Serving the Public Good?—A Corpus-Assisted Discourse Analysis of Private Prisons and For-Profit Incarceration in the United States

Karoline Marko

doi:10.3389/fcomm.2021.672110

Abstract

It is a well-known fact that the United States has a very high prison population compared to other countries, and that it is particularly the private prison industry that has been thriving. This industry is based on a for-profit ideology that aims to save money by cutting costs wherever possible, and that, based on their profit-orientation, has no interest in rehabilitating offenders, since they make money with every incarcerated person. This paper investigates these issues from a linguistic perspective and takes a corpus of texts collected from the websites of the two largest private prison corporations in the United States (CoreCivic and The GEO Group) as a starting point for a corpus-assisted discourse analysis. The corpus comprises a total of 25,386 words and the analyses reveal that while both companies discursively background issues of violence, recidivism, and costs, they place a focus on the safety and security of their facilities and on their reentry programs for inmates. Thus, it is argued that the investigated corporations shift the discursive focus away from a negative discourse centering on violence and recidivism to a positive discourse centering on reentry and safety, which actively counters the findings that several researchers and journalists alike have revealed.

Highlights

Prisons as institutions of punishment have been known in Europe since the 12th century, and were introduced in the United States in the late 18th century (McShane, 2008, pp. 8–9)
As shown in the concordance lines, CoreCivic is presented as an active agent, and the language used on the website accredits the company with positive qualities such as dependability and innovation
To arrive at a better understanding of what is happening in this case, one must investigate the full context of the sentence: this specific sentence is taken from a statement made about the passing away of a child at one of CoreCivic’s facilities (Mariee Juares, see, e.g., Silva, 2019), and the statement points out that the medical care was not provided by CoreCivic but by another organization, thereby negating and refuting the involvement of CoreCivic in the death of the child

Summary

Introduction

Prisons as institutions of punishment have been known in Europe since the 12th century, and were introduced in the United States in the late 18th century (McShane, 2008, pp. 8–9). Prisons as institutions of punishment have been known in Europe since the 12th century, and were introduced in the United States in the late 18th century While public maintenance of prisons has been associated with consistency and improved standards, the earliest private prisons in the United States were known for their exploitation and brutality While evidence about the effectiveness and efficiency of the private sector remains scarce (Ludlow, 2017), private prison organizations justify their existence with arguments of cost-effectiveness, increased safety and Serving the Public Good?

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion