Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Most Restrictive Alternative - The Origins, Control, and Functions of the Supermax Prison, 1976-2010

University Of California-Berkeley, Berkeley CA

Investigators

Abstract

Supermax prisons across the United States detain thousands in long-term solitary confinement, under conditions of extreme sensory deprivation. Courts of law do not sentence prisoners to supermaxes; rather, supermaxes detain prisoners who are allegedly institutional security risks, according to correctional administrators. Between the1980s and the 1990s, almost every state built some form of supermax facility. Although many researchers have evaluated the exponential increases in overall prison incarceration rates and prison building during this period, few have looked closely at the supermax phenomenon itself. Therefore, this project seeks to explore one overarching question: How did the concept of the supermax prison emerge in the United States, and how did this emergence shape penology discourse and punishment practice? The work draws first on a historical and institutional analysis of the supermax phenomenon, examining how courts, legislators, correctional administrators, and architects orchestrated this punishment innovation. In addition, this project will explore how supermaxes have functioned over the last twenty years, since their first inception, specifically examining who is detained in these facilities, for how long, and with what effects on individuals and institutions. This analysis of the effect of supermaxes will draw on both the experiences of former prisoners of these facilities, as described in interviews, and on quantitative analyses of current correctional population data. This project will include both a national analysis of the spread of the supermax phenomenon and two more in-depth state-based case studies, focusing on details of the emergence of the supermax institution and its functioning specifically in California and Illinois. By exploring the mechanisms of policy innovation and institutional reform, through the lens of the supermax, this project will contribute not only to correctional history but also to socio-political conceptions of how legal change happens, gets replicated, and becomes entrenched.