Neoliberal State Policies and their Impact on Young People of Color

Introduction

This study will explore about neoliberal states and its policy regarding isolating young people especially the people of colour. The young people of colour face a far greater risk of being targeted, profiled, charged, arrested, harassed, violated and imprisoned for minor offenses than others. We will also look at how neoliberal state policies systematically imprison poor or low-income people in some case, the neoliberal policies came out with new strategies to incarcerate whole communities. Poor will get fined, arrested and incarcerated for minor offenses such, an unpaid parking ticket, sitting on a sidewalk, sleeping on a park, or a minor drug offense, can all result in jail time. This study will be related to politics dissertation help with the Australia juvenile justice, and as an example of the Justice Reinvestment program in Australia associated with neoliberal state policy, which can result of mass incarcerate whole community. We will also see the relationship between neo-liberalism and globalisation.

Neo-liberalism and Poverty (low-income)

Neo-liberalism idea is regularly used in the last 40 years to take over the economic system from state to private. The Neo-liberalism society will shape by the free market and this is extended to every part of our public and personal life. Neo-liberalism has three dimensions, it is an ideology, and it is about policies and form of governance. This study more focuses of the governance dimension of neo-liberalism. In the neoliberal mode of governance citizens defined as “customers” or “clients” (Steger and Roy, 2010). Neo-liberalism transformed the state from a provider of public welfare to a promoter of free markets. The state role in neo-liberalism more to regulate and deregulate law and policies to favour the free market. It is more associated with trade policies, liberalised the international movement of capital, cutting trade tariffs and barriers for multinational corporations that they can move around the world easily (Steger and Roy, 2010). The state sold most of the public assets to private companies and market thinking dominance our everyday lives. Globalisation is the international element of a broader program of neoliberal modification, which contributes to increase inequality in many different ways in the societies. As an example, inequality in the labour market, neo-liberalism idea in the free market is increasing wages for highly-skilled workers, managers and reducing wages for less-skilled workers obviously lead to greater inequality in the society, rich get richer the poor get poorer a most essential idea of the neo-liberal project the transfer of wealth from the poor the Rich, and neo-liberalism limited the power of unions, education (Guttal, 2007).

Loci Wacquant (2004) in his book, ‘Punishing the Poor’: The Neoliberal Government of Social Insecurity, published in French language and then translated to English in 2009, uncovers that, how neoliberal states around the world punishing poor people. In his book, he exposed the relationship between punishment and poverty under neo-liberalism. Wacquant gave an example of Prison-fare since 1980 in the USA 500% increase seen in The USA prison population (Wacquant, 2009). Young people among the most affected and social isolated group among others. As we mentioned before, the neo-liberalism state sold most of the public services to private, prisons and correction centres are one of those. Correction industry is now the third-largest employer in the USA, Wacquant demonstrated that, it is not a response to the rising crime but rather to the social insecurities. The penal policy is the key to the normalisation of precarious labour by compelling peoples’ acceptance of precarious work under the threat of increasingly punitive consequences for those who leave, reject or are excluded from this labour market (Wacquant, 2009). The neoliberal states put more people in prison than any other country around the world, and 70% of these prisoners are people of colour, which they belong to low-income families (Neoliberalism, Youth, and Social Justice, 2004). In the June quarter 2018 across Australia on an average night, 980 young people were in youth detention. The vast majority 90% were male, and 84% were aged 10–17. Nearly 60% which make 3 in 5 young people in detention were un-sentenced. They were awaiting the outcome of their court matter or sentencing (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 2018).

