Doctoral Dissertation Research: Hero or Inmate, Prison or Camp, Rehabilitation or Labor Extraction?: A Multi-Level Study of California's Prison Fire Camps

这项研究旨在更好地了解加州的保护营计划，在该计划中，4000多名男性和女性囚犯被安置在加州的五个营地中。这些营地通常没有安全的边界，看起来更像军营，而不是传统的监狱。在这些营地里，囚犯要么在营地内工作，要么在营地外为政府机构的各种项目工作，由林业或消防部门的雇员监督。这些囚犯的任务是应对紧急情况，包括野火，他们在那些从事艰苦、危险的工作，切断防火线，以防止和扑灭野火的人中占很大比例。目前的项目利用与囚犯、官员、主管和行政人员的访谈，以及现场人种学观察，从改造和惩罚的性质方面探索营地的日常生活。该项目的另一个阶段是调查集中营囚犯一旦假释并返回社区后会发生什么，特别是在就业和再犯率方面。虽然项目的每个阶段都有自己的方法和研究子问题，但最重要的研究问题是如何将一个特定的监狱环境融入加州乃至更广泛的美国的惩罚大局。因此，该项目将作为一个跳板，通过借鉴各种文献，包括法律与社会、惩罚社会学和犯罪学，来促进对惩罚和社会变革的认识。从更广泛的角度来看，这些发现可能会揭示出在减少再犯和帮助假释犯获得有酬工作方面，这些营地的相对有效性。

This research aims to better understand California's Conservation Camp Program, in which more than four thousand male and female prisoners are housed in fire camps throughout California. In these camps, which generally have no secure boundary and look more like army barracks than traditional prisons, inmates work either inside the camps or on crews outside the camps on various projects for government agencies under the supervision of forestry or fire department employees. Tasked with responding to emergencies, including wildfires, these prisoners constitute a substantial proportion of those doing the hard, dangerous labor of cutting fire lines to prevent and fight wildland fires. The current project utilizes interviews with inmates, officers, supervisors and administrators, as well as on-site ethnographic observations to explore everyday life in the camps in terms of the nature of rehabilitation and punishment. Another phase of the project examines what happens to camp inmates once they parole and return to the community, especially in terms of employment and recidivism rates. Although each phase of the project has its own methodologies and research sub-questions, the overriding research question is how one particular carceral setting fits into the larger picture of punishment in California and the United States more broadly. This project will therefore serve as a springboard for contributing to knowledge about punishment and social change by drawing from diverse literatures including law and society, sociology of punishment, and criminology. More broadly, the findings may shed light on the relative effectiveness of the fire camps in reducing recidivism and aiding parolees in securing gainful employment.