The term correctional boot camps refers to correctional programs that involve a relatively short period of placement (90–180 days) in a setting similar in environment, attitude, and activities to military basic training or boot camp. The offenders, often referred to as cadets, involved in a correctional boot camp program are required to participate in military-style drills and physical activities and are required to comport themselves in a manner similar to the military (e.g., responding to questions with a vigorous “Yes, Sir!” or “No, Sir!”). Correctional boot camp cadets typically are youthful, nonviolent offenders with few prior convictions.
Advocates of correctional boot camps claimed these programs are effective in reducing subsequent offending and helped reduce the prison population by being an alternative to imprisonment. In a roughly 25-year period starting in the early 1980s, correctional boot camps emerged, became common, and then fell into obscurity. The rise of correctional boot camps is largely explained by their fit with tough on crime movement of the 1980s and 1990s, and their decline was fueled by mounting evidence of their ineffectiveness in achieving their stated goals as well as numerous instances of egregious cadet abuse.
Common Elements of Correctional Boot Camps
Correctional boot camps share many common elements. Most notably, all boot camps have an atmosphere simulating military basic training. The housing units typically resemble military barracks (not prison or jail cells). Cadets and correctional officers wear military-style uniforms. Correctional officers are given military ranks (e.g., sergeant, major). Cadets are organized into groups typically called platoons. Members in the same platoon live and eat together, complete military exercises and drills together, and graduate together.
Correctional boot camps are commonly organized into three or more phases. Program activities vary by phase. Typically, early phases involve higher levels of exercise and military drills and later phases involve higher levels of community service (e.g., picking up trash) and treatment programming. In all phases, cadets are required to wake up early (5 a.m.) and engage in various activities throughout the day; there is little to no time for unstructured activities. The structured activities involve exercise, military drills, completing obstacle courses, community service, educational programs, vocational programs, and treatment programs. The typical correctional boot camp program is intended to last 90–180 days, but the actual length of confinement is often longer due to in-program misbehavior. Minor misbehavior is disciplined using physical exercises such as pushups and verbal reprimands. Repeated and serious misbehavior typically is met with the removal of valued privileges and/or program expulsion. Expelled cadets most often are moved to traditional correctional institutions (i.e., jails, prisons) to serve a longer period of confinement. Successful cadets, on the other hand, are celebrated with a graduation ceremony for each platoon.
Most correctional boot camps have eligibility criteria that limit those involved to youthful offenders with relatively minor criminal history. The physical vigor of boot camps leads to older offenders and offenders with serious medical programs being ineligible for boot camps. Thus, the typical correctional boot camp cadet is younger than 35 years of age and many, if not the majority, are under age 25. Furthermore, correctional boot camp programs are used in most jurisdictions as an intermediate sanction in between probation and prison, suited for nonviolent offenders with a limited number of prior convictions. This population is viewed as being amenable to boot camps, as boot camp advocates contend that these offenders will be deterred by the harsh environment of correctional boot camps and the military discipline at the heart of each correctional boot camp will instill self-discipline in these wayward youth.
In addition to the pseudo-military atmosphere, the vast majority of correctional boot camps incorporated rehabilitative programming. In fact, correctional boot camps appear to have evolved toward greater use of rehabilitative programming over time. The earliest correctional boot camps, which were introduced in 1983, had little to no rehabilitative program other than educational programs. By contrast, later correctional boot camps included considerable rehabilitative programs, especially drug treatment.
The Proliferation of Boot Camps
The first modern correctional boot camp appeared in the United States in 1983, when two correctional boot camps opened (one in Oklahoma and one in Georgia). From there, correctional boot camps spread rapidly. Ten years later, the number of correctional boot camps rose to at least 59; and in 1995, there were at least 120 correctional boot camps operating in the United States.