Wacquant in his book talked about prison-fare, which only target the minority men and women. This occurs through exclusion from social assistance programs (workfare) and incorporation into the expanding carceral apparatus (prison-fare). This “double regulation” of poverty primarily targets black women and men, materially and symbolically (Wacquant, 2009). If we are looking to Australia criminal justice system, they are doing exactly what Wacquant said, Indigenous community in Australia the most disadvantaged community. More than half 59% of that detainees were Aboriginal or Torres Strait nearly 3 in 5, despite Indigenous young people making up only 5% of the general population aged 10–17. Indigenous young people aged 10–17 were 26 times as likely as non-Indigenous young people to be in detention on an average night (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 2018). However, according to the Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989 in the first article mentioned “if you are under 18 years of age, you are a child, and you have rights” also in article 42 it is about the rights of “every child no matter their religion, race or abilities; whatever they think or say; what their culture is; whether they are boys or girls or whether they are rich or poor”. Australian government breaches both articles of the convention on the rights of the child 1989. Nowadays, a prison is more like a cultural organism. Each country has prisons are different from others. As an example, the American prison or a French prison is a different organism from an Australian one. In America there is the particular issue of how to run effectively and equitably a prison whose population takes in a substantial proportion of Afro-Americans and Hispanics; in France, North Africans and blacks; in Australia, Aboriginal people (Harding, 2001).

Giroux Henry global TV Network Chair, McMaster Univ, he believed, since 1980s, there was a massive transfer of public wealth to private and this is an ongoing attempt to privatised almost everything. Giroux believed neo-liberalism value everything on market base, anything that doesn’t fit into market values, it is disposable. He mentioned the “war on youth” and this war in time period become hotter. Neo-liberalism punishing young people in ways has not ever seen before. Young people with low income, especially poor minority become disposable population (Wacquant, 2009). He believed that, there is no investment on them basically, to get them out of the way, put them in prison that basically, contain them, or as Wacquant mentioned the issue of supervisory workfare, where the neoliberal states use techniques of control, surveillance and punitive restrictions on poor people. Workfare is running like a labour probation programme in which poor people to prove their willingness to work even there are no jobs for them or there are jobs but don’t allow poor people to support their families (Wacquant, 2009). Welfare gave to poor with conditioning that they have to the demonstration in making progress in changing outlook and behaviour. Welfare offices in the past haven’t instructed poor how to be good citizen-workers but nowadays these offices are the site of instruction on how to be a good citizen or good worker (Wacquant, 2009). As an example in America, a welfare recipient has to signed lots of documents and show commitment to lots of conditions before she/he has to receive a single welfare check. If she/he couldn’t stand of those commitments, her/his welfare grant will be reduced or terminated. At the same time, her/his social security number will be matched against local and national criminal records to find that she/he is not the person who should be incarcerated, or any outstanding arrest warrant, or convicted of any crime. She/he has been fingerprinted and photographed, and also her/his financial information has to been matched against various job providers’ databases and Tax board records to check her/his lack of income. Their information has been entered into the welfare system’s database, this way low enforcement officers will access to their personal information (Kornbluh, 2012).

Justice Reinvestment program

The Justice Reinvestment program in juvenile justice in Victoria, which is the outcome of neoliberal policies, this program claim that there aim to address the root and causes of crime than the actual crime in Victoria (Youthlaw.asn.au, 2019). Giroux and Wacquant believed that, neoliberal states now moving from putting people in prisons to mass incarceration, and they are doing it imposing criminalising practice to low income and poor people are profiled. As example welfare fraud, there is very aggressive investigation related to issue by the criminal justice system and information is provided by the welfare system. And both welfare officers and the criminal justice system increasing number of families pay their criminal penalties. In 2012, number of Americans under the criminal justice, supervision was total 7,025,800 people, local jailed 744,500 was jailed in local and 1,500,00 prisoner in state and federal prisons and 4,781,300 was on probation or parole (Dolan and L. Carr, 2015). The number of people in probation is shocking when Giroux and Wacquant are talking about mass incarceration; it is about neoliberal policies to the warehouse, confine and the isolated whole community and exactly what the Justice Reinvestment program doing in Australia. It is about the mass incarceration of the poor and low-income community, most disadvantaged community penalties by the welfare system, or minor offenses such parking fines, traffic lights, drugs and those who couldn’t effort the court bills, and that their communities are profiled as a criminal postcode .

