From the Asylum to the Prison: Rethinking the Incarceration Revolution - Part II: State Level Analysis

Abstract:     
The United States exhibited wildly erratic behavior regarding the institutionalization of persons deemed deviant during the 20th century. During the first half of the century, the country institutionalized people in mental hospitals and asylums at extraordinarily high rates. Deinstitutionalization brought a sharp diminution of that population, but it coincided with an exponential increase in our prison populations.

In previous research, I analyzed these trends at the national level and explored their relationship to homicide rates. One key question that emerged was whether the findings would hold at the state level. This study collects and tests state-level data and finds that, indeed, the correlations remain strong and robust. It makes three findings:

First, at the national level, using new expanded data on mental institutions, the contrast between the mid-century and 2001 is even more pronounced: during the 1940s and 50s, the United States consistently institutionalized in mental hospitals and prisons at rates above 700 persons per 100,000 adults, reaching peaks of 778 in 1939 and 786 in 1955. The relationship between aggregated institutionalization and homicide over the period 1934 to 2000 is statistically significant at the national level.

Second, the very same relationship exists at the state level. Using state-level panel data regressions spanning 1934 to 2001, and controlling for economic, demographic, and criminal justice variables, I find a large, robust, and statistically significant relationship between aggregated institutionalization and homicide rates.

Third, there are important relations at the individual state level. Using a Prais-Winsten regression model, the individual state analyses reveal some differences but the overall direction of influence shows the same striking relationship between aggregated institutionalization and homicide.

Keywords: prison population, mental hospital population, state-level data, mental hospitalization, asylum, mental illness, institutionalization, incarceration, incapacitation, deterrence, incarceration revolution, punishment theory, homicide, structural covariates of homicide, unemployment, executions

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