I disagree here. I think it is categorically different with the American model. The author's treatment of the American model is too apologetic. The US prison system is a travesty. Perhaps the most you could say for it is that it might make some victims feel better.The process continues during the incarceration, which is treated less as a form of punishment than as a sort of state-imposed rehabilitation. It's not a categorial difference from the American model, which includes a number of rehab and therapeutic offerings, but, with Breivik about to enjoy some not insignificant creature comforts in his three-room cell, the emphasis is clearly distinct.
Retributive seems pointless. It's "justice" without a goal. So much conservative protest over wasted dollars and no real effort to give incarcerating someone a long term benefit to society (or at least less of a cost to society). Our current system often makes people more effective predators rather then better citizens. I have no idea of the total costs, but spent a bit of time looking at the cost savings of treatment, counseling and harm reduction programs in Washington State for a CBA class, the savings from diverting certain prisoners from the retributive system were huge, more then paying for the new programs cost. The benefits presumably go much further then the tax dollars spent on crime. People who aren't in jail hold down jobs, probably have better health care, give better care to their children and lots of other things. Too bad every politician lies in wait for a Willie Horton to coup de grass an election, insures that we will never have real reform.
Exactly so. Add to the equation that many American prisons are now run by private corporations, for profit, with an incentive to keep the prison full, and you have a recipe for tragedy.