Skyscraper Jails

A damning account of the latest transformation in mass incarceration, revealing how powerful nonprofits and so-called progressives used the language of social movements to build new jails.

jails, a network of skyscraper facilities amounting to the largest carceral construction the city has seen in decades.

How did this happen?

, scholars and organizersJarrod Shanahan and Zhandarka Kurti detail how progressive forces in New York City appropriated the rhetoric of social movements and social justice to promise "downsized" and "humane" jails. The principal advocates of these new jails were not right-wing politicians, but prominent city activists and progressive non-profit organizations.

is at once a case study and a cautionary tale for what will be coming to cities and towns across the United States and beyond.