Humphrey School of Public Affairs
July 30, 2020 - 12:00 pm CDT
Virtual Event
Since the 1990s, governments and corporations in the U.S. have created a host of new ways to generate revenues by extracting resources, disproportionately from poor Black, Indigenous, and other communities of color. Such practices include fine-centered policing, court fees, commercial bail, prison charges, civil asset forfeiture, and much more. The discussion will aim to clarify the connections between predatory law-enforcement practices that have been growing for decades and the powerful political uprising that has emerged in the wake of George Floyd's killing at the hands of police.
In March 2015, Americans learned from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) that the city of Ferguson, Missouri, had been operating a “predatory system of government.” Police officers were acting as street-level enforcers for a program—aggressively promoted by city officials—in which fines and fees were used to extract resources from poor communities of color and deliver them to municipal coffers. In a current book project, Josh Page and Joe Soss argue that what the DOJ discovered in Ferguson should not be seen as an anomaly, either in relation to U.S. history or contemporary American governance. For this event, Professor Soss will join AshLee Smith for a conversation about revenue-centered criminal justice practices.
Since the 1990s, governments and corporations in the U.S. have created a host of new ways to generate revenues by extracting resources, disproportionately from poor Black, Indigenous, and other communities of color. Such practices include fine-centered policing, court fees, commercial bail, prison charges, civil asset forfeiture, and much more. The discussion will aim to clarify the connections between predatory law-enforcement practices that have been growing for decades and the powerful political uprising that has emerged in the wake of George Floyd's killing at the hands of police.
Joe Soss is Cowles Chair for the Study of Public Service at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs. His research and teaching explore democratic politics, social inequalities, and public policy. His current book project, Preying on the Poor: Criminal Justice as Revenue Racket, explores the financialization of criminal justice in the United States. Co-authored with UMN Professor Joshua Page (Sociology), the book explores the origins, operations, and consequences of criminal justice practices that siphon resources from poor communities of color and turn them into revenues for governments and corporations.
AshLee Smith is a PhD candidate at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs, specializing in domestic social policy. She received her BA in Anthropology from Louisiana State University. She is the recipient of the Diversity of Views and Experience (DOVE) fellowship at the University of Minnesota and the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship (NSF GRFP). As a result of her life experiences, she is passionate about studying public policy and applying research to the real world surrounding the lives of the vulnerable in the U.S. Her research interests focus on social policy at the federal and state level, poverty, inequality, and the intersection between policy design, social control, and race. Her dissertation topic looks at how the criminal justice and child welfare systems combine to impact the lives of poor families and families of color.