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Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
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1

Introduction

As of 2019, more than 6.4 million people were on probation, in jail or prison, or on parole in the United States (Minton, Beatty, and Zeng, 2021). Over 600,000 individuals were released from state and federal prisons between 2000 and 2019, and one in three U.S. adults—more than 75 million people—have an arrest or criminal record of some kind (Carson, 2021; Manza and Uggen, 2008; Petersilia, 2003; Prescott and Starr, 2020).1 The annual budgetary cost of incarceration in the United States has been estimated at $80 billion (Lockwood and Lewis, 2019), though some estimates place it as high as $182 billion (Wagner and Rabuy, 2017). In a system that is this costly and that touches this many lives, accurate and effective measurement of success after release from prison is a high-stakes matter. How do we know whether the system is working?

In the United States, the dominant measure of correctional failure or success is recidivism. The National Institute of Justice (NIJ), the research arm of the U.S. Department of Justice, defines recidivism as “a person’s relapse into criminal behavior, often after the person receives sanctions or undergoes intervention for previous crime” (National Institute of Justice, 2021). NIJ also states that recidivism is measured by acts that result in arrest, conviction, or incarceration during a specified period (typically three years) following an individual’s release from prison. Traditionally, recidivism rates have been used as a near-universal measure to evaluate the success of correctional policies, correctional agencies, and reentry

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1 The number of individuals released from state and federal prisons fell to 549,000 in 2020. Numbers for 2021 were not available as of report release.

Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×

programs. As documented in this report, however, common recidivism measures convey an incomplete and often inaccurate and misleading understanding of the success of individuals who enter and are subsequently released from prison.

Among their other purposes, correctional interventions are intended to reduce criminal behavior and increase public safety, achieve justice for crime victims, and rehabilitate individuals who have committed crimes. Recidivism rates are used to measure the success of these interventions. Yet as this report details, recidivism conveys little about the social reintegration or personal well-being of those returning from prison and nothing about victim satisfaction with correctional interventions.

This report advances our understanding of post-release success in two key ways. First, it discusses multiple limitations of recidivism as a measure of correctional success, and it proposes significant changes in the way post-release criminal behavior is measured. Second, it considers measures of success that go beyond recidivism and provide indicators of post-release success in multiple life domains, including health, family, employment, housing, civic engagement, and personal well-being. In developing this broader notion of success, the committee considered how the outcomes for those released from prison are shaped by the social and policy environments to which they return. We recognize that success depends on the interaction among the attributes and choices of individuals, the decisions of legal authorities, and access to services and supports that facilitate reentry.

STUDY CHARGE AND SCOPE

Criticisms of the concept and measurement of recidivism are not new. Researchers in criminology, sociology, economics, psychology, public health, medicine, social work, and other fields have enlarged our understanding of what success in reentry looks like and what it requires. Nevertheless, widely promulgated recidivism data and statistics have not changed in response to these insights. It is against this backdrop that Arnold Ventures requested that the Committee on Law and Justice of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convene an expert committee to provide guidance on the measurement and evaluation of success among people released from prison. The committee was charged with critically examining: (1) the strengths and weaknesses of current measures of recidivism; and (2) correlates of positive outcomes for individuals released from prison (see the committee’s full Statement of Task in Box 1-1). Twelve prominent scholars and practitioners were included on the committee, representing a broad range of expertise including criminology, sociology, health and medicine, law and policy, statistics, corrections, and reentry (see Appendix A for biographical sketches of the committee members).

Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×

One of the first tasks facing a National Academies committee is to determine the scope of its statement of task. The committee accordingly made judgments about the bounds of its work. The primary focus of this report is on adults released from incarceration in prisons, which is the principal focus of research and source of data on recidivism. The committee recognizes that measures of success for those under community supervision, in the jail population, and in juvenile correctional settings are undeniably important, and encourages relevant stakeholders—including state, local, and federal agencies—to consider the applicability of the findings and recommendations from this report to those settings.

The measurement of success inevitably invokes normative questions of justice, including the reasonable and proper purposes of punishment and our rehabilitative obligations to those reentering society. Such questions are essential and need to be considered carefully by decision makers, communities, and scholars, but they are beyond the scope of this report. This committee’s primary task is to review the relevant research literature on the measurement of recidivism and reentry, call attention to areas needing further research, and draw appropriate conclusions. The measurement of success, however, does require consideration of systemic inequalities that shape experiences of reentry for historically marginalized populations. Such considerations are within the scope of the committee’s charge when

Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×

applied to the measurement of post-release success. Accordingly, this report considers evidence about the ways inequalities in the distribution of power, access, and opportunities shape reentry outcomes, and it draws conclusions about how this evidence can inform efforts to improve measures of success.

