
Too many prisons make people worse - sohkamyung
http://www.economist.com/news/international/21722654-world-can-learn-how-norway-treats-its-offenders-too-many-prisons-make-bad-people
======
cubano
Prisons not only make the convicts inside them worse, but from my experience
and POV, it makes the people observing and interacting with them worse as
well.

I say this because while I seem to observe this prison-is-terrible-the-
convicts-need-compassion, _not one person here has offered to help me in any
meaningful way_ , even though I have documented my trials and tribulations
over and over [0][1][2].

I have a 30 year history of software development, with 14 or so with the LAMP-
stack. No one reading this is willing to even talk about some side project or
prove-yourself 2 week gig? Ok right I get it...this isn't a help wanted or job
board fine that's cool.

But still, I'm not getting it anymore...is everyone just into some sort of
bullshit social signalling exercise or, perhaps worse, are willing to try to
help ex-cons as long as they are funneled into low paying exploitative back-
breaking jobs with no future that almost surely will lead 95% back into crime?

If so, can we start being honest about that's what all this discussion is
about..."boy someone should sure do something about how screwed these people
are but hell no it won't be me."

Yeah, so I'm frustrated and scared and broke and all that, so try to forgive
my rant...I'm sure I'll come to regret it as I do so much else in my life.

[0] [https://postmoderncoder.svbtle.com/fear-and-jaywalking-in-
la...](https://postmoderncoder.svbtle.com/fear-and-jaywalking-in-las-vegas)
[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14394324](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14394324)
[2]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14302656](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14302656)

~~~
Camillo
May I ask you a question about your story in [0]? You said that you could not
call anyone because you did not remember any numbers. Is that how it works?
When they let you make a phone call after arrest, you can only call numbers
you know by heart? You can't look them up? That sounds insane, who commits
phone numbers to memory nowadays?

~~~
lastofus
You don't get to keep your phone once arrested and booked. If the person
processing your items is nice, they will look up a number for you in your
phone and write it down on some scratch paper which you can take into holding.

~~~
tripzilch
That's ridiculous. What if the person isn't nice? What if you didn't have your
phone with you in the first place? Or it got damaged or lost? How did this
even work before mobile phones that stored contact lists, which really isn't
that long ago?

What should _any_ of that matter as to whether you get justice or not?

I swear, with this stuff, the plea bargaining, juries, "expensive lawyers",
sometimes I get the idea that the US justice system is designed to provide
plot devices for TV series of police/justice procedurals, and everything else
is an afterthought. How often do people say, after dealing with
police/justice, "I felt like I was in a bad movie"?

~~~
carrja99
If the person isn't nice you are SOL. I got arrested once during a commute for
an unpaid parking ticket from college, cue cop placing cuffs on me tightly,
slamming me against the squad car, searching the vehicle, then hauling me off
to county for booking. They refused to let me look up numbers on my phone and
I was left to call my parents 3 hours away to come pay the cash only bond.

It was a pretty eye opening experience. Especially on the arresting officer's
part because they get no clue as to why they are arresting you beyond "FAILURE
TO APPEAR" that shows on their screen, so they assume the worst.

~~~
DKnoll
Failure to Appear is failure to comply with a court summons, not failure to
pay a parking ticket. There is definitely more to this story.

~~~
throwanem
Get a ticket, you get a choice between paying the fine and appearing in court
to contest it. Guess what happens when you do neither.

~~~
DKnoll
In the US? You get a court summons delivered by mail. Then you should probably
go to court.

------
hackermailman
Unsurprisingly people who have done long stretches of time in Norway's prison
system disagree with this article. Only a few prisoners enjoy the freedom of
this island, which is equivalent to a trustee camp in a US min security
prison. The rest who were given 10+ year sentences are in complete isolation
in what the media loves to refer to as hotel prisons. In these cells
everything is provided for you including your own shower, therefore there's no
reasons for the guards to ever let you out and you stay in there 23hrs per
day. Because the media calls them hotels, it prevents any prisoner from being
able to complain and be taken seriously, so often these guys will either light
their cells on fire and hopefully get transferred to one of the older style
jails so they can talk to other inmates, or they just kill themselves.

