Recapping the most popular episodes of my podcast in 2018
The first year of the Decarceration Nation podcast (a podcast about radically reimagining America’s criminal justice system has come to a close.
Out of the first 40 episodes, these were the ten most popular:
10: Square One Project (with guest Sukyi McMahon)
The Square One Project asks the question, if we started our criminal justice system again from “square one” but knowing what we know now, how would it be different?
9: The Last Mile (with guest Beverly Parenti)
The Last Mile is an amazing program that goes inside prisons to teach incarcerated folks programming and entrepreneurship. Beverly Parenti is one of the co-founders and is the Executive Director of TLM which is now expanding from California to Men’s and Women’s facilities across the USA.
8. My Reform Agenda
I gave a short ten minute speech in Washtenaw County about my hopes for criminal justice reform moving into the future that was the inspiration for this episode.
7. Harm Reduction Part One (with Dr. Sheila Vakharia)
If you want to understand “Harm Reduction” or are interested in the arguments for why the American War on Drugs have been a TOTAL failure, this is probably the episode for you.
6. Jpay Bad
Jpay, and their parent company Securus, charge people in prison (and their families) usurious fees for everything from email access to account management.
5. E-Carceration (with guest James Kilgore)
Discussing the expansion of electronic monitoring and post-incarceration surveillance with one of the most recognized experts in e-carceration James Kilgore. We discuss many of our agreements and disagreements.
4. Prison Privatization (with guests Bianca Tylek and Mike Crowley)
Bianca is the executive Director of the Corrections Accountability Project and Mike Crowley is a Justice Researcher and former Obama Administration era OMB administrator. We discuss the privatization of public functions in prisons across the USA.
3. Civil Commitment (with guest Guy Hamilton-Smith)
Did you know there is a man imprisoned in Illinois, for over thirty years, who was NEVER adjudicated guilty of a crime in a court of law? Civil Commitment Law allows governments to deprive citizens of their liberty by claiming only that their freedom endangers public safety.
2. Abolition (with Jay Ware)
What is prison abolitionism? A discussion between myself (an incrementalist) and Jay Ware (an abolitionist) about influences, goals, the national prison strike, and the best ways to work towards a better criminal justice system.
1. Julian Adler
My discussion with Julian Adler (of the Center for Court Innovation) about his book Start Here: A Road Map To Reducing Mass Incarceration. We discuss everything from risk assessment tools to John Rawls.
Anyway, that’s the list (based on number of listens), I hope everyone has a wonderful New Years Eve and an incredible 2019. New episodes will start coming out in January.
Josh is the host of the Decarceration Nation podcast and is a blogger and freelance writer who writes about criminal justice reform, television, movies, music, politics, race, ethics, and more.
