Bruce Western

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Bruce Prichart Western
Born (1964-07-01) July 1, 1964 (age 60)
Australia
Nationality Australian-American
Education University of Queensland (B.A., 1987)
CUNY Graduate Center (PhD student, 1987-1988)
University of California, Los Angeles (M.A., 1990; PhD 1993)
Known forResearch into mass incarceration
SpouseYes
Children3 daughters
Scientific career
FieldsSociology
Institutions Columbia University
Harvard University
Thesis Unionization trends in postwar capitalism: a comparative study of working class organization  (1993)
Doctoral advisor Iván Szelényi [1]

Bruce Prichart Western (born July 1, 1964) [2] is an Australian-born American sociologist and a professor of sociology at Columbia University. In 2023, he was elected to the American Philosophical Society. [3]

Contents

Early life and education

Western was born in Australia, to a white native Australian father who taught at the University of Queensland, and a Thai international student mother. His father was John Western. [4] He became interested in inequality in Australia growing up in Queensland, where he, his brother, and their mother stood out as racial minorities. [5] He received his B.A. in government with honors from the University of Queensland in 1987. [6] That year, Western then became a student in the doctoral program in sociology at the Graduate Center, CUNY, with the intention of both working with sociologist Iván Szelényi and fulfilling a long-held dream of living in New York City. [7] Szelenyi left the Graduate Center in 1988, and Western followed him to the University of California, Los Angeles, where he subsequently received his master's and Ph.D. degrees in sociology from in 1990 and 1993, respectively. [6]

Career

After receiving his PhD, Western taught at Princeton University for fourteen years. He taught at Harvard University from 2007 to 2018, where he was a professor of sociology in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the director of the Kennedy School's Multidisciplinary Program in Inequality and Social Policy. [8] [9] [10] and the Daniel and Florence Guggenheim Professor of Criminal Justice Policy, as well as director of the Malcolm Wiener Center for Social Policy and faculty chair of the Program in Criminal Justice Policy and Management at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government. [11] In 2018 he moved to Columbia University, where he is professor of sociology and co-director of the Justice Lab. [12]

Research

Prisons and mass incarceration

Originally, Western's research pertained to organized labor, but he became interested in researching prisons and mass incarceration, in his words, "almost by accident" after talking to a colleague about the United States' use of prisons to manage disadvantaged populations. [9] As of 2008, he had written or co-written more than a dozen articles about prisons, as well as a book (Punishment and Inequality in America) on the same topic. [9] In Punishment and Inequality in America, originally published in 2006, he concludes that "mass imprisonment has erased many of the 'gains to African American citizenship hard won by the civil rights movement.'" [13] In a 2010 study, Western and fellow sociologist Becky Pettit outlined the way in which, according to them, poverty increases prison populations and these populations in turn increase poverty. [14] [15] Other studies co-authored by Pettit and Western have found that on average, incarceration reduces annual salaries by about 40% for the average male former prisoner, and reduces hourly wages by, on average, 11% and annual employment by nine weeks. [16] [17] In 2009, with Devah Pager and Naomi Sugie, he found African American job applicants with a criminal record were less likely to receive a call back after an interview than white applicants with a criminal record. [18]

As of 2013, Western was studying what happens to prisoners after they are released, and has interviewed the subjects of the study in person, which has, according to Elizabeth Gudrais, "put a human face on the statistics and dashed preconceived notions in the process." [19] In 2015, he published a study based on these interviews, showing that 40% of the recently incarcerated prisoners he interviewed in the Boston area had witnessed a killing when they were children. [20] [21] Another finding of his research on these released prisoners was that most of them immediately return to poverty upon their release. [22]

Unions

He has also researched the relationship between the decline of unions and increasing income inequality, and has found that the former accounted for a third of the increase in income inequality among male workers. [23] [24]

Honors and awards

In 2005, while on the faculty of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton, Western received a Guggenheim Fellowship for his project, "The Growth and Consequences of American Inequality." [25] His book Punishment and Inequality in America won both the 2008 Michael J. Hindelang Book Award from the American Society of Criminology and the 2007 Albert J. Reiss, Jr. Distinguished Scholarship Award from the American Sociological Association. [26] Western was inducted into the National Academy of Sciences in 2015. [27]

Personal life

Western lives in New York, New York.

Related Research Articles

The concept of a carceral archipelago was first used by the French historian and philosopher Michel Foucault in his 1975 publication, Surveiller et Punir, to describe the modern penal system of the 1970s, embodied by the well-known penal institution at Mettray in France. The phrase combines the adjective "carceral", which means that which is related to jail or prison, with archipelago—a group of islands. Foucault referred to the "island" units of the "archipelago" as a metaphor for the mechanisms, technologies, knowledge systems and networks related to a carceral continuum. The 1973 English publication of the book by Solzhenitsyn called The Gulag Archipelago referred to the forced labor camps and prisons that composed the sprawling carceral network of the Soviet Gulag.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Prison–industrial complex</span> Attribution of the U.S.s high incarceration rate to profit

The prison-industrial complex (PIC) is a term, coined after the "military-industrial complex" of the 1950s, used by scholars and activists to describe the many relationships between institutions of imprisonment and the various businesses that benefit from them.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Incarceration in the United States</span> Form of punishment in United States law

Incarceration in the United States is one of the primary means of punishment for crime in the United States. In 2021, over five million people were under supervision by the criminal justice system, with nearly two million people incarcerated in state or federal prisons and local jails. The United States has the largest known prison population in the world. It has 5% of the world’s population while having 20% of the world’s incarcerated persons. China, with more than four times more inhabitants, has fewer persons in prison. Prison populations grew dramatically beginning in the 1970s, but began a decline around 2009, dropping 25% by year-end 2021.

