Gaes and his distinguished coauthors offer a comprehensive analysis of public versus private management of prisons, a competition that originated in the 1980s with the introduction of private facilities into the criminal justice system. The authors argue that prison performance must be measured in reference to the goals of a particular prison system and introduce the technique of multilevel modeling to allow for simultaneous measurement of the individual and the institution. They also show how their analytic framework can be applied to other criminal justice components_prosecution, adjudication, postrelease supervision, policing_and to evaluating the privatization of almost any publicly administered service. They contend that the ability to meaningfully compare public and private prisons can better inform penal policy and improve prison performance and accountability. This book will be a valuable resource for public administrators and policy analysts, corrections personnel and criminologists.
Industry Reviews
Measuring Prison Performance breaks new ground in corrections. Long overdue, this book lays out the theory and methods to develop a practical way to evaluate prison performance. It integrates topics from the disciplines of public administration, economics, criminology, and criminal justice to provide unique insights. More than that, this book can be used as a paradigm to evaluate the performance of any public agency, and can be used as a model to make decisions about the privatization of public services. -- Joan Petersilia, Ph.D., University of California, Irvine
Gerald Gaes and co-authors Camp, Nelson, and Saylor have written what will undoubtedly be a preeminent resource in the analysis of performance from a multitude of perspectives in not only correctional environments but across the public sector as a whole. As governmental entities are called upon with increasing frequency to justify the allocation and utilization of scarce resources, they will turn to this work to help define and improve the substance and structure of their response. Other stakeholders will also benefit significantly from application of the principles outlined. -- Richard L. Stalder, Secretary, Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections
As America has constructed a far-flung network of penal institutions, the obvious question remains unanswered: how should we measure the performance of prisons? This practical and provocative book presents a long overdue framework for evaluating the utility of these unique institutions. We can only hope that policymakers and practitioners will follow the illuminated path. -- Jeremy Travis, President, John Jay College of Criminal Justice
Measuring Prison Performance is a must read for any practitioner, researcher, or public policy analyst who cares about the functioning of our nation's penal institutions. The book shows administrators how data can be used to supplement knowledge gained from audits, inmate data bases, and 'management by walking around.' The authors show us how to translate some of our nation's best practices into tangible and meaningful data, and by doing so, increase our ability to manage our prisons. The added bonus is that these same procedures can be applied to any government agency interested in increasing productivity, efficiency, and accountability. -- Kathy Hawk Sawyer, retired Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons
Bravo. Measuring Prison Performance marries public administration and corrections. This is an extremely important book by a team of sophisticated researchers who really know their stuff. A must-read for people who work at or just care about improving our prisons. -- James B. Jacobs, Warren E. Burger Professor of Law, New York University