~~~
mistercow
Do you have a source where we can read more? Everything I'm finding is an
article gushing about how humane Norway's prisons are. I keep finding
headlines like "Twice as many suicides in Norwegian prisons" from The Norway
Post, but their site won't actually load for me, and the Google cache on those
results looks like it's probably their homepage.

I wasn't able to find a lot, but I did find this:
[https://www.kriminalvarden.se/globalassets/publikationer/for...](https://www.kriminalvarden.se/globalassets/publikationer/forskningsrapporter/prison-
suicide-in-12-countriespdf)

That claims that the suicide rate per 100k in norway is 127. According to
this:

[https://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=194](https://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=194)

The US had around 20 in the same timeframe. Apparently local jails are worse,
at around 40-50:

[https://www.themarshallproject.org/2015/08/04/why-jails-
have...](https://www.themarshallproject.org/2015/08/04/why-jails-have-more-
suicides-than-prisons#.sabBFJ6CE)

So what I've found so far seems to back you up: We're looking at Norway being
something like an order of magnitude worse when it comes to prisons. But I'd
like to find better data.

~~~
hackermailman
Norway also exports prisoners to the Netherlands to serve time as they are at
capacity in some facilities. Renting a foreign countries' prison is not
mentioned by the media over here touting the Norwegian system.

My source is primarily from anecdotes of friends I knew arrested in Oslo who
spent long periods of isolation during pretrial and were told by other
prisoners which jails to avoid getting transfered to, all of which are the new
prisons because they are extreme in isolation. There's some other anecdotes
here comparing old style jails to Bergen "luxury" prison
[https://youtu.be/iA1L2kg3wRw](https://youtu.be/iA1L2kg3wRw) and here
[https://youtu.be/iWhdzIJMEmQ](https://youtu.be/iWhdzIJMEmQ) talking about
Norway's most hated man Anders Breivik who like everybody else assumed life in
a Norwegian prison would be easy until they experienced the reality of
solitary confinement. Even worse, because Breivik sued and won a lawsuit
against the prison for isolation an appeals court was forced to overturn that
decision because he is Breivik and a terrorist monster so there was political
pressure to do so, and this means the top court in Norway has officially ruled
that solitary confinement does not violate the prisoner's human rights.

There's also papers in journals around about disabled minimum security
prisoners in Norway being forced into isolation in these new prisons as the
trustee camps and old jails can't accommodate them, of which I can't find
immediately.

~~~
jopsen
Anders Breivik isn't the best case for setting a precedence, as far as I could
read the ruling was grounded in the fact that he was dangerous and that other
prisoners would be a danger to him.

Obviously, that case has particularities that do not transfer to other cases.
Such as the man being universally hated.

But it is true, that Norwegian prison system isn't perfect. And unnecessary
pretrial isolation justified as restricting contact to outside conspirators is
not uncommon.

All that said, Norway is the still the best place start your criminal career
:)

~~~
vacri
> _Anders Breivik isn 't the best case for setting a precedence, as far as I
> could read the ruling was grounded in the fact that he was dangerous and
> that other prisoners would be a danger to him._

Norway has civil law rather than common law - doesn't this mean that this
decision doesn't work as precedent, as that's only really seen in common law?

~~~
skissane
> Norway has civil law rather than common law - doesn't this mean that this
> decision doesn't work as precedent, as that's only really seen in common
> law?

