Singapore Prisons: Strict Yet Humane?

There are few things I am more interested in reading than accounts of international prisons to see the different ways that countries are experimenting with corrections.

In this Straits Times article on Singapore prisons, the reporter portrays Singapore prisons as incredibly spartan, but humane. No beds here, just cement floors - and the prison officials the inmates would sleep on the floors anyway. Not that there is room for bed - the cells are described as the size of two ping-pong tables. The officials don't coddle inmates with televisions like Westernized prisons and if you want any money, you had better work. There is also a severe limit on written materials - any printed materials coming in are censored and inmates are only allowed two letters out per month (with the exception of inmates who have demonstrated good behavior who are allowed more).

The prison complex is like a monument to modern corrections. A mammoth complex, housing all of the country's inmates, with the latest technology. Cameras are installed everywhere for 24/7 monitoring. Each cell also is equipped with an intercom to alert staff to emergency inmate needs. It is perhaps the future of corrections.

At the same time, it is a throwback to corrections past. The emphasis is on a military-style regime where inmates have to stand at attention and their heads are shaved. The spartan nature of the cells reminds me of penitentiaries, which were purposefully spartan so as not to distract the inmate from repentance.

Is this the tough love that Western prisons need? Maybe we just need to take all the beds out of our prisons for insta-rehabilitation. Or is it a system that has no hope of actually preparing inmates for life as a contributing citizen on the outside? I don't see how you can enforce the military style regime without using potentially inhumane force on dissenters (and in American prisons, at least, there would be a lot of dissenters - I'm deeply suspicious of how the Singapore prison officials are managing it).

While I respect the Singapore system, it almost seems like too much of a prison official's fantasy -giant high-tech facility, no-frills or coddling of the inmates, military regime where inmates salute the guards...it's like what every other prison has hoped for - and has failed to achieve. I don't trust it to work when none other has.

Instead, I really hope for more in twenty-first century corrections. The Singapore prison, for all that it holds itself to be the latest and the greatest, is still the exact same model of corrections theory: build a building, stick bad men in it, voila, in ten years they'll come out better citizens. I notice that there are no numbers on recidivism.

As a final note, let's all keep some perspective that this is a publication of the "most widely read newspaper in Singapore" (from the Straits Times website). I could be wrong, but Singapore doesn't strike me as a place where reporters who valued their jobs would trash the prison system.