A Mass Psychology of Punishment: Crime and the Futility of Rationally Based Approaches

Abstract

No, I'm not going to vote for Dinkins: I want a mayor who's going to be the mayor of all the people, not just the blacks and minorities who are committing all the crimes.... You voted for Jackson in the primary that time, didn't you? Yeah, you're always on their side. You don't care about the fact that those animals are out beating people up, mugging people. They should all be in jail, locked up for life. SO PRONOUNCED A RELATIVE ON THE OCCASION OF A SMALL FAMILY GET-TOGETHER, raising a disturbing issue that frames this essay's larger concerns. Perhaps what is most worrisome about these statements has less to do with what was being said (though this, too, is surely of major concern), but how and under what conditions this relative was saying it. The anger was utterly palpable in the facial expressions, as well as in the overall bodily tensions, visible as these deeply interconnected attitudes about crime and race were being stated. Moreover, efforts to change the subject were to no avail since there seemed to be a virtual investment in repeatedly coming back to the theme and attacking not only the criminal population, but also the family liberal being addressed much closer at hand around the dinner table. As it happened, this particular relative was slowly going out of business, beset by increasing worries about how he would make ends meet as he edged toward his middle sixties, with hardly enough money to pay for his own and his wife's health? care insurance. His savings were by now meager, slowly vanishing, and he perceived that age discrimination made his prospects for reemployment slim. In this respect, his

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