The Culture of Urban Control Jail Overcrowding in the Crime Control Era [Hardcover]

As a timely addition to the legacy of John Irwin, The Culture of Urban Control offers an in-depthand sophisticatedsnapshot of jail overcrowding in Chicago. With a critical eye on the conditions of confinement, litigation, and the media, Dr. Walsh delivers a complex picture of current penal reform.Although neglected by criminologists, the jail plays a crucial role in shaping urban communities, and none more so than the massive and storied Cook County Jail in Chicago. John Walshs fascinating analysis therefore makes a welcome contribution to the criminology of social control.Peppered through this account are glimmers of light revealing what happens within the day-to-day working of the Cook County criminal justice system, what occurred among the various stakeholders associations with problems typical of large urban criminal justice systems, and what resulted from judicial and other efforts to ameliorate and resolve disputes affecting the operations and outcomes of Chicagos jail. A 'prospector' digging for 'gold' will find some within these pages. . . .[T]he authors focus on an urban jail, [is]valuable, and should be worthy of starting a broader conversation about the role and operation of jails.Through an analysis of a federal consent decree and media representation related to overcrowding within the largest single-site jail facility in the United States, the incarceration binge of the 1990s is explored at the local level in The Culture of Urban Control: Jail Overcrowding in the Crime Control Era. Analysis of jail conditions, expansion, the inmate experience and changing correctional populations provide a narrative of the culture of control within the Cook County Department of Corrections in Chicago, Illinois.The Culture of Urban Control: Jail Overcrowding in the Crime Control Era explores and analyzes the growth and expansion of the United States largest single-site urban jail system. Through an analysis of a United States Federal Court initiated consent decreel³"