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Evaluating criminal justice programs
Evaluation and Program Planning, Vol. 17, No. 2, pp. 159 164, 1994 Copyright © 1994 Elsevier Science Ltd Printed in the USA. All rights reserved 0149-7189/94 $6.00 + .00
Pergamon
0149-7189(94)E0007-J
E V A L U A T I N G CRIMINAL JUSTICE P R O G R A M S Using Policy as Well as Program Theory
DENNIS J. PALUMBO a n d REBECCA D. PETERSEN School of Justice Studies, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona
My gloomy suggestion is limited to saying that a large proportion o f males from the lower classes may end up living their most active lives in prisons or camps.
(Nils Christie) Theory-driven and constructionist evaluation are two approaches that have recently been developed in program evaluation (Bickman, 1987, 1990; Chen, 1990; Chen & Rossi, 1992; Guba & Lincoln, 1989). In the former, the claim is that theory is important because neglect of theory produces an evaluation that is "a set of predetermined research steps that are uniformly and mechanically applied to various programs without concern for the theoretical implications of program content, setting, participants, implementing organizations, and so on" (Chen, 1990, p. 18). Without theory, evaluation is concerned only with the extent to which a program achieves narrow program goals. As Chen (1990, p. 34) notes:
The question of whether or not the goals are appropriate for the effectiveness of the program, or whether these rational goals and procedures could lead to unintended consequences, might not be considered. Evaluators may sometimes be serving only bureaucratic interests and neglect the broader implications for human needs and purposes from the perspective of other stakeholders. To avoid such problems, a new conceptual framework for evaluation should be concerned with value rationality and should provide more insight into the real purposes of a program and its implication for wider social interests. The lack of theory in criminal justice evaluation leads to exactly which Chen says. One example is shock incarceration, which is a program that puts young, nonviolent offenders in a 4- to 6-month boot-camp-like situation that emphasizes military discipline and physical exercise. Evaluations of a program such as shock in-
carceration usually consider program goals such as how much it reduces recidivism of offenders or diverts offenders from prison (Mackenzie & Shaw, 1993). But, as we shall argue, this approach ignores the extent to which the program supports the larger "get tough on crime" policy goals. When viewed with the theory underlying this policy, this approach enables us to "provide more insight into the real purposes of the program and its implications for wider social interest." We distinguish between policies and programs in this introduction. Policies are the intentions of governmental aspirants and officials that are found primarily in politicians' statements, party platforms, and campaign promises. These guide or give direction for legislation. Programs are the specific activities engaged in by agencies in implementing these policies. Thus, shock incarceration can be viewed as a program aimed at helping to achieve broader policy goals, such as "getting tough on crime." O f course, as we shall discuss later in this introduction, it can also be viewed as an independent development, unrelated to the get tough policy, that is supposed to achieve different policy goals. Furthermore, we argue that using a social constructionist approach helps ferret out the wider social interests underlying broad policy goals. The principal tenet of constructionist evaluation is that there is not an explicit factual reality about a program as positivist evaluation would claim. Instead, differing perceptions about programs are held by different stakeholders. Reality exists in these perceptions, not in objective facts that allegedly can be discovered by direct observation. As Yanow (1993, p. 41) notes, "Agency staff, clients, and other policy stakeholders may form interpretations of policy language, legislative intent or implementing actions; and these interpretations may differ from one another and may diverge from the intent of the policy's
Reprint requests should be sent to Dennis J. Palumbo, School of Justice Studies, Arizona State University, Box 870403, Tempe, AZ 85287-0403.
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legislators (if that even can be e s t a b l i s h e d - a question raised within the domain of interpretive analysis)." Using the constructionist approach identifies the varying set of interpretations held by different stakeholders. To date, the constructionisi approach to evaluation has been concerned only with p r o g r a m stakeholders and their perceptions of the program's goals (Guba & Lincoln, 1989). We propose here to expand this notion of constructionism to include the social construction of the putative problem the program is designed to ameliorate (e.g., for shock incarceration, this would be the "crime" problem). The main issue is whether the politically constructed get tough policy is meant to deal with a "real" crime problem or if it is a part of a putative crime problem that claimsmakers have socially constructed to fit their specific ideological value and power needs (Best, 1989; Holstein & Miller, 1993). Thus, we propose to integrate the theory-driven and constructionist approaches and apply this integrated framework to criminal justice programs. Although we propose that evaluators consider broad policy goals in their evaluations, we recognize that program evaluation is a practical and applied discipline (Guba & Lincoln, 1989). It is often conducted for clients who have practical concerns about the extent to which their programs are achieving specific, although often vaguely defined objectives. Evaluators need to satisfy these concerns. However, evaluations are often conducted by scholars or analysts who are interested in broader theoretical questions at the same time they try to satisfy practical program needs. In the latter role, program evaluation may be considered to be an applied social science discipline. However, in this role it can still contribute to the development of social science policy because applied social science has often led to important theoretical discoveries (Chalip, 1985). Our purpose in this introduction is to try to bridge the gap between applied and broader theoretical concerns. This is what we interpret the intention of theory-driven evaluation to be. Thus, an evaluation of a program such as shock incarceration cannot neglect practical program concerns such as the percent of sentenced offenders who complete its program, the recidivism rate of these offenders compared to offenders who do not complete it and compared to a similar group of offenders sentenced to prison, and the extent to which the program actually saves money and diverts offenders from prison. But the evaluator who wants to contribute to the development of broader social science theory should also consider how the specific program is linked to broader policy goals and how these policy goals are related to wider social interests. It is in this latter area that the analyst changes from a program evaluator to a social scientist. Of course, some analysts may not be interested in making this switch, and thus our discussion may not interest them. But, for those who are
interested in making this connection, we now describe how "claimsmakers" have socially constructed the concept of "intermediate punishments" and how this can be used to connect the program goals of shock incarceration to the broader get tough crime policy. In doing this, we will attempt to show that intermediate punishments such as shock incarceration are the direct result of the get tough policy, not independent creations of their own.
