By Wade Lee Hudson

In his July 22, 2024, review of recent books advocating the abolition of prisons, Adam Gopnik argues that the “frequent brutality and ingrained indifference” seen in prisons calls us to “freely imagine alternatives,” but he differs from the abolitionists.

He strongly supports those such as Michelle Alexander who see American incarceration as “a mechanism that preserves racial hierarchy.” Incarceration in her now famous formulation acts as the new Jim Crow.” Black people in New York State, for instance, are fifteen percent of the overall population and almost fifty percent of the prison population.

However, Gopnik rejects the argument that mass incarceration is a product of capitalism,

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