Jonathan Simon is an American academic, the Lance Robbins Professor of Criminal Justice Law, and the former Associate Dean of the Jurisprudence and Social Policy Program at the UC Berkeley School of Law. Simon’s scholarship concerns the role of crime and criminal justice in governing contemporary societies, risk and the law, and the history of the interdisciplinary study of law. His other interests include criminology; penology; sociology; insurance models of governing risk; governance; the origins and consequences of, and solutions to, the California prison "crisis"; parole; prisons; capital punishment; immigration detention; and the warehousing of incarcerated people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">United States incarceration rate</span> Incarceration rate of the United States

According to the World Prison Brief the United States in 2021 had the sixth highest incarceration rate in the world, at 531 people per 100,000. Between 2019 and 2020, the United States saw a significant drop in the total number of incarcerations. State and federal prison and local jail incarcerations dropped by 14% from 2.1 million in 2019 to 1.8 million in mid-2020. In 2018, the United States had the highest incarceration rate in the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Prison</span> Institution in which people are legally physically confined

A prison, also known as a jail, gaol, penitentiary, detention center, correction center, correctional facility, remand center, hoosegow, or slammer is a facility where people are imprisoned against their will and denied their liberty under the authority of the state, generally as punishment for various crimes. Authorities most commonly use prisons within a criminal-justice system: people charged with crimes may be imprisoned until their trial; those who have pled or been found guilty of crimes at trial may be sentenced to a specified period of imprisonment.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michèle Lamont</span> Canadian sociologist

Michèle Lamont is a Canadian sociologist who is the Robert I. Goldman Professor of European Studies and a professor of Sociology and African American Studies at Harvard University. She is a contributor to the study of culture, inequality, racism and anti-racism, the sociology of morality, evaluation and higher education, and the study of cultural and social change. She is the recipient of the Gutenberg Award and the Erasmus award, for her "devoted contribution to social science research into the relationship between knowledge, power, and diversity." She has received honorary degrees from five countries. and been elected to the British Academy, Royal Society of Canada, Chevalier de l’Ordre des Palmes Academiques, and the Sociological Research Association. She served as president of the American Sociological Association from 2016 to 2017. In 2024, she was elected to the American Philosophical Society.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Iván Szelényi</span>

Iván Szelényi is a noted Hungarian-American sociologist, as of 2010 the Dean of Social Sciences at New York University Abu Dhabi.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Punishment in Australia</span>

Punishment in Australia arises when an individual has been accused or convicted of breaking the law through the Australian criminal justice system. Australia uses prisons, as well as community corrections. When awaiting trial, prisoners may be kept in specialised remand centres or within other prisons.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Prisoner</span> Person who is deprived of liberty against their will

A prisoner is a person who is deprived of liberty against their will. This can be by confinement or captivity in a prison, or physical restraint. The term usually applies to one serving a sentence in prison.

Devah Iwalani Pager was an American sociologist best known for her research on racial discrimination in employment and the American criminal justice system. At the time of her death, she was Professor of Sociology and Public Policy at Harvard University. She was a class of 2011 William T. Grant Scholar.

Christia Mercer is an American philosopher and the Gustave M. Berne Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Columbia University. She is known for her work on the history of early modern philosophy, the history of Platonism, and the history of gender. She has received national attention for her work teaching in prisons and advocating for educational opportunities for incarcerated people. She is the Director and Founder of the Center for New Narratives in Philosophy at Columbia University, which "supports innovative research in the history of philosophy and promotes diversity in the teaching and practice of philosophy." She is the editor of Oxford Philosophical Concepts, co-editor of Oxford New Histories of Philosophy, and was elected to serve as president of the American Philosophical Association, Eastern Division, 2019–20.

Yu Xie is a Chinese-American sociologist and a sociology professor at Princeton University. He joined the University of Michigan as an assistant professor in 1989 and served as a professor from 1996 to 2015.

Martin Guevara Urbina (1972) is a Mexican-born American author, writer, researcher, professor, and speaker who, as a sociologist and criminologist, works on Latina and Latino issues in the United States.

William "Bill" Craig Martin was an Australian sociologist. He was Professor of Sociology at Flinders University and the University of Queensland and was an editor of the Journal of Sociology. His main research interests were in the sociology of work and employment.

