The Care Promise: Understanding the Role, Promise, and Risk of Care Institutions in Prisoner Reentry

Maria Valdovinos Olson

Advisor: John G. Dale, PhD, Department of Sociology and Anthropology

Committee Members: Amy Best, James Witte

Online Location, Zoom
July 09, 2024, 10:00 AM to 12:00 PM

Abstract:

In 2020, the murder of George Floyd at the hands of the police, along with the inequities of COVID-19 impact, fueled a contentious summer of protests. The protests called for a different type of social arrangement rooted in care rather than punishment. I refer to this ideological critique of punishment, articulation of a moral obligation to care for each other, vision for communally sourced collective care, and call for integrating a care ethic into institutions, systems, and processes as the care promise. In this dissertation, I make the case that prisoner reentry constitutes an important testing ground for the care promise as an envisioned politics of care to replace existing institutions and policies of punishment.

Reentry as a care institution is charged with supporting the formerly incarcerated in the transition from incarceration to the community. At the same time, it is characterized by disorganized provider networks, unresponsive policies, services that are misaligned with client needs, and programs that generally do not yield improved recidivism outcomes. Given the role of the reentry services provider in linking corrections to the community, reentry is subject to care and coercive practices that could explain many of these contradictions. Yet, we know surprisingly little about the social organization of care provision in community-based reentry. Specifically, there is a dearth of research examining how care and coercion elements interact to support or impede reintegration. Furthermore, the theorization of care for non-traditional care populations is conspicuously absent within sociological inquiry despite being a central organizing principle of social life. 

Using a broad historical lens and qualitative research design, this dissertation investigates the provision of care in reentry. First, I chronicle the historical, political, and policy shifts that gave rise to the project of care within the criminal legal context. Second, I draw on reentry planning, discharge/release, and community corrections policies and procedures to examine how care is conceptualized and structured for deployment during this early phase of the reentry process. Third, I carry out a multi-level analysis of a reentry services network to understand how the networked arrangement of reentry services provision supports and impedes reentry. Fourth, I make the general case for why care demands a more significant focus within the sociological discipline and work towards theorizing care related to this population, the post-incarceration re-integration process, and the institutional reentry context. I also consider the implications of my project for informing improved reentry policies and practices that can reduce post-incarceration recidivism and produce more equitable outcomes.

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