T H E SOCIAL C O N S T R U C T I O N OF INTERMEDIATE SANCTIONS During the 1970s alternatives to incarceration were called community corrections. They were meant to change criminal justice policy from simply incarcerating nonviolent offenders in large fortresslike prisons miles from the communities where the offenders lived, to placing them in small halfway houses in the community where they could receive counseling, job training, education, and help in finding a job. The purpose was to rehabilitate the offenders in the hope that at least some would not commit new crimes after being released. These community corrections programs were labeled "soft on crime" by Republicans who successfully used the label to defeat Democrat candidates in state, local, and national elections. Ronald Reagan and George Bush were masters at politically using the crime issue to defeat Democrats. For example, many observers believe that lhe infamous Willy Horton ad, in which a fierce looking black man was being released from prison on furlough, had a major impact on the 1988 election of George Bush. With the publication of the "Martinson Report" in 1974, an intellectual justification was created for putting an end to the community corrections movement and the few attempts at rehabilitation that were being made. Martinson and his colleagues reviewed hundreds of rehabilitation studies with the goal of discovering what methods worked. Although they found that some methods worked with some individuals, overall they concluded that "with few and isolated exceptions, the rehabilitative efforts that have been reported so far have had no appreciable effect on recidivism" (Martinson, 1975, p. 790). This led to the conclusion that "nothing works" and was picked tip by claimsmakers who promoted a "get tough" approach to crime. In pu,'suance of the get tough approach, a number of states passed mandatory sentencing laws in the late 1970s. These specified the minimum sentences for a number of crimes, especially drug crimes, taking away discretion for sentencing from judges and, in essence, giving it to legislatures and prosecutors. The federal government also passed mandatory sentencing laws and created the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines Commission by the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984. The Commission then developed a grid with specified criminal his-
Policy and Program Theory in Evaluation of Criminal Justice Programs tory of the offender across the top and the seriousness of the crime along the side. The intersection of the two specified the appropriate sentence for the offender which the judge was to follow. Any reasons for any deviations from the guidelines had to be explained and justified by the judge. As a result of these laws, incarceration rates in most states and in the federal prison system shot up and the costs of corrections increased concomitantly. Alternatives to incarceration were again sought in many states, but this time to help alleviate the prison crisis and help reduce the cost of corrections and not necessarily to rehabilitate as in the community corrections movement of the 1970s. It costs around $25,000 a year to maintain one offender in prison, and approximately $50,000 to construct a prison cell for a medium security prison. If the alternatives to incarceration really divert offenders from prison, money would be saved, because it costs less to monitor an offender on intensive probation, home arrest, or electronic monitoring or to maintain him or her on shock incarceration. (Whether or not this occurs will be discussed later in this introduction.) By the mid-1980s, the characterization of alternatives to incarceration was changed. Researchers began to refer to them as "intermediate sanctions," saying that they were essential to achieve "just deserts" and to give judges more sentencing options than just probation or prison (McCarthy, 1987; Morris & Tonry, 1990; Von Hirsch, 1992). This new construction of alternatives was done by criminologists and intellectuals, who were its principal claimsmakers. This new characterization of alternatives to incarceration emphasizes intermediate punishments and control over offenders rather than rehabilitation and community responsibility. It has several strands to it. One is the claim that courts need more sentencing options than just probation or prison in order to better fit the degree of punishment to the severity of the crime (Morris & Tonry, 1990; Von Hirsch, 1992). Criminals, the claim goes, do not fall neatly into two categories, and so punishment should not either. In this way the system achieves "just deserts." Another strand is the claim that, as prisons became overcrowded, courts are sentencing more and more offenders to probation, many of whom had committed crimes that were too serious to be given a simple probation sentence but which were not serious enough to warrant a prison sentence (Petersilia, Turner, Kahan, & Peterson, 1985). The claim is that these offenders are in need of "control" that intermediate punishments such as intensive probation can provide. Under intensive probation, an offender is subjected to very close monitoring by two probation officers who have a maximum case load of 25 instead of the 100 or more that a regular probation officer has. But the pragmatic reason for the development of alternatives to incarceration--the claim that carried the
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day in most legislatures-was that, by diverting offenders from prison to the less costly alternatives, the government could save money, avoid more overcrowded prisons, and still maintain public safety because the programs emphasized control and punishment rather than rehabilitation. These claims have been disputed. The claim that they actually divert offenders from prison has been questioned (Austin & Krisberg, 1981; Irwin & Austin, 1994). In fact, it is possible that instead, they simply allow the state to control more and more people. The claim here is that they do this by widening the net of control. There are two parts to net widening: one is stronger nets, where offenders who would have been sentenced to regular probation or parole are put on greater degrees of control such as shock incarceration. The second is larger nets, which result when new offenders are placed in the cells that are freed up by the diversion of some offenders from prison. This latter is indicated by the fact that new prisons are still being constructed and the incarceration rate has not declined even with the increase in the number of offenders being sentenced to alternatives (Abel, 1982; Vass, 1990). The claim that so-called intermediate punishments form