The global prison population is increasing, reaching 11.5 million in 2022. Member States around the world face great challenges when it comes to prison and penal reform, many of which are shared.
Nearly a third of the global prison population remains in pre-trial detention, with extensive costs to the state, communities, families and individuals.
Prisons are overcrowded in the majority of countries worldwide. This is an acute global human rights, health and security crisis.
Budget, resource and capacity constraints lead to unliveable conditions and poor prison health. Prisoners are likely to have existing health problems on entry to prison, and the poor conditions in many prisons jeopardize health further.
Overcrowded, underfunded prisons with a lack of tailored training for prison officers and ineffective management cannot ensure security, making both prisons and wider society less safe.
Prisons reinforce existing inequalities, with an overrepresentation of marginalized communities and insufficient attention to women, youth, persons with disabilities and other prisoners with special needs.
Prison and penal reform offers benefits not only to the lives of incarcerated individuals but to their families, communities and to society as a whole. UNODC is working towards a world in which no one is deprived of their liberty unless strictly necessary; a world in which prisoners’ human rights are respected in safe and secure prisons with decent conditions; a world in which penal systems are gender-, age- and disability-responsive; and in which ex-prisoners are supported to reintegrate as full members of our societies.
Prisoners are people, and prisoner rights are human rights. Protecting these rights is fundamental to our dignity as a society.
While crime flourishes in poorly managed prisons, those that respect rights and focus on rehabilitation mean prisoners are less likely to reoffend – making us all safer.
Contagious diseases spread fast in prisons, and from there travel out to the wider community. By improving health inside prisons, we keep the wider community healthier too.
Imprisonment can disrupt social cohesion and cause long-lasting impoverishment of families and communities. Limiting imprisonment to a measure of last resort and working to maintain family ties can reduce this damaging impact.
Imprisoning a person is expensive and comes with long term indirect costs. Penal reform can save governments vast amounts of money, while supporting individuals to become productive members of society.
Evidence-based reform supports the provision of timely trials and proportionate sentencing, making hope and the fair and effective delivery of justice a reality for many more people.
People are sentenced to imprisonment as punishment in itself, not for additional punishment. While being deprived of their basic right to liberty, prisoners retain other human rights, with the exception of those which are restricted by the very fact of being in prison.
Prison reform is necessary to ensure that this principle is upheld and that the human rights of prisoners are protected.
The vast majority of prisoners will eventually return to society. Yet incarceration, by itself, does not have a reformative effect. On the contrary, it exacerbates many of the challenges faced by individuals who have come into conflict with the law.
Rehabilitation and social reintegration support should start as early as possible within the criminal justice process in order to have maximum effect. This includes:
Prisons that respect rights and focus on rehabilitation mean prisoners are less likely to reoffend, leaving us all better off.
Prisoners are likely to have existing health problems on entry to prison, as they are predominantly from poorly educated and socio-economically deprived sectors of the general population, with compromised access to adequate health services.
In addition, being imprisoned may have very serious health implications, in particular in prisons which are overcrowded, where nutrition is poor, sanitation inadequate and access to fresh air and exercise often unavailable. Conditions that are more prevalent in prison than in the general population include HIV, tuberculosis, hepatitis B and C, sexually transmitted diseases, skin diseases, malaria and diarrhoea.
Prison health is public health: prisons are not isolated from wider society. The high turn-over of prisoners and prison staff, together with the fact that the vast majority of prisoners will eventually be released means that health conditions in prisons unavoidably have an impact on community health.
Adequate healthcare and improved conditions for those in prisons is therefore essential to protect and improve prisoners’ health while at the same time contributing to healthy communities.
Imprisonment can cause long-lasting impoverishment of families and communities.
When a person is imprisoned, the rest of the family must deal with the associated emotional impact and stigma, potentially coupled with the loss of their income and new expenses that must be met, such as the costs for a lawyer, transport for prison visits and so on.
The impact of imprisonment does not end with a prisoner’s release, as they often have no prospects for employment and are subject to socio-economic exclusion. This severe stigma makes prisoners vulnerable to an endless cycle of poverty, further marginalization, re-offending and re-imprisonment.
Imprisonment therefore contributes to the impoverishment of the prisoner, their families and even future generations. This in turn harms the wider community, creating future victims and hampering future economic performance.
Imprisonment disrupts social cohesion, and mass imprisonment has the potential to disrupt entire communities – often disproportionately affecting marginalized groups.
Social cohesion is based on long-term relationships, and the disruption associated with imprisonment of a person negatively impacts bonds between spouses, between a parent and their child, and even between family members who are not imprisoned. This disruption reshapes family and community structures across generations.
Mass imprisonment has the potential to produce long-term and deep social transformations that affect entire communities, often linked with a disproportionate impact on marginalized groups.
Prison reform is essential to support prisoners to maintain constructive bonds with the outside world, reducing disruption, supporting social reintegration prospects and mitigating the negative impact on the prisoner’s family.
Prison and penal reform help to reduce imprisonment to a measure of last resort and to promote community-based measures, helping to maintainfamily ties, avoiding impoverishment and protecting communities from the serious and long-lasting impact of mass incarceration.
Imprisoning a person is expensive. The costs of the upkeep of a prisoner are generally significantly higher than what is spent if a person was to be sentenced for a non-custodial measure, such as probation or community service.
But the costs do not end there. When considering the costs of incarceration at large, account needs to be also taken of indirect costs, such as those relating to social, economic and health aspects. These are difficult to measure, but are immense and long-term.
Prison and penal reform can save governments vast amounts of money and allows the redirection of resources towards social, treatment and other services benefitting the community at large.
What happens to people in the course of imprisonment affects all of us: public safety, our health, our community’s finances, social cohesion, and ultimately the human dignity of us all. Support the #PrisonersMatter campaign today.
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