Precedent exists in civil law systems also. The difference is that in civil
law systems precedent is generally seen as persuasive rather than binding, and
lower-level judges have greater freedom to disregard precedent than in common
law systems. That said, I think the difference between common law and civil
law systems is a matter of degree rather than a stark boundary. Even when they
aren't formally speaking bound by precedent, lower civil law courts will tend
to respect the past rulings of the higher courts and apply them–no judge likes
being overturned on appeal. And, in common law systems, not all precedents are
binding, some are merely persuasive; and there is the procedure of
"distinguishing" –
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distinguishing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distinguishing)
– which enables judges to justify not following a precedent even while still
formally affirming it as binding.

------
renegadesensei
Is it possible to punish and rehabilitate at the same time? I ask partly
because I have small kids. When they do bad things, I try to focus on
educating them and not punishing. Then again, most of the bad things they do
(making a mess, being too loud, etc.) are relatively benign. If they were to
do something really horrible and victimize some other kid, I would probably
punish them, but at the same time I would hope I could teach them never to do
such a thing again.

I think that's the moral dilemma with prison systems. It's easy in abstract to
say that we should just focus on rehabilitation and take this utilitarian
argument about what's best for society. But I know that if, for example,
someone were to harm my children, I would have trouble being convinced that
that person needs free college and housing (partly paid for by me). Even if
that statistically led to a better outcome for society, it would not seem like
justice; rather it would seem that person is being rewarded for harming my
family. This I think is a general problem with utilitarianism - that when we
just focus on group outcomes, we sometimes lose sight of things like
individual rights and justice, messy moral concepts that don't always create
optimal group results.

Maybe there is some way to do both things or differentiate between types of
criminals. I don't really have a solution. Just posing the conundrum.

~~~
boomboomsubban
Every situation involves them losing their freedom. Even in this cage free
prison they are stuck there under someone else's control. This is a
punishment, and I don't see why justice needs more than this. A victim may
wish for harsher punishment, but that won't actually help their problems.

~~~
cbanek
Totally agree. Vengeance sounds great until you get it - and you realize you
still have the same problems, and maybe a few new ones.

Perhaps like rehabilitating offenders, we also need to rehabilitate victims as
well. Being a victim can be as troubling than being an offender because it's
not really in your control. This can really be hard on people, especially
mental health, PTSD, anxiety, fear of people, etc.

I'm not even sure such a system exists - it seems like the victim would be on
their own for finding care and help with that?

~~~
tripzilch
In the Netherlands there is a program for exactly that, "slachtofferhulp"
("victim help"). I'm not entirely sure what it entails, but I've been offered
it even after merely witnessing the shop on the corner of my street being
robbed from a distance (the thief ran past me just as I stepped outside my
house, so I made a statement to the police).

Well okay he did threaten me, raising the knife while saying "don't even think
about it" [standing in his way/stopping him]. But he didn't come at me, and I
was certain I could have outrun him if he did (by running towards the shop,
which he was focused on getting away from, after all), I remained at distance.
Of course, this being the Netherlands, there was about zero risk the guy would
pull a gun (especially after brandishing a rather cheap looking chef's knife).

------
gtirloni
A few weeks ago, running the subway in a major North American city, I kept
admiring how people were polite and waited for other people to leave the
trains before entering, how many times I saw someone give up their seats for
the elderly (not that they really needed, there were a lot of empty seats
elsewhere). That got me thinking if those _same_ people would be as polite if
they were in the _same_ train but with 20x more people around. I think extreme
situations are a great equalizer in crowded situations and it's my feeling
they would behave the same: not wait for anyone, not give up seats, etc.

My point is, what works for Norway (population: 5.2m, prison population: 3874
or 0.0745% [0]) is never going to work for Brazil (population: 207m, prison
population: 659020 or 0.31% [1]).

I like the idea of these idyllic prisons but inmates that will fit those are
the exception here. Nevertheless, the system should offer them and help good
inmates to be removed from the terrible traditional prisons so they don't
become worse. It's often said that prisons are like college for criminals.

I don't know if this system could handle things like this:
[http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/01/60-killed-beheaded-
gri...](http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/01/60-killed-beheaded-grisly-
brazil-prison-riot-170102185216472.html)

In summary, I love the idea but let's not pretend that by just having those
prisons that things will change drastically. It's a complex situation and
there are problems everywhere (bad laws, slow courts, poverty, etc).

0 -
[http://www.prisonstudies.org/country/norway](http://www.prisonstudies.org/country/norway)

1 -
[http://www.prisonstudies.org/country/brazil](http://www.prisonstudies.org/country/brazil)

~~~
matt4077
"You can judge a society by how well it treats its prisoners", was actually
said by a Russian–he knew what he was talking about.