The growth of correctional boot camps was driven by many factors; however, three factors appear most prominent. First, the policies and philosophy guiding sentencing and corrections in this era changed to a tough on crime approach. The U.S. prison population grew at unprecedented rates in the 1980s and 1990s, as a direct result of these policy changes. This glut of prisoners strained the capacity of existing prisons and created a need for alternatives to prison. Second, correctional boot camps with their strict, militaristic atmosphere were emblematic of the tough on crime approach. Congress blessed the boot camp model by providing federal funds to jurisdictions to implement correctional boot camp programs in the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. Third, proponents of correctional boot camps successfully argued that correctional boot camps not only provided an intermediate sanction for offenders too serious to be placed on probation and too marginal to be imprisoned but also reduced prison populations and prison costs by diverting marginal offenders from strained prisons.
Research Concerning Correctional Boot Camps
The growth in the number of correctional boot camps largely preceded rigorous research examining the effectiveness of correctional boot camps to control prison populations and reduce recidivism. In time, however, a voluminous body of research focused on these issues, particularly correctional boot camp’s effect on recidivism. This body of research also examined the effect of correctional boot camps on prisoner adjustment to confinement, as boot camp critics contended that the confrontational, punitive environments of correctional boot camps would have harmful psychological effects on youthful offenders, especially those with histories of abuse.
Succinctly stated, the research does not support the contention that correctional boot camps reduce recidivism. A host of studies evaluated correctional boot camp’s effects on recidivism. In 2005, David B. Wilson, Doris L. MacKenzie, and Fawn Ngo Mitchall synthesized these studies using meta-analytic techniques. The overwhelming majority of these evaluations found no meaningful or statistically significant differences in the recidivism rates of correctional boot camp participants and similar offenders who were sentenced to traditional sanctions. Thus, Wilson and colleagues concluded that correctional boot camps are ineffective in reducing recidivism—correctional boot camp participation had no measurable effect on recidivism in either direction. However, correctional boot camps that incorporated greater levels of rehabilitative treatment programming did exhibit lower levels of recidivism among their cadets than among offenders sentenced to traditional sanctions.
The question becomes: Why are correctional boot camps ineffective in reducing recidivism? The evidence suggests that perhaps this ineffectiveness is due to the fact that boot camp participants do not find the correctional boot camp atmosphere particularly onerous. Contrary to boot camp advocates’ claim that correctional boot camps’ harsh, Spartan environments would be perceived as grueling and objectionable and as a result deter subsequent offending, the empirical evidence indicates that boot camp participants have more favorable perceptions of their correctional experience in comparison to offenders confined in traditional facilities. In all likelihood, the favorable perceptions of correctional boot camps are attributable to the fact that correctional boot camps solve one of the central problems of confinement—boredom. The heavily structured schedule of correctional boot camps permits little idle time, and thus boredom is minimized. On the other hand, critics of the boot camp model contend that correctional boot camps are ineffective because they do not offer sufficient treatment programming aimed at the risk factors known to predict recidivism. The empirical research also contradicts this explanation, in that, on average, correctional boot camps had as much rehabilitative programming as traditional facilities. Taken together, these findings suggest that correctional boot camps are no more effective than traditional kinds of confinement because boot camp participants do not perceive the correctional boot camp environment as especially onerous and boot camp participants receive comparable levels of rehabilitative treatment as offenders confined in traditional facilities.
The research assessing correctional boot camps’ purported ability to reduce prison population is more limited. Yet, this research indicates that correctional boot camps, like other intermediate sanctions, do not reduce prison populations. The reason for this failure to reduce prison population is simple—most offenders eventually sentenced to correctional boot camps would have been sentenced to some form of probation had correctional boot camps not existed. Thus, correctional boot camps are more likely to widen the net by exposing those who would have been sentenced to probation, rather than divert those who would have been sentenced to prison (or longer jail sentences). Moreover, a considerable portion of those committed to a correctional boot camp program is eventually expelled for noncompliance, which typically results in these offenders being placed in secure confinement for longer periods than they would have served in the correctional boot camp program. As a result of these two factors, the research indicates that correctional boot camps have minimal effects on prison populations or prison costs.
