David Harris in the Washington Post on the Shifting Politics of Crime in the U.S.

Professor David Harris commented the announcement by Attorney General Eric Holder that the Department of Justice would seek to find ways around mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent drug offenders. Holder said that too many Americans are incarcerated for too long. Professor Harris explained that this was part of a change in thinking on crime: the politics behind the issue have changed. “There is a growing awareness of the fiscal and social costs of our great experiment in mass incarceration, and the balance has shifted from trying to look unrelentingly tough to asking what works best.’’

Read the full article here.