Vera Institute of Justice

To focus on municipal debt, and the fiscal inquests of social movements, is to expand our understanding of the scourge of our time—mass incarceration. In this talk, Destin Jenkins will offer a brief history of debt and incarceration; a history that necessarily includes a discussion of social movement campaigns to disrupt the financial strings that bind race, power, and inequality. The history reveals the profitability of punishment, the ways in which Black folks were conscripted into debt arrangements that placed them at greater risk, and how debt-fueled punishment ultimately constrains the political horizons of local governments. The talk will conclude with an offering on the dilemmas of jail finance.