[noloqy]

It's sad that in my country, where prisons are currently run by the government, there exist plans for privatization. With privatization there's almost no benefits, and a lot of opportunities for trouble; it the Dutch government feels the urge to repeat the mistakes of others.

[protomyth]

The concern isn't the privatization[1], it is the profit motive of the contract does not align with the a just system. If the contract was based on potential cells as opposed to the actual number[2], then bribing to get more profit couldn't happen. The minute any groups profit incentive doesn't match your goal is going to give you problems.

1) do some reading on prison worker unions and you'll see the perversity isn't restricted to private enterprise

2) we will pay you a fixed X for your Y number of cell facility

[digikata]

Really the thing incentivized should be pushing down the recidivism rate (maybe in an x year period after release).

[protomyth]

Not going to disagree with the intent, but that would make it very worth the effort to get as many children who shouldn't be in prison incarcerated since they likely wouldn't be prone to going back. In fact, it might lead to no prison time for hard cases since that would affect he prison's profits.

[digikata]

Absolutely agree with you. It's a general problem with using any performance metric as a sole-focus driver for optimization. You'll find the optimizations may drive behavior beyond where the metric has direct value. That's a truism if you're talking about performance of prison contracts, computer systems, factory throughput, or even capitalism as a whole.

And really, that's what a well-running oversight function should be doing in the case of prison management, adjusting metrics to drive the system toward good whole-society outcomes. Public vs private prisons theoretically doesn't matter, except that introducing private prisons introduces a dynamic where corruption of the oversight function and metrics is used for optimization of profits.

[protomyth]

Agreed, incentives are fun problems everywhere.

> Public vs private prisons theoretically doesn't matter, except that introducing private prisons introduces a dynamic where corruption of the oversight function and metrics is used for optimization of profits.

Read up on some of the campaigning done by the prison worker's union in California and you will see public has its own profit motives that are just as bad.

[justinmk]

"Privatization" where the government contracts to third parties, is not privatization. When the decision is centrally-managed, and the revenue raised by force (taxes), you haven't addressed the central problem. So calling it privatization is misdirection. It's a confusion of terms that is meant to keep people arguing in circles.

Actual privatization removes centralized decision-making. We should be able to opt-out of governments and opt-in to alternative sovereigns. The fact that governments are allowed to claim authority on the basis of geography is why they're still in business, and it's why these messed up situations occur.

[noloqy]

How would you describe the central problem you're referring to? I think the main issue here is that "the system" allows for the possibility of an unjust justice system due to commercial interests.

Everybody agrees that what has happened was illegal and should not have happened, and that it is the sovereign's responsibility to create a system in which the risks of such events are minimized, simply because the consequences can be so far stretching. This can be done by ensuring financial independence of judges; eliminating the role of parties who benefit from outcomes that are not necessarily aligned with society's benefits.

I don't yet see how decentralizing decision making reduces this risk.

[justinmk]

The central problem is any entity that is allowed to raise revenue by force. Which is the definition of a State.

> the possibility of an unjust justice system due to commercial interests.

There's no such thing as a non-commercial interest. Money is not the only thing that is directly in demand. Power is valuable. Regardless of how the government labels its activities, it has things people want; labeling those things non-commercial is just marketing. Trying to plug the holes with regulations and endless "reforms" is a distraction meant to saturate your time.

> ensuring financial independence of judges; eliminating the role of parties who benefit

"Oversight" is a hand-wavy solution to a never-ending problem. The feedback loop is too long.

> how decentralizing decision making reduces this risk

Competition provides alternatives. Lack of competition reduces incentives for providing great service. The state has no competition, and it raises revenue by force, it's silly to expect a good outcome from that.

[apalmer]

yoour on the soap box and not really responding to the issues at hand... there is no such thing as a non commercial interest?

[falk]

""Privatization" where the government contracts to third parties, is not privatization."

Yes it is. The definition of privatization is simply "denationalization: changing something from state to private ownership or control."

[jeltz]

I am a proponent of strong government but I agree about your point about this fake privatization which most of the time works the same way as before but with more overhead and corruption. It is just switching a government agency to a company filling exactly the same role in the same way.

[kghose]

If the privatization plan had no incentive for increasing occupancy, then this problem would not occur. Regardless of whether things are government run or privately run the key is oversight by independent bodies that have as little incentive to be biased in one way or the other.

[jlarocco]

Privatized prisons will always have an incentive to increase occupancy because they will always benefit by having more prisons and providing more jobs.

The problem with having an independent body provide oversight is that in the worst case it's just another level of corruption. Even in the best case they have an incentive to keep the prison system larger because it means more work (aka money) investigating and auditing.

I'm not a big fan of the government, but I think prisons are one thing the government should do itself.

[noloqy]

True - you would have to set rules in place that would prevent any kind of incentive for increased occupancy, and then create government bodies that enforce these rules. Also, you would have to set rules in place for many kinds of standards for living conditions for inmates, and set up bodies that enforce those as well.

The thing is that when commercial incentives come into play, companies will go out of their way to find ways to increase profits. Privatization essentially starts a race to the bottom; a race that can only be slowed down by regulatory institutions. In the end, the company always wins and society loses. Banks have showed us that.

[aswanson]

The privatization is just getting started. Look at this insanity: http://www.mockprisonriot.org/exhibitors/Pages/default.aspx