Recidivism refers to an individual repeating an undesirable behavior, despite having already experienced a negative result because of this behavior. It tends to refer to criminals repeating their criminal behavior after having been incarcerated for previous criminal activities. Reducing the rates of recidivism remains one of the challenges of the criminal justice system. Several reduction activities involve community-based strategies.
One method to reduce recidivism is to focus on the individuals who are most likely to reoffend. As criminal justice costs continue to increase across the country, states struggle with budget constraints. A cost effective method of reducing recidivism rates focuses on utilizing scarce resources on the individuals who show a high predisposition towards reoffending. This would result in the greatest return on investment for the corrections departments. Individuals who have a low risk of recidivism are actually more likely to reoffend when they are over-supervised by the system. For this reason, those with a low-risk of reoffending should receive minimal supervision (“Lessons from the states: reducing recidivism and curbing corrections costs through justice reinvestment,” 2013).
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Another community-based method involves electronic surveillance for those who are likely to reoffend. This method utilizes technology, such as GPS and electronic monitoring, to monitor individuals who are in a halfway-house scenario. One program showed a drop in recidivism rates from 54.6 to 51.1. This occurred in the Illinois Department of Corrections (DOC). Illinois DOC supervises approximately 77,000 individuals. This is one of the largest correctional systems in the country. While this may not seem like a significant drop, it actually has a tremendous impact on the criminal justice system. Since this also occurred in a large DOC system, it offers the potential to work in the state of California as well (“Illinois targets recidivism reduction with community-based alternatives,” n.d.).
- “Illinois targets recidivism reduction with community-based alternatives,” (n.d.). Retrieved July 29, 2013, from: http://bi.com/
- “Lessons from the states: reducing recidivism and curbing corrections costs through justice reinvestment.” (2013, April 29). Retrieved July 29, 2013, from: http://www.corrections.com