The US could start by no longer jailing drug consumers or first-time low-level
street dealers. It just really really doesn't work anyway. That would reduce
the prison population by what? 2/3? Suddenly you have 3x the budget and space,
which should allow for quite a few improvements.

But what really needs to be done with it the basic idea of prison as some sort
of moral retribution. Come up with a formula to quantify and compare the
outcomes of the criminal justice system, then start maximising. The US could
easily study the effects of prison and other punishments (as well as social
programs, medial intervention etc) in every detail imaginary.

(Also I don't quite get your analogy. Are you saying Americans tend to be
violent because there are too many of them for one country? FWIW the US is No
182 in terms of population density, barely ahead of Norway at No. 202. Far far
ahead are Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, and most of Europe, all of which have
only a fraction of the violent crime of the US)

~~~
rayiner
> The US could start by no longer jailing drug consumers or first-time low-
> level street dealers. It just really really doesn't work anyway. That would
> reduce the prison population by what? 2/3? Suddenly you have 3x the budget
> and space, which should allow for quite a few improvements.

Nothing like that:
[https://www.google.com/amp/s/fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/rel...](https://www.google.com/amp/s/fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/releasing-
drug-offenders-wont-end-mass-incarceration/amp). Releasing every prisoner with
a drug crime as their most serious offense would reduce the prison population
by 14%. (Almost all that is low level dealers--few people are in prison for
mere possession.)

It would be a good step, but people overestimate how big an impact it would
have.

~~~
fjdlwlv
14% is huge, especially considering how many people commit crime because their
life was destroyed by a drug conviction (their own or their parent's) leading
to further crime.

~~~
tptacek
John Pfaff studies this at Fordham and also rebuts this variant of the
argument: if you look, there's no strong correlation between people _ever_
convicted of _any_ drug crime and later sentencing.

(His book, _Locked In_, is pretty great).

Reminder: nobody, including Pfaff, is saying it's good we lock up drug
offenders like this. It's bad, and we should stop. It's just not a solution to
mass incarceration. To address that, we need an across-the-board fix for
aggressive prosecution, which is what appears to be the most important factor
ratcheting up prison populations.

------
crucini
This article is a fine example of IYI - "intellectual yet idiot" as Taleb
terms it. Verbal cleverness + plausible statistics + apples/oranges comparison
= what? Equals: "We have the answer to everything, but sadly the rulers and
electorate aren't as wise/clever/compassionate as us." Others in this thread
have pointed out specific fallacies in this article - for example there are
prisoners in the US using chainsaws and axes; there are prisoners in Norway in
solitary confinement who would be in general population in a US prison.

But let's zoom up to the bigger syndrome. Notice the author quotes at least
one offender, but doesn't bother talking to any corrections officers. Did it
occur to him that someone who worked in a prison for 20 years might know a
little bit more about corrections than someone who read a bunch of studies and
statistics?

Symptomatic of a broader problem - the chattering classes, who consume and
generate information, are increasingly cut off from the real world, and
increasingly influential. Of course it's easy to have opinions about how
something "should" work when you have no experience and no skin in the game.

