Interpreting Penal Change

A number of recent commentators, most notably and perhaps most elegantly David Garland, have outlined the contours of a new crime control dispensation that is said to characterize modern society. One strand of the evidence for this development is the upward trend in countries’ per capita prison populations. The purpose of this research note is to highlight some of the difficulties associated with any analysis carried out at this level of abstraction, especially with respect to the USA.