These reforms limit their objectives to the maintenance and practicality of the current system, rather than questioning the hierarchical and exploitative principles underlying the system’s function. In doing so, carceral AI locks us into false dichotomies (e.g., incarcerated in a jail versus incarcerated at home), without the possibility of liberatory alternatives (e.g., not incarcerated at all).

 

Abolitionist philosophy calls for an end to the reliance on imprisonment and policing and proposes alternatives that engage holistically with the structural conditions underlying violence and suffering. In this vein, abolitionists often advocate for ‘non-reformist reform’, change that is not cordoned by what is possible within the current system but rather change that is premised on what should be made possible long-term given human needs. Non-reformist reform prioritizes decarceration and reinvestment of resources back into communities.

 

By contrast, reforms grounded in carceral AI intensify eugenic logic and tend to pull resources away from addressing root causes of human suffering. Carceral AI systems are expensive to develop, justifying increases to police and prison budgets rather than reinvesting resources into communities, such as funding reentry support programs and education. For example, the Sentence Risk Assessment Tool in Pennsylvania ultimately had no impact on sentencing, despite taking 10 years to develop and being funded by taxpayer dollars.

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Finally, carceral AI systems are rubber stamp reforms, allowing legislatures to claim some measure is being taken to address the crisis of mass incarceration while leaving the core problems unaddressed.

 

For instance, the number of people on electronic monitoring has increased fivefold from 2005 to 2021, driven in part by the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the increase in this so-called “alternative” to incarceration, research has shown that it places intense financial and psychological burdens on monitored individuals and their families, making it more difficult for them to reintegrate into society. By contrast, community organizations have long advocated for low-tech non-reformist reforms to reduce prison populations, such as eliminating cash bail and releasing elderly populations from prison. See our recommendations for non-reformist reforms in the 5th point under recommendations.

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Suggested readings:

• Arnett, C. (2019). From Decarceration to E-carceration. Cardozo L. Rev., 41, 641.

• Barabas, C. (2022). Refusal in data ethics: Re-imagining the code beneath the code of computation in the carceral state.

• Benjamin, R. (2019). Race after technology: Abolitionist tools for the new Jim code. John Wiley & Sons.

• Butler, P. (2015). The system is working the way it is supposed to: the limits of criminal justice reform. Geo. LJ, 104, 1419.

• Critical Resistance (2020). Reformist reforms vs. abolitionist steps in policing. https://criticalresistance.org/resources/reformist-reforms-vs-abolitionist-steps-in-policing/

• Kilgore, J. (2022). Understanding E-Carceration: Electronic Monitoring, the Surveillance State, and the Future of Mass Incarceration. The New Press.

• Weisburd, K. (2019). Sentenced to surveillance: Fourth Amendment limits on electronic monitoring. NCL Rev., 98, 717.