~~~
ouid
20 years of individual experience does not give you nearly as much data as "a
bunch of studies and statistics". Being glib about the scientific method
doesn't make you better than it.

~~~
crucini
Adam just raised seed funding to build the next great mobile app. He needs a
high performance back end which will support rapid iteration. He looks at two
candidates for tech lead:

Bob has 20 years experience in server software development and led the back-
end development at a previous mobile startup.

Charlie is an econ PHD from Yale and has many statistics at his fingertips
about software development. He has never written any software.

Who should Adam hire?

~~~
ouid
These scenarios are not analogous.

------
OliverJones
The author wrote: "In America some prisoners are released after long sentences
with little more than clothes and a bus fare."

Rubbish. In the county where I live, Essex in MA, inmates are given the
clothes they were wearing when arrested and a ride to the courthouse where
they were convicted, and turned loose. Pity the guy arrested in May who gets
out in January. They shoplift at the local Marshalls on their way home. I
wonder why?

~~~
cubano
This is definately not rubbish.

I have been released twice from the Florida DOC, both times from a panhandle
camp (Gulf C.I) that was approximately 9 hours from my home.

They definitely DO NOT give you the clothes "you were arrested in" as long ago
those clothes were thrown away (at the "reception center" along with your cell
phone, which was almost certainly stolen by the COs and/or convicts, and all
other property you may have had)

My first time through, in 2004, my ex-wife actually sent me a beautiful set of
clothes to be released in. They were of course "lost". She was so upset when
she came to pick me up the assholes in release _were actually threatening to
lock her and /or me up_ because she was making such a stink about me having no
clothes for release.

I ended up getting very ill fitting cheap-ass pants and a white t-shirt, and
back then, a $100 dollar bill. That's it. Thankfully, I had her to pick me up
and drive me home.

The second time through I wasn't so lucky. In 2014 I was given the same shit
clothes, only $50 this time as they changed the release policy, and a bus
ticket. That is it. No cell phone, no wallet...nothing.

It sounds like you are talking about jail, not prison.

~~~
OliverJones
Yes, correct, I'm talking about the Essex County Jail.

------
tuna-piano
Why are we looking at Norway? Because it is doing something right, or because
it fits the authors preplanned narrative?

Singapore has much lower crime stats than Norway and the USA [1,2]. Let's take
a look at how Singapore treats its prisoners.

The punishment for even minor crimes (like graffiti) includes caning[3]. They
stick you in a prison cell for months, and on some random morning, they will
wake you up and give you the sentenced number of hard beatings to your
backside. The beating is done by someone with specialized training to inflict
maximum pain (while remaining safe). So for months, every day you are scared,
never sleeping soundly, as you don't know if this will be the night of your
beating.

-Would the graffiti rate in the USA go up or down if the USA imposed the same penalties as Singapore?

-Would reducing recidivism rates by 20-50%, as the article claims possible, really be enough to lower crime in the USA to a OECD average level [4]?

-Norway and Singapore each have ~5M people. Singapore has 130 rapes a year, Norway has 1,000. How do you justify leaving the Norway justice system in place to the additional 800 rape victims in Norway, when a better system for reducing crime has been invented?[5]

Maybe the US is stuck in middle-no-mans land that leads to bad outcomes. To
address this, they could either make prisons into hotels/universities (Norway)
or impose stricter penalties (Singapore). But if someone did something
terrible to one of my family members, I know which system I'd prefer.

[1] [http://www.nationmaster.com/country-
info/compare/Norway/Sing...](http://www.nationmaster.com/country-
info/compare/Norway/Singapore/Crime)

[2] [http://www.nationmaster.com/country-
info/compare/Singapore/U...](http://www.nationmaster.com/country-
info/compare/Singapore/United-States/Crime)

[3]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caning_in_Singapore](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caning_in_Singapore)

[4]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intention...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate)

[5] Of course, it's never fully accurate to measure systems by comparing
numbers across different cultures/measurement systems. The main point remains
though.

~~~
toothbrush
_> Norway and Singapore each have ~5M people. Singapore has 130 rapes a year,
Norway has 1,000. How do you justify leaving the Norway justice system in
place to the additional 800 rape victims in Norway, when a better system for
reducing crime has been invented?_

I feel obligated to point out that you are assuming that the rate of reporting
(and being believed by the authorities making these statistics!) (EDIT: as
well as the strictness of the legal definition thereof) is equal in both
countries. I have my doubts about that.