The issues at hand have broad reach. The measurement of success for those returning from prison has implications for the responsibilities of correctional agencies toward the persons under their supervision, the design of effective reentry policy, community-based programs and services across multiple sectors, the well-being of marginalized communities, victim satisfaction with correctional interventions, and crime control policy. Improving metrics of post-release success is a vital first step in making informed policy decisions and ensuring that taxpayer investments are spent wisely. It is also important for ensuring that the criminal legal system is accountable to those it affects directly, to their families and communities, to their victims and survivors, and to the broader public.

The committee recognizes the pressing need for progress in each of these spaces. It also recognizes that progress will require work beyond that undertaken in this report. The committee’s charge focuses on the measurement of success for those returning from prison. The charge does not include evaluating reentry programs or making recommendations for improvements to them, though these are both vital next steps in reimagining reentry. The committee encourages those interested in improving reentry to consider this report a necessary but not sufficient step in that direction.

STUDY APPROACH

Throughout its deliberations, the committee considered several questions relevant to its charge. The following are nine major questions that guided the committee’s work:

  1. How should “success” be defined for persons released from prison?
  2. What are feasible standards for post-release success and how are they related to standards of success for the general population?
  3. Do current measures of recidivism adequately capture the multiple dimensions of success and the multiple purposes of the criminal legal system, including crime reduction, rehabilitation, and justice for crime victims and survivors?
  4. Do current measures of recidivism draw on the best available knowledge about how desistance from criminal behavior occurs?
  5. What are the results of current widely cited studies of recidivism, and how have rates of recidivism based on these studies changed over time?
  6. What are the chief limitations of current recidivism measures?
Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
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  1. How do recidivism, desistance, reentry, and success differ by race, gender, and other salient identities?
  2. How do or should measures of post-release success differ across these groups?
  3. How should the needs of policy makers and service providers for a feasible method of measuring success be balanced with the need for more accurate and nuanced measures of success?

The committee met and deliberated over a ten-month period to address these questions and reach the findings and recommendations presented in this report. To augment its own expertise, the committee held several information-gathering sessions. The first public session included a moderated conversation highlighting the lived experiences of formerly incarcerated individuals, as well as research presentations focused on data and methods for measuring recidivism and qualitative approaches to studying reentry. The second public session included research presentations on theories of identity change and desistance from crime, as well as moderated conversations highlighting practitioner expertise in reentry, health, employment, education, and housing. Additional listening sessions engaged advocates for crime victims and survivors and correctional leaders, with the aim of better understanding their perspectives on the conceptualization and measurement of post-release success. Insights from these sessions are highlighted in text boxes throughout this report.

The committee conducted an extensive critical review of the literature pertaining to the measurement of recidivism and correlates of positive outcomes for those returning from prison. This review began with an English-language search of online databases, including ProQuest and HeinOnline. Committee members and project staff used online searches to identify additional literature and other resources. Attention was given to consensus and position statements issued by relevant experts and professional organizations. Research reports in peer-reviewed journals of the disciplines relevant to this study received priority. This report also builds on recent publications of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, including The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences; and Decarcerating Correctional Facilities during COVID-19: Advancing Health, Equity, and Safety (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2020; National Research Council, 2014).

LANGUAGE

In the service of accuracy, the committee uses the term “criminal legal system” to describe the various institutions, agencies, and official actors who enact and enforce criminal law in the United States. This terminology

Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×

can be found in scholarly and popular publications across disciplines, including the American Journal of Public Health, the New York University Law Review, Drug and Alcohol Dependence, the American Bar Association’s Dispute Resolution Magazine, and the Encyclopedia of Criminology and Criminal Justice (Mantha et al., 2021; McDonald and Belknap, 2014; Pinard, 2020; Schneider and Alkon, 2020; Sundaresh et al., 2020).

This report also adopts “person-first” language to refer to people who have experienced incarceration. The use of person-first terminology with reference to people caught up in the criminal legal system recognizes their humanity, their inherent dignity as human beings (Cox, 2020). It avoids labels such as “offender,” which defines someone wholly in terms of their criminal legal status and implies that law violation constitutes an immutable social status and personal identity (Solomon, 2021; Tran et al., 2018).