William Spelman is a professor of public affairs at the University of Texas at Austin's Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs. He is an expert on urban policy and criminal justice policy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Craig Haney</span>

Craig Haney is an American social psychologist and a professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz, noted for his work on the study of capital punishment and the psychological impact of imprisonment and prison isolation since the 1970s. He was a researcher on The Stanford Prison Experiment.

Elizabeth M. "Becky" Pettit is an American sociologist with expertise in demography. She has been a professor of sociology at the University of Texas-Austin, as well as an affiliate at its Population Research Center, since 2014. She is an advocate for decarceration in the United States.

Christopher James Wildeman is an American sociologist and Professor of Sociology at Duke University. Wildeman is known for researching the effects of incarceration on children's health, homelessness, and racial inequality.

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References

  1. ↑ Western, Bruce Prichart (1993). Unionization trends in postwar capitalism : a comparative study of working class organization (Ph.D.). University of California, Los Angeles. OCLC   29541828. ProQuest   304073404.
  2. ↑ "Bruce Western". Library of Congress. Retrieved February 11, 2016.
  3. ↑ "The American Philosophical Society Welcomes New Members for 2023".
  4. ↑ "Professor John Western remembered". University of Queensland . August 10, 2011. Retrieved November 22, 2018.
  5. ↑ Gabrielsen, Paul (August 15, 2017). "Profile of Bruce Western". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 114 (33): 8672–8674. Bibcode:2017PNAS..114.8672G. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1710704114 . ISSN   0027-8424. PMC   5565469 . PMID   28784808.
  6. 1 2 "Bruce Western CV" (PDF). Harvard University. Retrieved November 28, 2015.
  7. ↑ Gabrielsen, Paul (August 15, 2017). "Profile of Bruce Western". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 114 (33): 8672–8674. Bibcode:2017PNAS..114.8672G. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1710704114 . PMC   5565469 . PMID   28784808.
  8. ↑ "Professor Bruce Western". United States Studies Centre. Retrieved November 28, 2015.
  9. 1 2 3 "Bruce Western". Harvard Magazine. January–February 2008. Retrieved November 28, 2015.
  10. ↑ Lavoie, Amy (June 14, 2007). "FAS names Bruce Western professor of sociology". Harvard Gazette. Retrieved August 21, 2017.
  11. ↑ "Bruce Western". Harvard University. Retrieved November 28, 2015.
  12. ↑ "Bruce Western" . Retrieved August 17, 2018.
  13. ↑ Gottschalk, Marie (April 15, 2008). "Two Separate Societies: One in Prison, One Not". Washington Post. Retrieved November 28, 2015.
  14. ↑ Western, Bruce; Pettit, Becky (July 2010). "Incarceration & social inequality". Daedalus. 139 (3): 8–19. doi: 10.1162/DAED_a_00019 . PMID   21032946. S2CID   57571604.
  15. ↑ Abramsky, Sasha (October 8, 2010). "Toxic Persons". Slate. Retrieved November 28, 2015.
  16. ↑ Tierney, John (February 18, 2013). "Prison and the Poverty Trap". New York Times. Retrieved March 10, 2016.
  17. ↑ Porter, Eduardo (April 30, 2014). "In the U.S., Punishment Comes Before the Crimes". The New York Times. Retrieved June 23, 2017.
  18. ↑ Ajunwa, Ifeoma; Onwuachi-Willig, Angela (2018). "Combating Discrimination Against the Formerly Incarcerated in the Labor Market". Northwestern University Law Review. 112 (6): 1390. Retrieved February 13, 2020.
  19. ↑ Gudrais, Elizabeth (March–April 2013). "The Prison Problem". Harvard Magazine. Retrieved January 13, 2016.
  20. ↑ Western, Bruce (November 2015). "Lifetimes of Violence in a Sample of Released Prisoners". RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences. 1 (2): 14–30. doi: 10.7758/rsf.2015.1.2.02 .
  21. ↑ Smith, Clint (February 8, 2016). "The Meaning of Life Without Parole". The New Yorker. Retrieved February 8, 2016.
  22. ↑ Walsh, Colleen (March 1, 2016). "The Costs of Inequality: Goal Is Justice, but Reality Is Unfairness". U.S. News & World Report. Retrieved June 23, 2017.
  23. ↑ Western, B.; Rosenfeld, J. (August 1, 2011). "Unions, Norms, and the Rise in U.S. Wage Inequality". American Sociological Review. 76 (4): 513–537. doi:10.1177/0003122411414817. S2CID   18351034.
  24. ↑ Harkinson, Josh (August 1, 2011). "Major Study Links Decline of Unions to Rising of Income Inequality". Mother Jones. Retrieved November 28, 2015.
  25. ↑ "Bruce Western receives Guggenheim Foundation fellowship award". Princeton University. August 31, 2005. Retrieved December 17, 2015.
  26. ↑ "Punishment and Inequality in America". Russell Sage Foundation. Archived from the original on December 8, 2015. Retrieved November 28, 2015.
  27. ↑ "Bruce Western elected to the National Academy of Sciences". Department of Sociology News. Harvard University. April 29, 2015. Retrieved November 28, 2015.
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