~~~
qw
Scandinavian countries have a wide range of definitions of rape (which is a
good thing). That means a lot of situations that are not classified as rape in
other countries are included.

In 2015, 97 of the rapes in Norway were classified as "assault rapes". That
means that someone used violence/force, drugs or threats to rape her (or him).

One example taken from Singapore is that if a woman is penetrated anally it is
not classified as rape, but sexual assault.

Another example taken from Singapore is that a married man can by definition
not commit rape against his wife unless they have been living apart. Marital
status does not give any protection in Scandinavia when someone says no.

Seeing how the definition of rape in Singapore is so different than in
Scandinavia makes me think we can't compare the numbers without giving proper
context.

------
hl5
The better way is to reduce poverty. You can build whatever "rehibilitation"
program you want, but if the future holds no promise, why follow the rules?

------
Shivetya
prisons are just the beginning. when you get out you can find yourself
prevented from obtaining a job, a residence, and even assistance, because of
local, state, and federal laws.

The Renew Act of 2017 is trying to expand the age limits for expungement of
records of first time offenders.[1] its a start but there are more
opportunities to fix the system post prison too. you don't even have to go to
prison to have a record that prevents you from being productive in society.

one of favorite examples are the volunteers for smoke jumping, putting out
forest fires. there are states where its illegal for a person who did this job
in prison to obtain the same outside. if we keep up the barriers where do we
truly expect people to go?

[1] [http://dailysignal.com/2017/05/24/heres-smart-modest-
increas...](http://dailysignal.com/2017/05/24/heres-smart-modest-increase-
second-chances-deserving-ex-offenders/)

~~~
maxxxxx
No idea why this got downvoted. The lack of job opportunities for people out
of jail is a real problem.

~~~
hnaparst
Because the people who read HN think they know everything. My comment was
downvoted even more than this.

------
MarkMc
From a related Economist article [0]:

"Oregon, which insists that programmes to reform felons are measured for
effectiveness, has a recidivism rate less than half as high as California’s."

Assuming it's not a statistical blip, I wonder why Oregon is so different to
California. Seems to me that a politician who promises to reduce the
recidivism rate and thereby save taxpayer dollars would get more votes.

[0] [http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21722642-lot-known-
abo...](http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21722642-lot-known-about-how-
reform-prisoners-far-too-little-done-americas-prisons-are)

------
dmh2000
The US has minimum security prisons also and just like this one, you have to
qualify one way or the other.

[https://www.forbes.com/2009/07/13/best-prisons-cushiest-
mado...](https://www.forbes.com/2009/07/13/best-prisons-cushiest-madoff-
personal-finance-lockups_slide_2.html?thisspeed=25000)

~~~
refurb
Yeah, this article is a bit confusing. The US has prisons just like this.
Prisoners who commit less severe crimes or prisoners who have a good record
are eligible.

Do journalists think every US prison is like Pelican Bay? Do they think
Shawshank Redemption is representative of the norm in the US?

~~~
ams6110
Like any other commercial media, the main goal of _The Economist_ is to get
readers/subscribers. Slanted, inflammatory stories do a better job at that
than objective, well-researched pieces that present a fuller picture.

------
lerie
The USA has "boys homes" that do this. As a child, I attended one such place
where we all had to grow our own vegetables, to this day I can grow
vegetables.

Privatized prisons (in the USA) are money makers, holding mostly low to medium
risk offenders, you can even buy shares on the stock market.

