Editing Prison–industrial complex (section)

=== The War on Drugs ===

[[Marc Mauer]], executive director of the criminal justice reform group [[The Sentencing Project]], has argued that the growth and expansion of the prison-industrial complex since the 1970s has its roots in the [[War on drugs|War on Drugs]], which, rather than suppressing the [[illegal drug trade]], has produced a perpetual cycle of drug dealing and imprisonment. This he attributes to a structural feature of the drug trade, a market with perpetually high demand and lucrative potential profits.<ref name=":19" /> Mauer describes the "replacement effect", in which no matter how many drug suppliers are incarcerated, other sellers simply take their place; since there is a constant supply of new drug sellers, there is thus a constant supply of potential prison inmates.<ref name=":19" /> According to this view, the prison-industrial complex depends on this guarantee of future inmates to ensure its growth and profitability, making prison construction, operation, services, and technology all safe investments.

[[Angela Davis|Professor Angela Davis]], one of the most recognized American prison abolition activists,<ref>{{Cite web |title=Angela Davis Speaks at Critical Resistance Meeting about the Prison Industrial Complex |url=https://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/news-and-ideas/angela-davis-speaks-at-critical-resistance-meeting-about-the-prison-industrial-complex |access-date=2023-03-04 |website=Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University |language=en}}</ref> has argued that while some appear to believe that the prison industrial complex is taking the space once filled by the military industrial complex, the aftermath of the [[War on terror|War on Terror]] shows how the links between the military, corporations, and government are growing even stronger.<ref name=":26">{{Cite book |last=Yvonne. |first=Davis, Angela |url=http://worldcat.org/oclc/249245063 |title=Are prisons obsolete? |date=2003 |publisher=Seven Stories Press |isbn=1-58322-581-1 |oclc=249245063}}</ref> The relationship between these complexes, Davis suggests, shows they are symbiotic, because they mutually support and promote each other, even sharing some technologies. Further, they also share important structural features, both generating immense profits from processes of "social destruction"<ref name=":26" /> In essence, Davis argues that the relationship between the military and prison industrial complex can be understood like this: the exact things which are advantageous to corporations, elected officials, and governmental agents, those who have evident stakes in expanding these systems, leads to the devastation of poor and racialized communities as it has throughout American history.<ref name=":26" />