Ruth Wilson Gilmore Expanding Prison population “Crisis” and “Surplus”
The surplus that Gilmore is referring to are the surplus of people mostly poor people of color that were left unemployed due to economic recession, surplus of land that was left unused due agribusiness and the industrialization of farming and the increased investment in high tech military industries resulted in large groups of people being unemployed. For those in government they understood that warfare spending produced wealth. This in turn created a social crisis where people were fighting for social welfare rights because they were deliberately excluded which created various forms of activism and in turn created a moral panic which included civil disorder, political alliances among organizations. In order to cure society of the social crises ( people of color out of control, idle youth in the streets, and women and children without husbands and fathers) the state began to incarcerate large numbers of African American and Latinos. The prison system is the answer to the social crisis and deviant behavior.
Gilmore also explains that structural changes to employment opportunities could also be another reason for prison expansion in California. These structural changes forced large groups of people to find other ways to support themselves and generate income. Many people resorted to property crimes or drug dealing and those convicted of such crimes made up a large number of the prison population because even laws changes which affected how a person would be charged and how long their sentence would be. People would not have resorted to crime had they not been forced out of work and if the social programs and resources were still available to them.
Media, policies and government were also influential in creating the social or moral crisis. The use of such terms as “law and order” and safety and crime were used to justify the building of so many prisons in a short period. Society was more concerned with crime rates and drugs than they were about unemployment and inflation. Society continued to worry about crime and safety even though crime rates were down.
The crisis was not necessarily economic the crisis seemed to be people especially those of color wanted fair treatment and employment. The surplus consisted of finance capital, land, labor (people) and sate capacity.
Crisis is usually what happens when something in society, ( people, land, buildings) becomes surplus or more than what was expected or needed and “society” decides that it should do something about it. In California the prison system is the answer to the crises: Land was made a surplus because of agribusiness (industrial farming), finance capital was made surplus by California’s budget and tax laws and the people in the urban areas were made surplus by uneven development, structural changes to employment opportunities and racism.
