A review by lucasmiller
From the War on Poverty to the War on Crime: The Making of Mass Incarceration in America by Elizabeth Hinton
5.0
This is a particular type of of big important history book. I think it is much easier to appreciate and study then to enjoy.
Hinton is a very gifted scholar who is part of a new generation of historians that are doing really important work. She has been mentored by people like Robin D.G. Kelly and Eric Foner. She has the research and writing chops. It's all there.
This book is a brick. The text runs 340 pages, but it doesn't feel brisk. It swings for the fences with its thesis that the foundation of Mass Incarceration begins with the War on Crime legislation put forward by LBJ as part of the Great Society. To my knowledge this pushes back the development of the Age of Mass Incarceration from the Reagan Era to 20 years earlier in the heart of the Liberal Hour of American social policy. This is shocking, exciting, and well argued.
It's a chore to get through the book. To read with a study group, a class, or in sections is advisable I think. It was overly ambitious to assign this to High School juniors who are learning at home during quarantine, but they are hanging in there.
It's well structured and lends itself to gutting/dipping into. I jumped over some of the extended examples in the later chapters, but still feel like I read this book. An essential for the history shelf. One I'll go back to.
Hinton is a very gifted scholar who is part of a new generation of historians that are doing really important work. She has been mentored by people like Robin D.G. Kelly and Eric Foner. She has the research and writing chops. It's all there.
This book is a brick. The text runs 340 pages, but it doesn't feel brisk. It swings for the fences with its thesis that the foundation of Mass Incarceration begins with the War on Crime legislation put forward by LBJ as part of the Great Society. To my knowledge this pushes back the development of the Age of Mass Incarceration from the Reagan Era to 20 years earlier in the heart of the Liberal Hour of American social policy. This is shocking, exciting, and well argued.
It's a chore to get through the book. To read with a study group, a class, or in sections is advisable I think. It was overly ambitious to assign this to High School juniors who are learning at home during quarantine, but they are hanging in there.
It's well structured and lends itself to gutting/dipping into. I jumped over some of the extended examples in the later chapters, but still feel like I read this book. An essential for the history shelf. One I'll go back to.