Deterrence &
Recidivism
What works and what doesn’t in preventing crime.
The three measures of deterrence
Nagin, D. S. 2013. Deterrence: A Review of the Evidence by a Criminologist for Economists. Annual Review of Economics.
1. Certainty: a measure of how certain an offender is that they will be caught and face consequences.
2. Swiftness: a measure of how quickly an offender faces consequences.
3. Severity: a measure of the severity of the consequence for an offender.
Of the three strategies to deter crime, certainty is the most effective and severity is the least effective, making the increase of penalties one of the least effective ways to deter crime.
The general public is not aware of the penalties attached to specific crimes.
Almost no one who commits a crime stops to think, “What is the current level of offense for this crime?”
Cities have different laws from each other so crossing into a different municipality could mean you are charged with a different crime.
A 2022 study in the UK found that individuals who believed sentences were too lenient were significantly less accurate at estimating current penalties, tending to underestimate current incarceration sentences (House of Commons Justice Committee, 2024).
Incarceration has no effect on deterring future criminal behavior, and may actually increase the likelihood that someone will reoffend.
This is particularly true for repeat offenders, since perceived severity of incarceration decreases over time the more someone is incarcerated and an offender’s exposure to inmates with the same conviction increases their likelihood of reoffending within that particular crime category (Petrich et al., 2021).
Incarceration connects low-risk offenders to high-risk offenders and promotes antisocial behaviors (Weisberg, 2014).
Prisons are designed to incapacitate, isolate, and punish, not deter future criminal behavior. However, newer rehabilitative models show promise at reducing recidivism.
Recidivism metrics are severely limited in the way they measure reoffending behavior.
Crime desistance occurs incrementally and can involve setbacks.
Recidivism, as a binary yes or no metric, cannot show the reality of gradual improvement.
More accurate and nuanced metrics would measure the time elapsed between offenses and the relative severity of the offense compared to past offenses.
Simply locking people up for longer periods of time without addressing the underlying issues is a short-term “band-aid” fix that pushes the problem to the next generation.
Evidence-based alternatives: strategies that are proven to deter crime
Address underlying causes of criminal behavior.
Since 95% of the incarcerated population is eventually released, the most effective way to increase public safety in the long-run is to address the underlying factors and root causes of criminal behavior, which include: substance abuse, mental illness, unemployment, homelessness, antisocial influences, poverty, dysfunctional family and adverse childhood experiences, lack of education, and lack of community supports and services.
Educate the public on the penalties attached to specific crimes.
The general public is rarely aware of the penalties attached to specific crimes. Public awareness campaigns, such as sentencing surveys, are a great way to increase public knowledge on criminal penalties and provide greater transparency into the justice process. See the UK’s sentencing survey project “You be the Judge” here.
Implement rehabilitative custodial models in jails and prisons.
Rehabilitative custodial models employ evidence-based interventions such as the Risk-Need-Responsivity Model (Center for Justice Innovation. 2024), treatment and programming, positive reinforcements of prosocial behavior, staff cultures of ethical behavior and good relationships with inmates, and reentry services and stable care following release.
The Correctional Program Assessment Inventory (CPAI) is available to assess an agency’s adherence to the principles of effective intervention. Reductions in recidivism are positively associated with high CPAI scores (Petrich et al., 2021).
Dollar per dollar, money spent on increasing law enforcement personnel and presence in high-crime areas will more effectively deter crime than money spent increasing penalties and periods of incarceration. This is because increasing the likelihood of being caught has a stronger deterrent effect than increasing the punishment.