the nucleus of a new form of justice called "just deserts" also can be questioned. Considerable doubt exists, even among its proponents, that it is possible to construct a cardinal ordering of the various intermediate punishments. Consequently, the proponents claim, an ordinal ranking may be sufficient (Morris & Tonry, 1990; Von Hirsch, 1992). A cardinal ordering would enable sentencing judges to determine that one year in prison is exactly two times as severe as, say, 4 months on shock incarceration followed by a year on intensive probation. It is obvious that such precise measurement of the severity of punishment of various sentences is not really possible. Thus, the most that can be said is that a prison sentence is more severe than shock incarceration, and the latter is more severe than regular probation, and so on. The various sentences can be rank ordered, but there is still difficulty in ranking various intermediate sanctions. Is a sentence of 4 months on shock followed by a year on intensive probation more severe than a sentence of 2 years on intensive probation? Is the latter more severe than 8 months on home arrest followed by 3 years of regular probation? Perhaps some rough ordering of severity is possible. However, the claim that intermediate sanctions help to achieve "just deserts" is just one interpretation. Another is that because of net widening, intermediate punishments are simply an add-on and not really something between probation and prison. As we suggested above, proponents of the net-widening argument say that they put offenders on greater forms of control than they would be on if the intermediate punishments did not exist (e.g., shock incarceration instead of probation) and
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that they simply increase the total number of offenders under penal supervision. Intermediate sanctions such as shock incarceration can also be seen as a symbolic lever " . . . with which to combat broader fears of social disorder which are powerfully concentrated in the imagery of crime, disease, and war" (Simon, 1993, p. 3). That is, they are meant to reassure a population fearful of crime that the state is doing something about it. But as Simon (1993, p. 11) notes, it is "by no means clear that the crisis of modern punishment is primarily a philosophical one that can be cured by philosophical discussion." But, most importantly, none of the claims about intermediate punishments question the existence of a "crime p r o b l e m , " which is the basis of the get tough on crime policy. Much of the crime problem is related to and an outcome of the "war on drugs." Many of the offenders who have been arrested, prosecuted, and convicted in the 1980s war on crime have been drug dealers and users. By 1993, a full 60% of offenders sentenced to federal prison have been drug offenders (trafficking, possession, and other drug offenses). For the first time in American history, the percentage of new court commitments to state prisons for drug crimes has surpassed the percent there for property crimes, and the majority of these are African-Americans. One in 27 American males were under some form of correctional control in 1993, whereas one in four African-American males was similarly situated. A growing chorus of people, scholars, judges, intellectuals, and others have begun to question the war on drugs (Krauss & Lazear, 1991; Staff, 1991, 1992 July, 1992 December; Staley, 1992). The claim has been that not only has the war on drugs been the reason why prisons have become overcrowded, but it also has caused escalating violence in inner cities as control over the lucrative drug money has become the principal economic activity in inner cities. Thus, the claim is made that intermediate punishments do not change the direction of criminal justice policy because they do not address the drug issue. Instead, they are concerned with how to more efficiently control the growing number of offenders caught up in the war on drugs and the get tough on crime policy. Intermediate sanctions allow the state to control more and more individuals, particularly drug offenders and particularly black offenders, who in 1993 comprised almost 50% of the offenders in state prisons. They do this because instead of shutting down a wing of a prison or an entire facility as offenders are diverted to intermediate punishments, new prisons are being built and new offenders placed in the cells freed-up by the diversion of offenders to intermediate sanctions (to the extent to which this actually occurs). In addition to criticisms of the war on drugs, a wide range of officials and groups began to question the "get tough" policy itself. For example, Attorney General Janet Reno and a number of federal judges have criti-
cized the effectiveness of mandatory sentences, saying that they do not give the courts flexibility in sentencing (Staff, November 23, 1993). The American Public Health Association condemned mass incarceration, saying that it does not address the conditions that accompany criminal behavior such as unemployment, drug addiction, poverty, and lack of education (Staff, July 15, 1992). The American College of Physicians favors crime prevention and drug treatment instead of incarceration. They argue that mandatory sentencing and national drug strategies have not alleviated problems of drug abuse and drug-related crimes. The Criminal Justice Section of the American Bar Association said incarceration is both costly and ineffective. They favor repeal of mandatory sentencing guidelines and favor community-based programs (Staff, July 15, 1992). The Pennsylvania State Commission on Sentencing said that tougher sentencing policies of the 1980s nearly tripled the state's prison population, but had little impact on deterring crime (Staff, Dec. 15, 1992). Statistical data can be marshalled to support these criticisms. For example, although the incarceration rate of offenders sentenced to federal and state programs increased by 243% from 1973 to 1992, the rate of crimes known to the police (which is usually what the public and the media refer to as the crime rate) did not go d o w n - i t actually increased by about 42%, and the violent crime rate increased by 91% (these figures are based on data provided by the Bureau of Justice Statistics; see Maguire, Pastore, & Flanagan, 1993). However, whether or not getting tough on crime actually reduces crime is not important for policy because it is the arguments and discourse that influence public policy rather than scientific evidence. As Majone (1989, p. 1) notes, "As politicians know only too well, but social scientists too often forget, public policy is made of language. Whether in