If You Can’t Export Democracy, Try Prisons!

Ezekiel Edwards

If You Can’t Export Democracy, Try Prisons!

Although America’s attempt to export its version of democracy to Iraq has been a resounding failure, it has found more success at introducing to the region one of its world-renowned skills: building (and filling) prisons.

In 2006, as the U.S. State Department completed its $20 billion “reconstruction” program in Iraq, the only new rebuilding money requested was for prisons. State Department Iraq coordinator James Jeffrey asked Congress for $100 million for the sole significant building project --- prison construction (or, in the administration’s bureaucratic-speak, for “additional bed capacity for the Iraqi legal system”). This year, the United States has sought expansion of its prisons as its “security” operations around Baghdad have increased.

Even amid the human rights horrors of torture at Abu Ghraib and indeterminate detention at Guantanamo Bay,
the United States has built, maintained and expanded its prison complexes in Iraq, steadily filling them with more and more people. Stick to what you’re good at, right? Not so good at peace, let’s try prisons! We’ve managed to incarcerate 2.3 million inside of our own country, and turn prison construction into one of our most profitable enterprises, why not take our show on the road?

Many of these new prisons have been established at military bases and airports, such as the US Military compound at Al-Dhiloeia, Camp Cropper at Baghdad International Airport, the Hilla military compound, as well as in old Iraqi military barracks and public buildings, including schools and colleges across Iraq converted into detention centers.

And as prisons are being built, they are being filled. In June 2004 there were less than 5,500 people being held by American forces in Iraq. By June 2006 that number has risen almost three times to 14,500. Today, it stands at 21,000 (which does not include over 20,000 people being held in Iraqi custody or others detained outside of Iraq in the CIA’s secret prisons operating outside of the reach of international law).

While prisons in the United States are harsh and unforgiving, in Iraq they are worse. According to Amnesty International, for example, after a joint Iraqi-Multi-National Force team inspected Site 4 detention center in Baghdad, where 1,431 detainees were held under the control of the Interior Ministry, it found that detainees had been systematically abused and were being held in unsafe, overcrowded and unhealthy conditions.

Much like the prisoners stuck in Guantanamo’s abyss, thousands of people have been held by Multi-National Forces in Iraq without charge or trial, deprived of the right to challenge the lawfulness of their detention. Many have been released absent explanation after years in detention, while many others continue to be held without any effective remedy.

One of the few unfiltered glimpses of life inside the Pentagon's detention operations came from Donald Vance, a Navy veteran and American security contractor detained in error for 97 days at United States military's maximum-security detention site in Baghdad (Camp Cropper). He described being shackled, blindfolded, interrogated, and forbidden to cover his face to block light, noise and cold. He also described a haphazard system of detention and prosecution, where detainees are often held for long periods without charges or legal representation.

So as America has found “liberation” to be a far more bloody and complicated issue than anticipated, it has yet again turned increasingly to one of its favorite (and most disastrous) short-term solutions to any social, economic, and political quagmire (in addition to preemptive acts of military aggression): incarceration.

Ezekiel Edwards: Author Bio | Other Posts
Posted at 9:38 AM, Jun 26, 2007 in Criminal Justice
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Comments

Let's be a little fair here. I'll be the first to agree that the war in Iraq is a complete bumble, and that our president's intent to distribute 'democracy' to other lands is a resounding failure, but let's not try to label the U.S. as quite such a prison state yet, and say that the best things we know how to do is build prisons. It's true, there are a lot of people in prison in this country, but there are also about 300 million people in the U.S., so that means our prison population only amounts to less than 1% of our citizens. And let's not try to say that our prisons are anywhere near the worst that exist around the world. I'm sure that prison treatment handed down by the U.S. is nowhere as bad as it was when Saddam Hussein was in control. I read stories about prisoners who would suffer being hung to hooks for hours by their arms, after having their shoulders broken. I don't think our prisons hardly torture people quite so badly. And, of course, execution was pretty common under the old government, so I suppose there wouldn't be the need for so many prisons.

Nonetheless, while I agree it is pitiful that our rebuilding Iraq project has failed to accomplish anything but building prisons, what I think this demonstrates is gross incompetence more than anything. The leadership in this country need a serious overhaul, and we need to stop funneling our resources to this black hole of an agenda. However, let's not try to make it sound like we are intentionally trying to be so malicious.

Jason,

The size of America's prison population cannot be explained away by the fact that it has one of the world's largest populations. The United States incarcerates 714 people per 100,000, whereas the countries with the next highest rates per capita imprison less than 535 (Russia, Belarus, and Bermuda), a rate 25% lower. In fact, of the seven most populous countries (China, India, United States, Indonesia, Brazil, Pakistan, and Bangladesh), only the United States is in the top 23 (at number 1) in incarceration rates per capita. Of the 24 most populous countries, America is joined only by Russia in the top 23 in incarceration rates.
In 2006, the only other country that incarcerates more than one million people is China (America still out-incarcerates it by half a million inmates). America imprisons 1.3 million more people than the country with the world's third highest prison population (Russia); 6 times as many people as the country with the 4th highest (Brazil); and of the 11 countries that incarcerate over 100,000 people (there are 193 countries in the world), only 3 incarcerate more than 350,000. Just think, the country with the 6th highest prison population (Ukraine) incarcerates 198,386 people; the United States, over 2 million.

If Israel or Hong Kong were to place their entire populations in prison, on parole, or on probation, it would equal the number of people similarly situated in the United States. The number of people under the control of the American criminal justice system is greater than the entire populations of over 100 nations, and it equals the combined city populations of Paris, Rome, Barcelona, and Amsterdam.

If Namibia or Macedonia imprisoned every single person in their countries, they would still have fewer inmates than the United States. If Ireland put half of its 4.2 million people behind bars, it would still have fewer inmates than the United States. If Greece jailed 20% of its population of 11 million, it would still have fewer prisoners than America. California has more state prisoners than the combined prison populations of the three European countries with the greatest number of inmates (Germany and England, including Wales).

If New Zealand placed every one of its inhabitants on probation, it would equal the number of people on probation in the United States. The same result would follow if half of Austria were placed on probation.

There are more people on parole in the United States than there are people in Guyana.

Among "developed" nations, we incarcerate six times as many people as England, seven times as many as Canada and Germany, eight times as many as Italy and France, and ten times as many as Japan. Only Russia’s incarceration rate is in the same ballpark.

China has four times as many people as America, and India three times as many, and yet both have fewer people in prison.

1 out of every 136 Americans is incarcerated, for a total prison population of around 2.2 million people.

From mid-2004 to mid-2005, incarceration rates jumped to an average of 1,085 more people each week, resulting in 56,428 more people in prison by summer 2005 than at the same time in 2004, an increase of 2.6 percent.

The racial disparities of our prison population remain alarming, with around 12 percent of black men between the ages of 25 and 29 behind bars, compared to around 4 percent of Hispanic men and 1.7 percent of white men. Given those statistics, it should not be surprising that the five states with the highest percentage of their population in prison were Louisiana, Georgia, Texas, Mississippi and Oklahoma, while the five states with the lowest percentage are were Maine, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Vermont and New Hampshire.