The movement for person-first language originated with people with disabilities in the 1980s. It has since been adopted in other areas of health and medicine and is now regularly applied to people with mental health conditions and individuals diagnosed as obese. By 2016, the Justice Department’s Office of Justice Programs had formally adopted person-first language to describe formerly incarcerated people in an effort to “reduce not only the physical but also the psychological barriers to reintegration” (Mason, 2016). Recent commentary in Academic Medicine (Bedell et al., 2019) and the American Journal of Epidemiology (Bedell et al., 2018) has called for medical professionals to make a similar shift, arguing that the language clinicians use to describe patients influences how they treat patients and noting that histories of medical research abuse were tied to stigmatizing views of the incarcerated population. Using person-centered language also aligns with the current practice of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020). The committee’s use of person-first language is not intended to minimize the impact of crime on victims and survivors or on communities. Our aim in using this language is to accurately describe the communities of interest in this study and to recognize the humanity of people who have been incarcerated.

ORGANIZATION OF THE REPORT

This report is organized into five chapters. Following this introduction, Chapter 2 elucidates the concept of recidivism and provides context on its uses, current methods of measurement, and links to criminological theory, including life course, developmental, and macro perspectives. The chapter also considers the limitations of current measures of recidivism, the quality of the administrative data from which recidivism measures are derived, and how the concept and measurement of post-release success in the criminal

Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×

legal domain can be improved by taking into account changes in the timing and duration of post-release criminal activity.

Chapter 3 reviews existing research on reentry. It focuses on what is known about the characteristics and mechanisms of success, how success differs by race, gender, and other identity categories, and gaps in research on success. It culminates in an account of what we need to know in order to effectively measure success that is not addressed by current measures of recidivism. Chapter 4 builds on the findings from the previous chapters to identify and analyze alternative measures of success. In addition to considering how best to measure desistance from crime, this chapter examines correlates of positive outcomes beyond desistance and considers broader measures of reentry success in health, education, family, employment, and more.

Finally, Chapter 5 discusses future research needs and presents conclusions and the committee’s recommendations. Targets for these recommendations include government agencies, federal, state, and local policy makers, community institutions and organizations providing services to individuals who have been incarcerated, and the research community. Taken together, the recommendations are intended to offer more effective and robust ways of thinking about, evaluating, and measuring success among those released from prison.

REFERENCES

Alper, M., Durose, M.R., and Markman, J. (2018). 2018 Update on Prisoner Recidivism: A 9-Year Follow-Up Period (2005–2014). Washington, DC: US Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Bedell, P.S., So, M., Morse, D.S., Kinner, S.A., Ferguson, W.J., and Spaulding, A.C. (2019). Corrections for academic medicine: The importance of using person-first language for individuals who have experienced incarceration. Academic Medicine 94, 2, 172–175.

Bedell, P.S., Spaulding, A.C., So, M., and Sarrett, J.C. (2018). The names have been changed to protect the. . . Humanity: Person-first language in correctional health epidemiology. American Journal of Epidemiology 187, 6, 1140–1142.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2020). Health Equity Style Guide for the COVID-19 Response: Principles and Preferred Terms for Non-Stigmatizing, Bias-Free Language. https://ehe.jhu.edu/DEI/Health_Equity_Style_Guide_CDC_Reducing_Stigma.pdf.

Cox, A. (2020). The language of incarceration. Incarceration, 1. Available: https://doi.org/10.1177/2632666320940859.

Federal Bureau of Prisons. About our Agency: Pillars. https://www.bop.gov/about/agency/agency_pillars.jsp.

Lockwood, B., and Lewis, N. (2019). The Hidden Cost of Incarceration. Marshall Project. Available: https://www.themarshallproject.org/2019/12/17/the-hidden-cost-of-incarceration.

Mantha, S., Nolan, M.L., Harocopos, A., and Paone, D. (2021). Racial disparities in criminal legal system involvement among New York City overdose decedents: Implications for diversion programs. Drug and Alcohol Dependence 226, 108867. Available: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2021.108867.

Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
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Manza, J., and Uggen, C. (2006). Locked Out: Felon Disenfranchisement and American Democracy. Oxford University Press.

Mason, K. (2016). Justice Dept. agency to alter its terminology for released convicts, to ease reentry. Guest Post, The Washington Post, May 4. Available: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/true-crime/wp/2016/05/04/guest-post-justice-dept-to-alter-its-terminology-for-released-convicts-to-ease-reentry/.