written or oral forms, argument is central in all stages of the policy process." We argue in this special feature that evaluations of criminal justice programs such as shock incarceration need to recognize this and consider how they fit into claims about the policies of which they are a part. The articles in this issue put the discussion of particular programs in this broad policy context. The issue begins with an article by Petersilia, who raises questions about the "get tough" policy in California. She shows that while the prison population grew dramatically during the 1980s, the crime rate remained about the same. She concludes by discussing 8 reasons why prisons do not make more of an impact on crime. Her article is followed by Edmund McGarrel and Michael Sabath who discuss the differing perceptions that different stakeholders have of a reform policy adopted in Indiana. They find that there was the least difference in opinion among the criminal justice professionals on questions that asked whether the reform should be developed for less serious
Policy and Program Theory in Evaluation of Criminal Justice Programs offenders. They conclude that any alternative sentencing efforts, such as the one they evaluated, are likely to obtain support by focusing on less serious offenders, thus leading to net-widening. The next article is by Michael Hallett and Robert Rogers. They describe conflicting interpretations of the "truth in sentencing" program in Tennessee. They argue that "contextual constructionism facilitates an evaluation of claims put forward in the public arena and helps account for stakeholders promoting various claims." Their conclusion in regard to evaluation is that "The inclusion of multiple stakeholders holding oppositional viewpoints must now be a requisite facet of evaluation research." Dennis Palumbo, Michael Musheno, and Michael Hallett describe positive and negative political constructions of an alternative dispute resolution program in Arizona and alternatives to incarceration in Arizona. They find that the opposing constructions of these programs are similar, although they are institutionally separate programs and usually not considered together by analysts. They conclude by discussing the policy consequences of each and suggest that the claimsmakers who believe that the programs are beneficial will probably prevail in the moral discourse, although considerable opposition is developing to these claims. The next article by Arthur Lurigio and James Swartz describes impediments to sound evaluations of jail-based drug treatment programs. Their conclusion is that "the war on drugs will never be won if most of its weapons are based on enforcement or punishment." They suggest that treatment must be used in order to break the cycle of drug dependence and crime. However, Melissa Moon and Edward Latessa in the next article find that a drug treatment program operating in a mid-sized city in the Midwest did not succeed because the probationers in the experimental group failed to show up regularly and therefore had many more technical violations than the control group. The final article by James Byrne and Faye Taxman discusses the impact of crime control policy on gender, race, and class. They argue that unless there is an immediate shift in correctional control policy, the problems of gender-, race-, and class-based bias will remain. Although they find that a lot of criminal justice research concludes that discrimination does not exist, it is still the case that gender-, race-, and class-based differences can be identified at every point in the criminal justice process. Hence, it is possible to argue that it is the claims of those on either side of the issue that are important in policymaking, and not the empirical data. From a broader policy perspective, if we believe that enforcement and punishment are the wrong policies, we might want treatment to fail. This is because, similar to intermediate sanctions, treatment really supports criminalization of drugs, in as much as treatment is used on
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people who have been arrested for using drugs. If treatment seems to work, it holds out the hope that government will put more effort into it, rather than simply incarcerating users. This really supports the criminalization of drugs because it does not question the policy itself; instead, it says that criminalizing drugs is all right as long as treatment is provided. Perhaps the state should not be involved in trying to eliminate (or reduce) drug use and decriminalization is the answer.
REFERENCES ABEL, R. (1982). Introduction. In R. Abel (Ed.). The politics o f informal justice. The American experience, 1, (pp. 1-13). New York: Academic Press. AUSTIN, J., & KRISBERG, B. (1981, January). Wider, stronger and different nets: The dialectic of criminal justice reform. Journal o f Research in Crime and Delinquency, 18, 165-196. BEST, J. (Ed.). (1989). Images of issues. New York: Aldine de Gruyter. BICKMAN, L. (Ed.) (1987, Spring). Using program theory in evaluation. New directions for program evaluation, No. 33. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. BICKMAN, L. (Ed.). (1990, Fall). Advances in program theory. New directions for program evaluation, No. 47. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. CHALIP, L. (1985, Nov.). Policy research as social science: Outflanking the value dilemma. Policy Studies Review, 5, 287-308. CHEN, H. (1990). Theory-driven evaluations. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. CHEN, H., & ROSSI, P. (1992). Using theory to improve program and policy evaluations. New York: Greenwood Press. GUBA, E., & LINCOLN, Y. (1989). Fourth generation evaluation. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. HOLSTEIN, J. A., & MILLER, G. (Eds.) (1993). ReconsMering social constructionism: Debates in social problems theory. New York: Aldine de Gruyter. IRWIN, J., & AUSTIN, J. (1994). It's about time, America's imprisonment bridge. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth. KRAUSS, M. B., & LAZEAR, E. P. (Eds.) (1991). Searching for alternatives: Drug-control policy in the United States. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press. MACKENZIE, D. L., & SHAW, J. W. (1993, Sept.). The impact of shock incarceration on technical violations and new criminal activities. Justice Quarterly, 10, 463-487. MAGUIRE, K., PASTORE, A. L., & FLANAGAN, T. L. (Eds.). (1993). Sourcebook o f criminal justice statistics, 1992. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Government Printing Office. MAJONE, G. (1989). Evidence, argument and persuasion in the policy making process. New Haven: Yale University Press.
