The Prison Index – Empowering Criminal Justice Reform Activists

The Idea

Out of every four people behind bars in the world today is an American. We lock up more people than any other nation and aren’t any safer for it, but states are reluctant to change course. Criminal justice reform advocates need access to timely and accurate data to support their campaigns.

The Specifics

Having an intelligent discussion about ending mass incarceration and creating a just justice system requires access to compelling and accurate data. Relying on stale and inaccurate data squanders opportunities to win reforms.

On our website, we edit a database of 1,400+ links to empirical research about mass incarceration. Experienced researchers find this invaluable, but the public and policymakers tend to have difficulty finding the data they seek.

To be useful to the public, criminal justice data needs to be made accessible, and put in to contexts that can support current and future reform campaigns. We’ll launch a fact sheet series to give criminal justice reform advocates the tools they need to create change.

Discussion

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