McDonald, C., and Belknap, J. (2014). Intimate partner violence. The Encyclopedia of Criminology and Criminal Justice, 1–7. Available: https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118517383.wbeccj062.

Minton, T.D., Beatty, L.G., and Zeng, Z. (2021). Correctional Populations in the United States, 2019 – Statistical Tables. U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics, NCJ 300655. Available: https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/correctional-populations-united-states-2019-statistical-tables.

Morgan, R.E., and Thompson, A. (2021). Criminal Victimization, 2020. U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics, NCJ 301775. Available: https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/criminal-victimization-2020.

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2020. Decarcerating Correctional Facilities during COVID-19: Advancing Health, Equity, and Safety. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25945.

National Institute of Justice. (2021). Recidivism. U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, National Institute of Justice. Available: https://nij.ojp.gov/topics/corrections/recidivism.

National Research Council. (2014). The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/18613.

Petersilia, J. (2003). When Prisoners Come Home: Parole and Prisoner Reentry. Oxford University Press.

Pinard, M. (2020). Race decriminalization and criminal legal system reform. New York University Law Review Online 95, 119. https://heinonline.org/HOL/P?h=hein.journals/nyulro95&i=119.

Prescott, J.J., and Starr, S.B. (2020). Expungement of criminal convictions: An empirical study. Harvard Law Review 133, 2460.

Rhodes, W., Gaes, G., Luallen, J., Kling, R., Rich, T., and Shively, M. (2014). Following incarceration, most released offenders never return to prison. Crime & Delinquency 62, 8, 1003–1025. Available: https://doi.org/10.1177/0011128714549655.

Rosenfeld, R., Wallman, J., and Fornango, R. (2005). The contribution of ex-prisoners to crime rates. In J. Travis and C. Visher (Eds), Prisoner Reentry and Crime in America, 80-104. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Schneider, A.K., and Alkon, C. (2020). Our criminal legal system: Plagued by problems and ripe for reform. American Bar Association, Dispute Resolution Magazine 26, 1.

Solomon, A. (2021). What words we use—and avoid—when covering people and incarceration. Web article posted April 12. The MarshallProject. Available: https://www.themarshallproject.org/2021/04/12/what-words-we-use-and-avoid-when-covering-people-and-incarceration.

Sundaresh, R., Yi, Y., Roy, B., Riley, C., Wildeman, C., and Wang, E.A. (2020). Exposure to the US criminal legal system and well-being: A 2018 cross-sectional study. American Journal of Public Health 110, S1, S116–S122.

Tran, N.T., Baggio, S., Dawson, A., O’Moore, É., Williams, B., Bedell, P., Simon, O., Scholten, W., Getaz, L., and Wolff, H. (2018). Words matter: A call for humanizing and respectful language to describe people who experience incarceration. BMC International Health and Human Rights 18, 1, 1–6.

Wagner, P., and Rabuy, B. (2017). Following the money of mass incarceration. Prison Policy Initiative. Available: https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/money.html.

Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×
Page 9
Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×
Page 10
Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×
Page 11
Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×
Page 12
Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×
Page 13
Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×
Page 14
Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×
Page 15
Suggested Citation:"1 Introduction." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2022. The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/26459.
×
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Nearly 600,000 people are released from state and federal prisons annually. Whether these individuals will successfully reintegrate into their communities has been identified as a critical measure of the effectiveness of the criminal legal system. However, evaluating the successful reentry of individuals released from prison is a challenging process, particularly given limitations of currently available data and the complex set of factors that shape reentry experiences.

The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison finds that the current measures of success for individuals released from prison are inadequate. The use of recidivism rates to evaluate post-release success ignores significant research on how and why individuals cease to commit crimes, as well as the important role of structural factors in shaping post-release outcomes. The emphasis on recidivism as the primary metric to evaluate post-release success also ignores progress in other domains essential to the success of individuals returning to communities, including education, health, family, and employment.

In addition, the report highlights the unique and essential insights held by those who have experienced incarceration and proposes that the development and implementation of new measures of post-release success would significantly benefit from active engagement with individuals with this lived experience. Despite significant challenges, the report outlines numerous opportunities to improve the measurement of success among individuals released from prison and the report’s recommendations, if implemented, will contribute to policies that increase the health, safety, and security of formerly incarcerated persons and the communities to which they return.

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