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McCARTHY, B. (Ed.). (1987). Intermediate punishments: Intensive supervision, home confinement and electronic surveillance. Monsey, NY: Criminal Justice Press. MARTINSON, R. (1974). What Works?-Questions and answers about prison reform. Public Interest, 35, 22-54. MORRIS, N., & TONRY, M. (1990). Between probation andprison. New York: Oxford University Press. PETERSILIA, J., TURNER, S., KAHAN, J., & PETERSON, J. (1985). Granting felons probation: Public risks and altematiw,s. Santa Monica, CA: RAND. SIMON, J. (1993). Poor discipline: Parole and the social control q f the underclass, 1890-1990. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press. STAFF. (1992, July 15). Medical groups question reliance on incarceration. Criminal Justice Newsletter, 23. Pace Publications. STAFF. (1992, December). Pennsylvania sentencing panel seeks new approach, Criminal Justice Newsletter, 23, Pace publications.
STAFF (1993, November 23). Drug Er~forcement Report, 10. STAFF. (1993, December 15). State officials call for a lowdown on crime bill, Criminal Justice Newsletter, 24(24). Pace Publications. STALEY, S. (1992). Drug policy and the decline of American cities. New Brunswick, N J: Transaction. UPTON, D., MARTINSON, R., & WILKS, J. (1975). The effectiveness o f correctional treatment: A survey q f treatment evaluation studies. New York: Praeger. VASS, A. A. (1990). Alternatives to prison: Punishment, custody attd the community. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. YANOW, D. (1993). The communication of policy meaning. Policy Sciences, 26, 4-61. VON HI RSC H, A. (1992). Scaling intermediate punishments: A comparison of two models. In J. M. Byrne, A. J. Lurigio, & J. Petersilia (Eds.), ,Smart Sentencing, The Emer~ence of Intermediate Sanctions. Newburg Park, CA: Sage.
Pergamon
0149-7189(94)E0007-J
E V A L U A T I N G CRIMINAL JUSTICE P R O G R A M S Using Policy as Well as Program Theory
DENNIS J. PALUMBO a n d REBECCA D. PETERSEN School of Justice Studies, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona
My gloomy suggestion is limited to saying that a large proportion o f males from the lower classes may end up living their most active lives in prisons or camps.
(Nils Christie) Theory-driven and constructionist evaluation are two approaches that have recently been developed in program evaluation (Bickman, 1987, 1990; Chen, 1990; Chen & Rossi, 1992; Guba & Lincoln, 1989). In the former, the claim is that theory is important because neglect of theory produces an evaluation that is "a set of predetermined research steps that are uniformly and mechanically applied to various programs without concern for the theoretical implications of program content, setting, participants, implementing organizations, and so on" (Chen, 1990, p. 18). Without theory, evaluation is concerned only with the extent to which a program achieves narrow program goals. As Chen (1990, p. 34) notes:
The question of whether or not the goals are appropriate for the effectiveness of the program, or whether these rational goals and procedures could lead to unintended consequences, might not be considered. Evaluators may sometimes be serving only bureaucratic interests and neglect the broader implications for human needs and purposes from the perspective of other stakeholders. To avoid such problems, a new conceptual framework for evaluation should be concerned with value rationality and should provide more insight into the real purposes of a program and its implication for wider social interests. The lack of theory in criminal justice evaluation leads to exactly which Chen says. One example is shock incarceration, which is a program that puts young, nonviolent offenders in a 4- to 6-month boot-camp-like situation that emphasizes military discipline and physical exercise. Evaluations of a program such as shock in-
carceration usually consider program goals such as how much it reduces recidivism of offenders or diverts offenders from prison (Mackenzie & Shaw, 1993). But, as we shall argue, this approach ignores the extent to which the program supports the larger "get tough on crime" policy goals. When viewed with the theory underlying this policy, this approach enables us to "provide more insight into the real purposes of the program and its implications for wider social interest." We distinguish between policies and programs in this introduction. Policies are the intentions of governmental aspirants and officials that are found primarily in politicians' statements, party platforms, and campaign promises. These guide or give direction for legislation. Programs are the specific activities engaged in by agencies in implementing these policies. Thus, shock incarceration can be viewed as a program aimed at helping to achieve broader policy goals, such as "getting tough on crime." O f course, as we shall discuss later in this introduction, it can also be viewed as an independent development, unrelated to the get tough policy, that is supposed to achieve different policy goals. Furthermore, we argue that using a social constructionist approach helps ferret out the wider social interests underlying broad policy goals. The principal tenet of constructionist evaluation is that there is not an explicit factual reality about a program as positivist evaluation would claim. Instead, differing perceptions about programs are held by different stakeholders. Reality exists in these perceptions, not in objective facts that allegedly can be discovered by direct observation. As Yanow (1993, p. 41) notes, "Agency staff, clients, and other policy stakeholders may form interpretations of policy language, legislative intent or implementing actions; and these interpretations may differ from one another and may diverge from the intent of the policy's
Reprint requests should be sent to Dennis J. Palumbo, School of Justice Studies, Arizona State University, Box 870403, Tempe, AZ 85287-0403.