Justice reinvestment Victoria believes that, the prisons are extremely expansive and harmful, by putting more people in the prisons doesn’t stop crime in Victoria, it costs around $98,000 a year to house each prisoner and an estimated $500,000 per prison bed in construction costs (Youthlaw.asn.au, 2019). The idea of the program is this; it is a better and effective way to invest money in programs and services in a postcode, where the youngest people committed crimes (Youthlaw.asn.au, 2019). Justice reinvestment approach is about incarceration of the whole community. One of the big threat presented by the environment are posed on the justice reinvestment approach is that they will invest in certain communities, which may generate a negative image on those communities and residents. On other hand, these particular communities will be labelled or profiled as problem communities. The neoliberal state apply different strategies to incarcerate people on the level of a big community, Hogg, and Brown (1998) in their book Rethinking Law and Order, describe situational crime prevention, if government cut opportunity for offenders, it will help to reduce crime. Australian government recent years applied situational prevention strategies, through “Neighbourhood Watch” and other programs which is called crime prevention through a redesign environment by changing architectural design of building and layout of streets, housing estates and shopping malls, reorder arrangement with the community; like blocking off traffic, channelling local pedestrian traffic, creating semi-private spaces and the increasing sense of ownership which increase social control through enhancing natural surveillance (Hogg and Brown, 1998). In some cases, they will increase the routine surveillance without altering the physical environment, which sends message to potential offenders that they are unwelcome. In fact, it is all about neo-liberalism policies, which pass more public space to private and increase mass incarcerating of low-income communities.

Wacquant believed this neo-liberalism is posing punishing policy and punitive practices compare to the disciplinary standard. The disciplinary standard associated with such goals as rehabilitating convicts and changing their behaviour but, instead, neo-liberalism more interested to locking up the poor, warehousing them, confining them in isolated neighbourhoods, making them generally invisible, and weakening the likelihood that they will pose a problem for the rest of society (Wacquant, 2009). This is how justice reinvestment program works in Victoria, by locking up whole poor communities in their neighbourhood. In reality, this program goes beyond the prison and detention centres. The justice reinvestment is the outcome of neo-liberalism policy, targeting disadvantaged communities especially the indigenes and colour. By this way, they can build walls around wider communities and incarcerate large numbers of low income and poor people, which they can control, observe and monitor them easily.

Conclusion

The neo-liberalism policies thought people how to think about mass problems in society. The Neoliberal state encourages the people, to know that, they are responsible for their own fate. For instance, massive pollution is caused by an individual, rather by the major corporations. As criminal justice practitioner I am completely agree with Giroux, what has seen disappear. In this discourse, the essence of the problem is an inability to translate private troubles into larger structural public considerations. There is no more social supportive approach; it is more about behaviour management approach. Neo-liberalism is not about simply quarantining the poor but most fundamentally about actively working to get the poor to change how they think and act. The education is the centre of politics, education has to be reclaimed. Education has to have a very different mission and very different purpose, and a very different set of practices. Neo-liberalism also destroys all those things, which are matter to a specific culture, we need to work collectively to reclaims all those things that matter such as justice for all, quality the ability to relate to the others in a way that expands the very process of democracy by itself. If we want to bring change, need to educate people, that they can think critically and empower them to have critical imagination about, what they believe in justice and equality. All of this is possible to address the social problems and to believe that, the world can be a better place and you need to fight for it collectively and bring justice for everyone.

Reference

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (2018). Youth detention population in Australia. [online] Available at:

Dolan, K. and L. Carr, J. (2015). The poor get Prison: The Alarming Spread of the Criminalization of Poverty. Washington, DC 20036: Institute for Policy Studies.

Hogg, R. and Brown, D. (1998). Rethinking law and order. Annandale, NSW: Pluto Press, pp.187-190.

Kornbluh, F. (2012). Cheating Welfare: Public Assistance and the Criminalization of Poverty. New York: New York University Press, 2011. 238 pp.. Law & Society Review, 46(4), pp.923-925.

Wacquant, L. (2009). Punishing the Poor: The Neoliberal Government of Social Insecurity. New York: Guilford Publication.

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