Crime, Inequality and Social Justice
Many authors have had contentious views on crime; however, Loury being an African American observed and went through inequality in terms of race. He observed higher racial inequalities in the realm of punishment than in any other arena of American social life (Glenn, 2010). Incarceration as a means to deal with crime offenders is greater among African American than the whites. This shows a trend of racial disparity in the rates of imprisonment
African Americans were associated with high rate of violence crimes than the whites, and this increased their number in prisons. Racial inequality on of imprisonment has also been increased because of the issue of “war on drugs”. African Americans were highly represented among those incarcerated (Glenn, 2010). For drug offenses even as they were no more using or selling those drugs than whites. This implies that there is racial disparity in imprisonment for crimes which can be described as an injustice.
Increasingly, there are disparities by social class in punishing these criminals, and these are so harmful to the affected families and communities (Glenn, 2010). This is because the prisoners come from the most disadvantaged parts of the society; it then happens that the prisons exacerbate the inequality ignoring that the factors that make young people get involved in crimes include disorganized childhoods, child abuse, inadequate education and this can be solved.
I agree with this view that there is disparity in imprisonment for crimes and this is shown by a higher rate of American prisoners than the whites. This could be because their low standards of living tempting them to get involved into illegal practices that cause crimes (Hawkins, Myers & Stone, 2003). At times they tend to be idle in the streets with nothing to do hence causing crimes. Thus a solution can be taken to curb that.
References
Glenn C. Loury. (2010). Crime, Inequality and Social Justice. © 2010 by the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.
Hawkins, D. F., Myers, S. L., & Stone, R. N. (2003). Crime control and social justice: The delicate balance. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press.