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legislators (if that even can be e s t a b l i s h e d - a question raised within the domain of interpretive analysis)." Using the constructionist approach identifies the varying set of interpretations held by different stakeholders. To date, the constructionisi approach to evaluation has been concerned only with p r o g r a m stakeholders and their perceptions of the program's goals (Guba & Lincoln, 1989). We propose here to expand this notion of constructionism to include the social construction of the putative problem the program is designed to ameliorate (e.g., for shock incarceration, this would be the "crime" problem). The main issue is whether the politically constructed get tough policy is meant to deal with a "real" crime problem or if it is a part of a putative crime problem that claimsmakers have socially constructed to fit their specific ideological value and power needs (Best, 1989; Holstein & Miller, 1993). Thus, we propose to integrate the theory-driven and constructionist approaches and apply this integrated framework to criminal justice programs. Although we propose that evaluators consider broad policy goals in their evaluations, we recognize that program evaluation is a practical and applied discipline (Guba & Lincoln, 1989). It is often conducted for clients who have practical concerns about the extent to which their programs are achieving specific, although often vaguely defined objectives. Evaluators need to satisfy these concerns. However, evaluations are often conducted by scholars or analysts who are interested in broader theoretical questions at the same time they try to satisfy practical program needs. In the latter role, program evaluation may be considered to be an applied social science discipline. However, in this role it can still contribute to the development of social science policy because applied social science has often led to important theoretical discoveries (Chalip, 1985). Our purpose in this introduction is to try to bridge the gap between applied and broader theoretical concerns. This is what we interpret the intention of theory-driven evaluation to be. Thus, an evaluation of a program such as shock incarceration cannot neglect practical program concerns such as the percent of sentenced offenders who complete its program, the recidivism rate of these offenders compared to offenders who do not complete it and compared to a similar group of offenders sentenced to prison, and the extent to which the program actually saves money and diverts offenders from prison. But the evaluator who wants to contribute to the development of broader social science theory should also consider how the specific program is linked to broader policy goals and how these policy goals are related to wider social interests. It is in this latter area that the analyst changes from a program evaluator to a social scientist. Of course, some analysts may not be interested in making this switch, and thus our discussion may not interest them. But, for those who are
interested in making this connection, we now describe how "claimsmakers" have socially constructed the concept of "intermediate punishments" and how this can be used to connect the program goals of shock incarceration to the broader get tough crime policy. In doing this, we will attempt to show that intermediate punishments such as shock incarceration are the direct result of the get tough policy, not independent creations of their own.
T H E SOCIAL C O N S T R U C T I O N OF INTERMEDIATE SANCTIONS During the 1970s alternatives to incarceration were called community corrections. They were meant to change criminal justice policy from simply incarcerating nonviolent offenders in large fortresslike prisons miles from the communities where the offenders lived, to placing them in small halfway houses in the community where they could receive counseling, job training, education, and help in finding a job. The purpose was to rehabilitate the offenders in the hope that at least some would not commit new crimes after being released. These community corrections programs were labeled "soft on crime" by Republicans who successfully used the label to defeat Democrat candidates in state, local, and national elections. Ronald Reagan and George Bush were masters at politically using the crime issue to defeat Democrats. For example, many observers believe that lhe infamous Willy Horton ad, in which a fierce looking black man was being released from prison on furlough, had a major impact on the 1988 election of George Bush. With the publication of the "Martinson Report" in 1974, an intellectual justification was created for putting an end to the community corrections movement and the few attempts at rehabilitation that were being made. Martinson and his colleagues reviewed hundreds of rehabilitation studies with the goal of discovering what methods worked. Although they found that some methods worked with some individuals, overall they concluded that "with few and isolated exceptions, the rehabilitative efforts that have been reported so far have had no appreciable effect on recidivism" (Martinson, 1975, p. 790). This led to the conclusion that "nothing works" and was picked tip by claimsmakers who promoted a "get tough" approach to crime. In pu,'suance of the get tough approach, a number of states passed mandatory sentencing laws in the late 1970s. These specified the minimum sentences for a number of crimes, especially drug crimes, taking away discretion for sentencing from judges and, in essence, giving it to legislatures and prosecutors. The federal government also passed mandatory sentencing laws and created the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines Commission by the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984. The Commission then developed a grid with specified criminal his-
Policy and Program Theory in Evaluation of Criminal Justice Programs tory of the offender across the top and the seriousness of the crime along the side. The intersection of the two specified the appropriate sentence for the offender which the judge was to follow. Any reasons for any deviations from the guidelines had to be explained and justified by the judge. As a result of these laws, incarceration rates in most states and in the federal prison system shot up and the costs of corrections increased concomitantly. Alternatives to incarceration were again sought in many states, but this time to help alleviate the prison crisis and help reduce the cost of corrections and not necessarily to rehabilitate as in the community corrections movement of the 1970s. It costs around $25,000 a year to maintain one offender in prison, and approximately $50,000 to construct a prison cell for a medium security prison. If the alternatives to incarceration really divert offenders from prison, money would be saved, because it costs less to monitor an offender on intensive probation, home arrest, or electronic monitoring or to maintain him or her on shock incarceration. (Whether or not this occurs will be discussed later in this introduction.) By the mid-1980s, the characterization of alternatives to incarceration was changed. Researchers began to refer to them as "intermediate sanctions," saying that they were essential to achieve "just deserts" and to give judges more sentencing options than just probation or prison (McCarthy, 1987; Morris & Tonry, 1990; Von Hirsch, 1992). This new construction of alternatives