Determinants of State Innovations in American Sentencing and Corrections Policy

Abstract

Recently, government officials, policy makers, and practitioners are taking a closer look at present day sentencing and corrections approaches. State policy decisions have in large part determined how justice is administered, and a variety of contextual factors determine which policies states are likely to adopt. This review synthesizes the empirical literature on determinants of state sentencing and corrections policy innovations and discusses their relative value in predicting state policy adoptions across studies. Results indicate that sentencing and corrections policies are less likely to be predicted by functional explanations such as crime rates than by certain economic, political, and social variables. The most consistently predictive determinants of state policy adoptions are the external influences of other states and the federal government.