EDITORIAL

Christine M. Rine

T

he Grand Challenges for Social Work
developed by the American Academy of
Social Work and Social Welfare (AASWSW) offer opportunities for the profession to
confront pervasive societal issues. Although these
challenges outline varying large-scale aims for
social work, each also advocates for innovative
strategies that can be readily implemented throughout areas of practice. The challenge to “promote
smart decarceration” is no exception with the overarching goal of reimagining the current criminal
justice system through progressive evidence-based
approaches that transcend discipline and professional divisions (AASWSW, 2017). The need is
clear as the United States has the largest incarcerated
population in the world by both number and ratio
incapacitated. It is not surprising that these substantial figures are accompanied by immense social and
economic costs. Direct cost estimations indicate
that our country pays “nearly $300 billion annually
to police communities and incarcerate 2.2 million
people,” amounting to approximately $134,400
per imprisoned person (O’Neill Hayes, 2020, para.
1; also see Hyland, 2019). Social costs are more
often indirect, accruing and conflating over time,
and rippling out into families and communities.
Although more difficult to calculate with accuracy,
when the cost of lost wages, poor health, and
long-term negative outcomes for families of those
incarcerated are monetized, the sum expense of our
criminal justice system rises to $1.2 trillion, which
increases this burden threefold (O’Neill Hayes,
2020). Current direct and indirect costs reflect a significant economic and social problem that largely
overlooks moral considerations for the worth of human life and ability to change (AASWSW, 2017;
Pettus-Davis & Epperson, 2015).

doi: 10.1093/hsw/hlab019

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Social work is uniquely qualified to lead decarceration efforts given its prominent history of spearheading micro, mezzo, and macro initiatives to
ameliorate deleterious social conditions. Value alignment is also evident in the profession’s commitment
to the pursuit of economic, racial, and social equity.
Due to varied practice settings, social workers can
support transdisciplinary collaboration unifying
wide-ranging discrete interests into cogent strategies
that promote humane treatment in a time of incarceration devolution. Overall, these efforts can lead
to more ethical and reasoned methods to ensure the
welfare of citizens while counteracting the culture of
mass incarceration. Social work research, practice,
and policy all have distinct yet interconnected roles
in advancing smart decarceration and reforming our
current criminal justice system. Through a personin-environment perspective, the profession can effectively converge over practice areas resulting in a
pragmatic and attainable agenda that incorporates
expertise across disciplines (Pettus-Davis & Epperson, 2015). To this end, social workers are skillfully
prepared to meet this grand challenge.
Social work research efforts to advance decarceration emphasize unexplored topics of study,
collaborative inquiry, standardized methods of
measurement and data collection, and widely circulated findings. For example, there is a need for
increased research surrounding factors that contribute to mass incarceration rather than indiscriminately using the number of those incapacitated to
uphold current exorbitant expenditures. To this
end, studies should include the social and personal
causes of criminal behavior and the influence of
decarceration approaches on such (Pettus-Davis,
Epperson, & Grier, 2017). Relatedly, we must
have a better understanding of the direct and indirect costs and benefits of decarceration compared

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Research, Practice, and Policy Strategies to
Promote Smart Decarceration

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2015). Although these interventions have been
found to be only moderately effective, the need for
rehabilitative services in these core areas will remain,
requiring evidence-based redevelopment and a community-focused lens. Practice interventions must
also increasingly confront racial, economic, and social disparities that influence crime, incarceration,
and recidivism. The profession’s appreciation for diversity and difference, coupled with proficiency in
culturally competent practice, equips social workers
to lead intervention efforts. Likewise, practitioners
are well positioned to adopt a community-minded
focus that relies on strategies founded in empirical
evidence critical to successful readjustment of formerly incarcerated individuals (Aos et al., 2006;
Austin et al., 2013; Pettus-Davis & Epperson,
2015). Last, social work practitioners can provide
firsthand insights into the efficacy of interventions
that prevent repeat offending and are therefore vital
to garnering favor and resources for continued
decarceration advancement. Practitioner advocacy
for funding to develop and maintain programs that
promote rehabilitation rather than more costly imprisonment is fundamental to influencing local,
state, and national resource allocation. Through
our unique skill set, social workers can enhance
current interventions and also advocate for the financial means needed to sustain them (Pettus-Davis
& Epperson, 2015).
Social work policy efforts to advance smart
decarceration require shifts in legislation that enhance multidisciplinary approaches, make use of
evidence and data, and ensure collaboration
throughout all levels of government. Although the
country’s incarceration rate continues to increase,
there is a scarcity of successful policies and interventions to address or prevent imprisonment. Advocacy and policy recommendations to reduce
incarceration, correct inequities, and ensure the
welfare of citizens seek to do so by redefining the
very nature of our criminal justice system (PettusDavis & Epperson, 2015; Pettus-Davis et al.,
2017). Although it may be difficult to acknowledge, research reveals that incarceration is not successful in realizing public safety neither through
rehabilitation nor inhibition of criminal behavior
by fear of punishment. Therefore, policy change
that better reflects current evidence views incarceration as a last-resort means to remove individuals who pose an imminent danger from society
when community-based alternatives are insuffi-