With more police on patrol there will be less crime. Spend less money on
prisons and more money on local police force.

~~~
ZephyrP
I did a stint in a state-operated group home for boys in 2006 and we
definitely did not 'grow our own vegetables'.

------
Overtonwindow
The American system of justice is not to rehabilitate, but to humiliate,
punish, and torture. Worse, we outsource this to the private prison system
which has an incentive to keep people in prison. You go to prison in America
you will be brutally tortured, humiliated, and will emerge far worse than when
you went in. That is the fault of every American citizen - not the politicians
- but the people. Because it is the citizenry who punishes the politician that
appears even remotely soft on prisoners, or supports prison reform. America is
a vengeful society, overflowing with righteous indignation.

~~~
tormeh
> overflowing with righteous indignation

As a non-American, I have to say this is the most puzzling thing about the US:
The abundance of anger and indignation in public debate. I guess it's a
natural consequence of a winner-takes-all voting system in combination with a
vast and heterogeneous population.

~~~
mikekchar
On the contrary. <rapidly fashions tinfoil hat> The US is a representative
democracy with only 2 credible political parties. In such a system, if you are
one of the incumbents, it pays to polarise every issue: that way no third part
can emerge. At the very worst, you are out of power for 8-12 years, but you
_always_ come back into power. If you manage to get you hooks into the media,
then you can encourage _them_ to polarise every issue too. They'll love it,
because confirmation bias is a powerful force. It leads to rabid followers of
the various institutions -- who deride the followers of the other
institutions.

Hmmm... tin foil hats are comfy. I think I'll wear this one for a while...

~~~
tormeh
A winner-takes-all voting system results in only two parties (Regional third
parties can exist, but not national ones). No conspiracy required, only maths.

~~~
Osiris
I studied comparative politics in college and this is absolutely true.
Different voting system have different outcomes due to the nature of the
rules. Unsurprisingly, every attempt to make a more fair voting/systems ends
up with its own pros and cons, such as giving minority parties
disproportionate influence due to need for coalitions​.

~~~
tjl
In Canada, we have a first past-the-post voting system (if you get the
majority of the votes in the riding, you get the seat) and we have at least 3
parties federally (Conservatives, Liberals, and NDP). Technically, we have 4
(including the Bloc Québecois but they're only in one province). So, it's
entirely possible to have a winner take all voting system and have more than
two parties. Things have fluctuated over the years and we've had 5 parties
when the Progressive Conservatives had a split and the Reform Party was
created, but they eventually merged once they realized that they couldn't win
if they split the votes.

There's been at least one attempt to try and change the voting system, but the
side involved in presenting the pros of the new system really did a terrible
job.

~~~
tormeh
Well, it sort of depends on the size of the "voting blocs" in which there are
winner-takes-all. If the voting bloc was a single person then you have
proportional representation, more or less. In the US, the voting blocs are the
states, and they are usually very big, so the US is very far from PR.

How big are these voting blocs in Canada?

Anyway, it's interesting to me that even PR systems usually end up having two
major parties (with a host of smaller parties around them). I guess that's
because many voters cannot bother to educate themselves about the smaller
parties or because there's usually one big question of the day that can be
answered in a yes/no fashion...

~~~
Overtonwindow
I work in lobbying so I'm on the periphery of something very interesting: The
idea of voting blocs, and being able to identify who is going to vote which
way, based on discernible facts such as race, gender, culture, religion,
occupation, income, etc. This is the new holy grail in politics.

I believe that with the right algorithms and data stream (i.e. Facebook) you
can calculate a parties relative strength in the electorate, based on voter
characteristics. Then apply layers of other data. For example, apply crime
statistics to it. Ex. Murder victim has characteristics that would make it
more likely than not they are liberal. Democrats -1. Murderer is caught and
has characteristics that they are more than likely Conservative. Republicans
-1. Result null.

Terrorist walks into a gay nightclub and kills 49 people who have
characteristics that they are most likely o vote liberal. Democrats -49.
Terrorist enters a military base and murderers 13 people who have
characteristics that would appear most likely to vote conservative.
Republicans -13. All +/\- a statistical norm.

