The Political Effects of Liberal Arts in Prison”

• In Event: Justice and Injustice: Political Science Perspectives on Crime and Punishment Mini-Conference Lunchtime Poster Session: New Questions in the Politics of Punishment

Abstract

This project examines the effects of liberal arts education on prisoners on recidivism,
employment, and political participation. This project comes in partnership with the Bard Prison
Initiative, a liberal arts college that has offered degreegranting
programs to prisoners since 2001.
They have offered roughly 50,000 credits to students enrolled in their programs. With access to
their historical and ongoing records, we will leverage their admissions process to conduct
rigorous causal inference on the effects of higher education, comparing those who participated in
the program to those who applied but barely did not participate (with an N of roughly 3,000).
Given the expansive effects of carceral involvement on civic consciousness, it is important to
understand the effects of highintensity
interventions, particularly given how education shapes
political participation. We are currently collecting data on recidivism and voting to examine
these effects. We also plan to administer surveys and conduct qualitative interviews to provide an
expansive, mixedmethods
understanding of how a liberal arts education effects how prisoners
navigate the carceral experience, view the government, and reenter
their communities. Based on
our work so far, we hypothesize that the relational networks, vocational opportunities, and
political education provided by the college program serve to mobilize students and alumni,
generating increased political participation and civic activism.

Author

• Adam Thal, Yale University