Health & Social Work

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with traditional punitive imprisonment. Expansion of intervention research also allows for increased attention to racial, social, and economic
disparity through study methods that appreciate
the lived experiences of affected constituencies.
A holistic approach of this nature requires a recursive flow of information where data informs practice and policy that continually shapes research.
Collaboration and large-scale adoption of novel
evidence-based decarceration policies and practices can be eased by legislation and incentives. Consistent measurement and data collection among
local, state, and national entities is also needed to
provide an accurate representation of current demographics and outcomes to inform decarceration
moving forward. A unified data source that allows
for individual-level analysis can encourage partnership across entities while better identifying variables related to recidivism, disparity, and effects of
incarceration that are cognizant of the person in
environment (Epperson & Pettus-Davis, 2016).
Last, social work researchers are vital in shaping
public perception through evidence that validates
the tenets of decarceration. Specifically, the benefits of a humanitarian response to criminality must
be clearly demonstrated through straightforward
interpretations of both the shortcomings of mass
incarceration and the advantages of alternative
approaches to criminal justice. To meet this aim,
research findings that translate into innovative strategies need to be easily understood by the general
populace and extensively disseminated throughout
current and diverse media platforms and social networks. Model legislation, policy statements, and
practice briefs that plainly illustrate decarceration
initiatives should be targeted to practitioners and
those with vested interests in the criminal justice
system (Pettus-Davis et al., 2017).
Social workers have long contributed to reducing crime, incarceration, and recidivism through
primary interventions and services, and those
implemented during and after imprisonment
intended to prevent repeat offending. Within the
criminal justice system, practitioners facilitate job
readiness training, psychoeducational programing,
peer support groups, mentoring programs, and
educational opportunities. They also rely on a
range of cognitive behavioral techniques and
provide specialized treatment for substance abuse
and sexual offenses (Aos, Miller, & Drake, 2006;
Austin et al., 2013; Pettus-Davis & Epperson,

vironment are ideal for social work to realize
decarceration goals set forth in this grand challenge. HSW
REFERENCES
American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare.
(2017). Promote smart decarceration. Retrieved from
https://grandchallengesforsocialwork.org/promotesmart-decarceration/
Aos, S., Miller, M., & Drake, E. (2006). Evidence-based adult
corrections programs: What works and what does not. Olympia: Washington State Institute for Public Policy.
Austin, J., Cadora, E., Clear, T. R., Dansky, K., Greene, J.,
Gupta, V., et al. (2013). Ending mass incarceration:
Charting a new justice reinvestment. Washington, DC:
The Sentencing Project.
Epperson, M., & Pettus-Davis, C. (2016, September). Policy
recommendations for meeting the grand challenge to promote
smart decarceration [Grand Challenges for Social Work
Initiative Policy Brief No. 9]. Cleveland: American
Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare.
Hyland, S. S. (2019). Bureau of Justice statistics: Justice expenditure and employment series. Retrieved from https://
www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty¼pbdetail&iid¼6728
Laird, L. (2013). Doing time extended: Ex-offenders face
tens of thousands of legal restrictions, bias and limits
on their rights. ABA Journal, 99(6), 50–55.
O’Neill Hayes, T. (2020). The economic costs of the U.S.
criminal justice system. American Action Forum:
Research. Retrieved from https://www.americanac
tionforum.org/research/the-economic-costs-of-theu-s-criminal-justice-system/#ixzz6vJUdrY00
Pettus-Davis, C., & Epperson, M. W. (2015). From mass
incarceration to smart decarceration [Grand Challenges
for Social Work Initiative Working Paper No. 4].
Cleveland: Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare.
Pettus-Davis, C., Epperson, M., & Grier, A. (2017).
Guideposts for the era of smart decarceration: Strategies for
practitioners, advocates, reformers and researchers. Retrieved from https://ijrd.csw.fsu.edu/sites/g/files/
upcbnu1766/files/Publications/Guideposts_SmartDe
carceration.pdf

Christine M. Rine, PhD, is associate professor, Social Work
Department, Edinboro University of Pennsylvania, 235 Scotland Road, Hendricks Hall G-37, Edinboro, PA 16444; email: crine@edinboro.edu.

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cient. In this sense, decarceration policies must
counter current conditions wherein the preponderance of those incarcerated do not pose a significant threat to anyone. When imprisonment is used
as a reflexive reaction to crime and unwanted conduct, behaviors that may be due to other factors
become criminalized. Sentencing reform better
aligned with individual circumstances and degree
of potential risk to public safety can address this
downfall in our current policies. The reduction of
social disparities based on racial, class, and behavioral health statuses should also be central in decarceration efforts ensured by legislative mandates
enacted across levels of government. We must also
remove policies that do not align with rehabilitative aims such as those that rescind or limit legal
powers and freedoms due to criminal rulings
(Epperson & Pettus-Davis, 2016; Pettus-Davis
et al., 2017). For example, there are presently approximately 40,000 “civil disability or collateral
consequences policies” nationwide that inhibit or
prohibit housing assistance, student loans, professional licensure, employment, voting, and parental
rights. Yet effective policies that have rehabilitative
aims do not exclude those with past convictions to
maximize success; doing otherwise is counterproductive (Laird, 2013; Pettus-Davis et al., 2017).
Last, decarceration policies require funding redistribution to build community-based programs to
reduce crime and recidivism founded on evidence
that flows from praxis between research and practice. This can be achieved by securing funding
specified for justice reinvestment initiatives that
strengthen communities most harmed by incarceration. Such social capacity assets can be created
through the implementation of behavioral health
services, public education, economic infrastructure, and other forms of community supports. This
reinvestment not only fortifies communities, but
also acts as a protective mechanism to deter crime
(Austin et al., 2013; Pettus-Davis et al., 2017).
Social workers are rallied to “promote smart
decarceration” through their areas of expertise that
span practice, policy, and research. We are tasked
“to improve social welfare and social justice for a
large segment of our society—not only those directly involved in the criminal justice system, but
also the families and communities from which they
come” (Pettus-Davis & Epperson, 2015, p. 12).
Our continued efforts to encourage collaboration
across disciplines and attention to the person in en-