ABSTRACT
As if the issues already covered in this volume were not controversial enough, one of the most contentious debates of recent years has concerned the privatization of prisons and penal services. James Mehigan and Abigail Rowe (Chapter 15) discuss the many forms of ‘contracting out’ that characterize the current prison system, focusing on questions of cost, efficiency, quality and legitimacy. Debates about the pros and cons of privatization show no sign of abating, especially in the UK where the government has declared that no new prison building will be funded by the state for the foreseeable future, and that prisons will be subjected to ‘contestability’ which has not only introduced routine market testing for prisons and created wider opportunities for contracting out ancillary services but has also seen some private prisons being forcibly returned to the public sector. As Mehigan and Rowe point out, there is nothing intrinsically novel about making a profit from imprisonment; in fact, private enterprise can be traced back to the gaols of the Middle Ages. As a consequence, the ethical implications of an industry that requires prisoner numbers to rise in order to be commercially viable have been a concern of many criminologists and penologists whose work is reviewed in this chapter. However, very recent years have seen a massive growth in the size and power of private corrections companies and, in mapping the terrain of global corporate interests in the prison industry, Mehigan and Rowe sound a particular note of caution regarding the possibilities for multinational companies to expand their businesses in the developing world.