Very cold calculus... I think government officials and political parties are
doing this right now, harvesting immense data to say with certainty: In a
particular voting district, we can reasonably say with x turnout we will have
a result of y; x1:y1, etc.

~~~
maxerickson
Yes, they are.

[https://medium.com/startup-grind/how-the-trump-campaign-
buil...](https://medium.com/startup-grind/how-the-trump-campaign-built-an-
identity-database-and-used-facebook-ads-to-win-the-election-4ff7d24269ac)

The better link is probably
[http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-27/inside-
the...](http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-27/inside-the-trump-
bunker-with-12-days-to-go) but it isn't loading right now.

------
tormeh
Would a prison dichotomy be a good idea? That is, the reformable criminals go
to rehabilitation, and the ones for which there is no hope go in for life (or
at least until old age)?

~~~
crucini
But we sort of have that already. First offences tend to get lesser sanctions,
including probation, which is an attempt to curb bad behavior without
imprisonment. In California at least, the three strikes law means that three
convictions above a certain threshold result in a life sentence. This
sometimes makes the news when the third conviction is relatively minor, like
shoplifting. California also has lifetime confinement for dangerous child
molestors after completion of sentence.

~~~
ktRolster
_This sometimes makes the news when the third conviction is relatively minor,
like shoplifting_

FWIW this has changed. Ever since prop 36, the third strike needs to be a
serious violent crime.

------
rectang
This doesn't apply in the USA, since for our citizens the purpose of our
prison system is not to rehabilitate, but to inflict savage vengeance.

~~~
psyc
Perhaps it's a reflection of Christianity. It's the will of God that evildoers
go to hell, to be tormented by other demons like themselves.

~~~
camus2
> Perhaps it's a reflection of Christianity.

It's a reflection of Puritanism, not Christianity as a whole.

~~~
psyc
What I meant is that it could be a manifestation of an archetype in the
Christian imagination - the 5th circle of hell. I did not have any conscious
implementation of a doctrine for dealing with punishment in mind.

------
m3kw9
American prison is actuall not a system but a culture. Think of how hard it is
to change a culture, you probably need new leadership with enough power like a
CEO at Microsoft to do something drastic in a reasonable amount of time, say
10 year frame.

------
darpa_escapee
It should be well known that the public, and often the judicial system, see
prison as punishment and not rehabilitation.

Another portion sees at as constitutionally-granted slave labor or an
opportunity for profit.

------
jlebrech
Maybe some convicts need exile not incarceration.

And petty criminals need to be reeducated.

------
adrianlmm
Who wrote that article? I can't find the source anywhere.

~~~
Symmetry
"The Economist is 160+ years old, and back then anonymity was the norm. Then
the industry went on a slightly disturbing path toward writer celebrity, and
we simply chose not to participate."

[https://andreaskluth.org/2008/11/20/why-the-economist-has-
no...](https://andreaskluth.org/2008/11/20/why-the-economist-has-no-bylines/)

------
jorgec
A bullet is cheaper.

------
chrshawkes
So what is the solution keep criminals in society?

~~~
ygaf
One takeaway from the article (if nothing else) was to give them
responsibility. I like that. Demanding something _from_ prisoners is more
likely to change them than punishment and waiting.

------
hnaparst
A discussion about disenfranchisement conducted by the least disenfranchised
people on earth. Pretty funny.

------
carsongross
One advantage the Norwegian prison system has is that it is filled with
Norwegians, I would be careful generalizing conclusions from it.

That being said, one concept I rarely see discussed is the use of basic income
as an incentive against crime, particularly violent crime: if you lost your
citizens dividend after conviction and slowly earned it back every year upon
release that would act as a powerful and immediate incentive to avoid
violence.

~~~
anarazel
Wouldn't it increase the likelihood of further crime, due to lack of income?

