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THE PUNISHMENT IMPERATIVE: THE RISE AND FAILURE OF MASS INCARCERATION IN AMERICA Todd R. Clear and Natasha A. Frost (2014). New York: New York University Press, pp 258 (hdbk) £19.99. ISBN 978-0-8147-1719-6
Clear and Frost introduce their book by defining what the 'Punishment Imperative' (PI) is, and how the 'grand social experiment' of mass incarceration has shaped the course of the American criminal justice system over the past several decades: '[T]he Punishment Imperative began with the co-alignment of an array of forces that came together to make the explosive growth in the penal system a social and political possibility.' The authors argue that rising crime rates, media attention to victimization, high political priority, an emerging, large pool of unemployed young black men that came to symbolize an urban 'enemy' in which to wage 'wars' against, and a political economy that emphasized gettough politics propelled the prison population and extended the reach of the correctional system starting in the 1970s. The book's timeliness allows the analysis of this storyline to be advanced by proposing that 2009 marked a shift in the mass incarceration trajectory, as prison numbers began to meaningfully drop for the first time in years, which, they contend, signifies the fall of the Punishment Imperative.12 The authors support this (somewhat tentative) claim by arguing that the dominant driver for the reduction of dependence and overuse of prisons is the present economic crisis, though it...