A sizable body of research also examines offender adjustment to correctional boot camps in comparison with offender adjustment in other kinds of correctional facilities. Opponents of correctional boot camps contend that the environments of boot camps lack the supportive care necessary to rehabilitate troubled youth, and the confrontational atmosphere of boot camps may actually harm youth with histories of neglect and/ or abuse. The boot camp adjustment knowledge base indicates that the majority of boot camp participants quickly adjust to the boot camp environment; however, some participants have considerable difficulty with this adjustment. Consistent with the contentions of boot camp critics, those at most risk of adjustment problems are those offenders with histories of abuse. Yet, even among offenders without such histories, a minority of offenders has more problems adjusting to correctional boot camps than do offenders sentenced to traditional institutions. These offenders are unwilling or unable to comply with correctional boot camps’ rules and as a result run afoul of correctional boot camps’ strict code of conduct.
The empirical research examining correctional boot camps finds that these correctional programs are neither as effective as their proponents claim nor as harmful as their critics claim. Correctional boot camps do not reduce the recidivism as their proponents claim, but they do not increase recidivism as their critics sometimes assert. Correctional boot camps do not reduce prison populations or costs, yet they most likely do not increase populations or costs. Likewise, correctional boot camps do not affect adjustment for the majority of offenders.
The Demise of Boot Camps
Since the late 1990s, the number of correctional boot camps in the United States has dropped dramatically. For example, between 1995 and 2000, one quarter of all correctional boot camps were closed. This contraction in the number of boot camps accelerated in the new millennium. In 2018, only a small number of boot camps remained in operation.
Correctional boot camps’ demise is largely explained by a dramatic erosion in their political support. Correctional boot camps once received considerable bipartisan political support. This support diminished as evidence mounted of correctional boot camps’ ineffectiveness in reducing prison populations and recidivism. Furthermore, the erosion in political support for correctional boot camps was accelerated by reports of offender abuse at the hands of correctional staff.
Several prominent cases of offender abuse garnered media attention and apparently sparked a backlash against correctional boot camps. Youthful offenders in several states died due to being pushed passed their physical limits and/or being deprived of access to medical attention. Perhaps the most dramatic and prominent case of offender abuse at a boot camp was the videotaped death of Martin Lee Anderson. Anderson was a 14-yearold boy, who was confined at one of Florida’s numerous boot camps. On his first day in the boot camp, he was forced to engage in physical activities including a run. When he complained of fatigue and shortness of breath, correctional officers coerced Anderson to continue his exercise by using force—all of which was captured on videotape. Anderson collapsed, and 1 day after being admitted to the boot camp, he died. Anderson’s death combined with numerous preexisting complaints of abuse were a direct cause of the demise of correctional boot camps in Florida, all of which were ordered closed. Thus, Florida, once a state with numerous correctional boot camps for juvenile offenders, has none in 2018. Florida is a microcosm of a national retreat away from correctional boot camps, which eventually resulted in only a handful of correctional boot camps remaining in operation.
References:
- Latessa, E. J., Cullen, F. T., & Gendreau, P. (2002). Beyond correctional quackery: Professionalism and the possibility of effective treatment. Federal Probation, 66, 43–49.
- Lutze, F. E., & Brody, D. C. (1999). Mental abuse as cruel and unusual punishment: Do boot camp prisons violate the eighth amendment? Crime & Delinquency, 45, 242–255. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1177/0011128799045002004
- MacKenzie, D. L., & Armstrong, G. S. (2004). Correctional boot camps: Military basic training or a model for corrections? Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
- Wilson, D. B., Mackenzie, D. L., & Mitchell, F. N. (2005). Effects of correctional boot camps on offending: A Campbell collaboration systematic review. Campbell Collaboration. Retrieved from http://www.campbellcollaboration.org