was done by criminologists and intellectuals, who were its principal claimsmakers. This new characterization of alternatives to incarceration emphasizes intermediate punishments and control over offenders rather than rehabilitation and community responsibility. It has several strands to it. One is the claim that courts need more sentencing options than just probation or prison in order to better fit the degree of punishment to the severity of the crime (Morris & Tonry, 1990; Von Hirsch, 1992). Criminals, the claim goes, do not fall neatly into two categories, and so punishment should not either. In this way the system achieves "just deserts." Another strand is the claim that, as prisons became overcrowded, courts are sentencing more and more offenders to probation, many of whom had committed crimes that were too serious to be given a simple probation sentence but which were not serious enough to warrant a prison sentence (Petersilia, Turner, Kahan, & Peterson, 1985). The claim is that these offenders are in need of "control" that intermediate punishments such as intensive probation can provide. Under intensive probation, an offender is subjected to very close monitoring by two probation officers who have a maximum case load of 25 instead of the 100 or more that a regular probation officer has. But the pragmatic reason for the development of alternatives to incarceration--the claim that carried the
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day in most legislatures-was that, by diverting offenders from prison to the less costly alternatives, the government could save money, avoid more overcrowded prisons, and still maintain public safety because the programs emphasized control and punishment rather than rehabilitation. These claims have been disputed. The claim that they actually divert offenders from prison has been questioned (Austin & Krisberg, 1981; Irwin & Austin, 1994). In fact, it is possible that instead, they simply allow the state to control more and more people. The claim here is that they do this by widening the net of control. There are two parts to net widening: one is stronger nets, where offenders who would have been sentenced to regular probation or parole are put on greater degrees of control such as shock incarceration. The second is larger nets, which result when new offenders are placed in the cells that are freed up by the diversion of some offenders from prison. This latter is indicated by the fact that new prisons are still being constructed and the incarceration rate has not declined even with the increase in the number of offenders being sentenced to alternatives (Abel, 1982; Vass, 1990). The claim that so-called intermediate punishments form the nucleus of a new form of justice called "just deserts" also can be questioned. Considerable doubt exists, even among its proponents, that it is possible to construct a cardinal ordering of the various intermediate punishments. Consequently, the proponents claim, an ordinal ranking may be sufficient (Morris & Tonry, 1990; Von Hirsch, 1992). A cardinal ordering would enable sentencing judges to determine that one year in prison is exactly two times as severe as, say, 4 months on shock incarceration followed by a year on intensive probation. It is obvious that such precise measurement of the severity of punishment of various sentences is not really possible. Thus, the most that can be said is that a prison sentence is more severe than shock incarceration, and the latter is more severe than regular probation, and so on. The various sentences can be rank ordered, but there is still difficulty in ranking various intermediate sanctions. Is a sentence of 4 months on shock followed by a year on intensive probation more severe than a sentence of 2 years on intensive probation? Is the latter more severe than 8 months on home arrest followed by 3 years of regular probation? Perhaps some rough ordering of severity is possible. However, the claim that intermediate sanctions help to achieve "just deserts" is just one interpretation. Another is that because of net widening, intermediate punishments are simply an add-on and not really something between probation and prison. As we suggested above, proponents of the net-widening argument say that they put offenders on greater forms of control than they would be on if the intermediate punishments did not exist (e.g., shock incarceration instead of probation) and
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DENNIS J. PALUMBO and REBECCA D. PETERSEN
that they simply increase the total number of offenders under penal supervision. Intermediate sanctions such as shock incarceration can also be seen as a symbolic lever " . . . with which to combat broader fears of social disorder which are powerfully concentrated in the imagery of crime, disease, and war" (Simon, 1993, p. 3). That is, they are meant to reassure a population fearful of crime that the state is doing something about it. But as Simon (1993, p. 11) notes, it is "by no means clear that the crisis of modern punishment is primarily a philosophical one that can be cured by philosophical discussion." But, most importantly, none of the claims about intermediate punishments question the existence of a "crime p r o b l e m , " which is the basis of the get tough on crime policy. Much of the crime problem is related to and an outcome of the "war on drugs." Many of the offenders who have been arrested, prosecuted, and convicted in the 1980s war on crime have been drug dealers and users. By 1993, a full 60% of offenders sentenced to federal prison have been drug offenders (trafficking, possession, and other drug offenses). For the first time in American history, the percentage of new court commitments to state prisons for drug crimes has surpassed the percent there for property crimes, and the majority of these are African-Americans. One in 27 American males were under some form of correctional control in 1993, whereas one in four African-American males was similarly situated. A growing chorus of people, scholars, judges, intellectuals, and others have begun to question the war on drugs (Krauss & Lazear, 1991; Staff, 1991, 1992 July, 1992 December; Staley, 1992). The claim has been that not only has the war on drugs been the reason why prisons have become overcrowded, but it also has caused escalating violence in inner cities as control over the lucrative drug money has become the principal economic activity in inner cities. Thus, the claim is made that intermediate punishments do not change the direction of criminal justice policy because they do not address the drug issue. Instead, they are concerned with how to more efficiently control the growing number of offenders caught up in the war on drugs and the get tough on crime policy. Intermediate sanctions allow the state to control more and more individuals, particularly drug offenders and particularly black offenders, who in 1993 comprised almost 50% of the offenders in state prisons. They do this because instead of shutting down a wing of a prison or an entire facility as offenders are diverted to intermediate punishments, new prisons are being built and new offenders placed in the cells freed-up by the diversion of offenders to intermediate sanctions (to the extent to which this actually occurs). In addition to criticisms of the war on drugs, a wide range of officials and groups began to question the "get tough" policy itself. For example, Attorney General Janet Reno and a number of federal judges have criti-
