from women to prevent him from oppressing them, which would require a mechanism of coercion, enforcement and isolation from the general population. Perhaps bourgeois cops fail in this (obviously arrest and conviction of rape is minimal), but the desire for people to not live around those with persistent anti-social tendencies is legitimate.

As for deterrence, I agree it doesn't work for many crimes such as murder which is often done in a state of passion, but I won't say I and every other car on the road don't slow my car down at known speed traps. I agree with you that deterrence is problematic, but I wouldn't go so far as to say it never works at all.