Mass Supervision

With a foreword by Bruce Western

Named one of the Best Books of the Year by NPR

Shortlisted, 2024 Stephan Russo Book Prize for Social Justice

The most comprehensive critique of probation and parole—and a provocative and compelling argument for abolishing both—from the former Probation Commissioner of New York City.

Imagine if probation didn't exist. And I came to you with $80 million and 30,000 people the courts considered troubled and troubling. And you could do anything you wanted with that money to make New York City safer and help people turn their lives around. Would you go out and hire a thousand civil service-protected bureaucrats to supervise people as they piss in a cup once a week, and to tell them to go forth and sin no more?
- Vincent Schiraldi's Job Interview with NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg

We've heard a lot in recent years about the nearly 2.1 million people incarcerated in American prisons and jails. But what about the approximately 4 million more who are on probation and parole—monitored by the state at great expense and at risk of being sent to prison at the whim of a probation or parole officer for the least imaginable infraction?

In Mass Supervision, Vincent Schiraldi combines firsthand experience with deep research on the inadequately explored practices of probation and parole. He illustrates how these forms of state supervision have strayed from their original goal of providing constructive and rehabilitative alternatives to prison. They have become, instead, what Schiraldi argues as a "recidivism trap" for people trying to lead productive lives in the wake of a criminal conviction.

Schiraldi reveals how probation and parole, as extensions of incarceration, have little impact on crime rates and needlessly disrupt countless lives. Ultimately, he argues that they should be dramatically downsized or even abolished completely.