cized the effectiveness of mandatory sentences, saying that they do not give the courts flexibility in sentencing (Staff, November 23, 1993). The American Public Health Association condemned mass incarceration, saying that it does not address the conditions that accompany criminal behavior such as unemployment, drug addiction, poverty, and lack of education (Staff, July 15, 1992). The American College of Physicians favors crime prevention and drug treatment instead of incarceration. They argue that mandatory sentencing and national drug strategies have not alleviated problems of drug abuse and drug-related crimes. The Criminal Justice Section of the American Bar Association said incarceration is both costly and ineffective. They favor repeal of mandatory sentencing guidelines and favor community-based programs (Staff, July 15, 1992). The Pennsylvania State Commission on Sentencing said that tougher sentencing policies of the 1980s nearly tripled the state's prison population, but had little impact on deterring crime (Staff, Dec. 15, 1992). Statistical data can be marshalled to support these criticisms. For example, although the incarceration rate of offenders sentenced to federal and state programs increased by 243% from 1973 to 1992, the rate of crimes known to the police (which is usually what the public and the media refer to as the crime rate) did not go d o w n - i t actually increased by about 42%, and the violent crime rate increased by 91% (these figures are based on data provided by the Bureau of Justice Statistics; see Maguire, Pastore, & Flanagan, 1993). However, whether or not getting tough on crime actually reduces crime is not important for policy because it is the arguments and discourse that influence public policy rather than scientific evidence. As Majone (1989, p. 1) notes, "As politicians know only too well, but social scientists too often forget, public policy is made of language. Whether in written or oral forms, argument is central in all stages of the policy process." We argue in this special feature that evaluations of criminal justice programs such as shock incarceration need to recognize this and consider how they fit into claims about the policies of which they are a part. The articles in this issue put the discussion of particular programs in this broad policy context. The issue begins with an article by Petersilia, who raises questions about the "get tough" policy in California. She shows that while the prison population grew dramatically during the 1980s, the crime rate remained about the same. She concludes by discussing 8 reasons why prisons do not make more of an impact on crime. Her article is followed by Edmund McGarrel and Michael Sabath who discuss the differing perceptions that different stakeholders have of a reform policy adopted in Indiana. They find that there was the least difference in opinion among the criminal justice professionals on questions that asked whether the reform should be developed for less serious
Policy and Program Theory in Evaluation of Criminal Justice Programs offenders. They conclude that any alternative sentencing efforts, such as the one they evaluated, are likely to obtain support by focusing on less serious offenders, thus leading to net-widening. The next article is by Michael Hallett and Robert Rogers. They describe conflicting interpretations of the "truth in sentencing" program in Tennessee. They argue that "contextual constructionism facilitates an evaluation of claims put forward in the public arena and helps account for stakeholders promoting various claims." Their conclusion in regard to evaluation is that "The inclusion of multiple stakeholders holding oppositional viewpoints must now be a requisite facet of evaluation research." Dennis Palumbo, Michael Musheno, and Michael Hallett describe positive and negative political constructions of an alternative dispute resolution program in Arizona and alternatives to incarceration in Arizona. They find that the opposing constructions of these programs are similar, although they are institutionally separate programs and usually not considered together by analysts. They conclude by discussing the policy consequences of each and suggest that the claimsmakers who believe that the programs are beneficial will probably prevail in the moral discourse, although considerable opposition is developing to these claims. The next article by Arthur Lurigio and James Swartz describes impediments to sound evaluations of jail-based drug treatment programs. Their conclusion is that "the war on drugs will never be won if most of its weapons are based on enforcement or punishment." They suggest that treatment must be used in order to break the cycle of drug dependence and crime. However, Melissa Moon and Edward Latessa in the next article find that a drug treatment program operating in a mid-sized city in the Midwest did not succeed because the probationers in the experimental group failed to show up regularly and therefore had many more technical violations than the control group. The final article by James Byrne and Faye Taxman discusses the impact of crime control policy on gender, race, and class. They argue that unless there is an immediate shift in correctional control policy, the problems of gender-, race-, and class-based bias will remain. Although they find that a lot of criminal justice research concludes that discrimination does not exist, it is still the case that gender-, race-, and class-based differences can be identified at every point in the criminal justice process. Hence, it is possible to argue that it is the claims of those on either side of the issue that are important in policymaking, and not the empirical data. From a broader policy perspective, if we believe that enforcement and punishment are the wrong policies, we might want treatment to fail. This is because, similar to intermediate sanctions, treatment really supports criminalization of drugs, in as much as treatment is used on
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people who have been arrested for using drugs. If treatment seems to work, it holds out the hope that government will put more effort into it, rather than simply incarcerating users. This really supports the criminalization of drugs because it does not question the policy itself; instead, it says that criminalizing drugs is all right as long as treatment is provided. Perhaps the state should not be involved in trying to eliminate (or reduce) drug use and decriminalization is the answer.
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STAFF (1993, November 23). Drug Er~forcement Report, 10. STAFF. (1993, December 15). State officials call for a lowdown on crime bill, Criminal Justice Newsletter, 24(24). Pace Publications. STALEY, S. (1992). Drug policy and the decline of American cities. New Brunswick, N J: Transaction. UPTON, D., MARTINSON, R., & WILKS, J. (1975). The effectiveness o f correctional treatment: A survey q f treatment evaluation studies. New York: Praeger. VASS, A. A. (1990). Alternatives to prison: Punishment, custody attd the community. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. YANOW, D. (1993). The communication of policy meaning. Policy Sciences, 26, 4-61. VON HI RSC H, A. (1992). Scaling intermediate punishments: A comparison of two models. In J. M. Byrne, A. J. Lurigio, & J. Petersilia (Eds.), ,Smart Sentencing, The Emer~ence of Intermediate Sanctions. Newburg Park, CA: Sage.