ABSTRACT

To an observer from Mars, our prisons may look silly and ineffective. This fact need not surprise us because our prisons reflect our state of ignorance and our sense of impotence. We feel constrained to run the sorts of prisons we do because of our failure to understand most maladaptive and violent behaviour, and our inability to deal with it. Given our unconscious awareness of our deficits, we have largely fallen back on strategies of containment and control.