Today's episode features Are Hoidal, Senior Advisor for the Norwegian Correctional Service and recent author of The Norweigan Prison System: Halden Prison and Beyond. For 14 years, Are served as the prison warden at Halden prison, known to be the most humane prison in the world. In this episode we discuss:
If you have any questions or comments that you would like addressed in the YouTube series Office Hours with Abbie and Juwan please email ccofficehours@gmail.com
And, as always, please review, subscribe, and share with everyone you know :)
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Become a supporter of the show with a monthly subscription (amount of your choice) and get a shoutout in upcoming episodes!
Today's episode features Are Hoidal, Senior Advisor for the Norwegian Correctional Service and recent author of The Norweigan Prison System: Halden Prison and Beyond. For 14 years, Are served as the prison warden at Halden prison, known to be the most humane prison in the world. In this episode we discuss:
If you have any questions or comments that you would like addressed in the YouTube series Office Hours with Abbie and Juwan please email ccofficehours@gmail.com
And, as always, please review, subscribe, and share with everyone you know :)
To stay up to date on all of the latest announcements, be sure to subscribe to the weekly newsletter!
Become a supporter of the show with a monthly subscription (amount of your choice) and get a shoutout in upcoming episodes!
Speaker 0 00:00:01 I think we have to treat them like human beings. We cannot treat them like animals, <laugh>, right? We have to, we have to treat them, uh, with respect, even if they have done something very wrong things. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, they cannot kill some, uh, persons and done something very wrong. But still, we want this person to be a better citizen.
Speaker 1 00:00:22 Please listen carefully.
Speaker 3 00:00:27 Welcome to Critical Conversations. I'm Abbie Henson, your host and an assistant professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Arizona State University. This podcast is a space to learn from change makers and experts on racial, social, and criminal legal issues, and to inspire further dialogue with friends, family, and community in order to impact culture and ultimately achieve equity and justice for all. I hope you enjoy being part of these critical conversations. Now, let's get into it. Hi everyone. Today's guest is Are Hoidal who served as a prison warden at the Halden Prison in Norway For 20 years, Halden Prison is known as the most humane prison in the world. In our critical conversation, we discuss how the Norwegian prison model, which focuses on humanization help and normality came about. Before we get into it, I just wanna shout you all out for listening, and I'm so grateful that you have continued to support the podcast and these endeavors. And so I'm just gonna ask if you could please like, share and please leave a review. It would be super, super helpful. So thanks again, and I hope you enjoy this episode. If you have any thoughts that you'd like to share or have any questions you'd like answered, please make sure that you email cc office hours gmail.com and watch office hours with Abbie and Juwan on YouTube to see those points being addressed. Thanks again.
Speaker 4 00:02:03 I'm just gonna get right into it. There's no death penalty or life sentences in Norway, is that correct?
Speaker 0 00:02:11 That's correct. We have a maximum 21 years for, um, even quite a heavy murders.
Speaker 4 00:02:18 Right. And so what's the philosophy behind that? Why is there no life sentences? Is there philosophy on the possibility of change, or what is that?
Speaker 0 00:02:29 Yes, of course. We believe in change in, uh, in Norway. We believe that every person can change. We can give also life sentence Here in Norway, we have, uh, what we call preventive detention. And that's for the, the extreme cases. No, we, I think we have 140 inmates in Norwegian prisons that have preventive detention. And if you have that sentence, you can, in the extreme cases, you can sit for life. But that's, uh, the special cases. And I don't think anyone so far in Norway has been for life in prison. So maybe this muscular we have now, maybe he will sit for life because that's a very extreme case.
Speaker 4 00:03:18 The preventive detention, correct me if I'm wrong, but that's where essentially they get evaluated every five years. So af at the tw at the 21 mark, there's a evaluation and if it's deemed that they should continue, then they have another five years and then they're reevaluated. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:03:35 Right. That's correct. Yes, that's correct.
Speaker 4 00:03:38 I live in America where we incarcerate the most people out of any country in the world. And so can you give kind of an overview? I know that Norway is different in that the entire country has a population of 5.5 million, and we have an entire prison population of 2.2 million. So yeah, there's a big difference there. How many prisons are there across the country? How many people are incarcerated throughout the country? Just again, to set some more context,
Speaker 0 00:04:07 I have some numbers. <laugh>.
Speaker 4 00:04:09 Oh,
Speaker 0 00:04:09 Perfect. Yes. We are a very small country. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, and, uh, yesterday <laugh> it was 3085 persons in prison.
Speaker 4 00:04:20 In the total country
Speaker 0 00:04:21 Total. Wow. 3085, uh, inmates in total in the Norway, we have, uh, 178 women
Speaker 4 00:04:32 Mm.
Speaker 0 00:04:32 In prison. Now, most of them are men. Right. 25% of them are from other countries.
Speaker 4 00:04:38 Oh, interesting. Right. So that's the thing that I was gonna ask is what the demographic breakdown is because as we know in America there's vast racial disproportionalities where black and indigenous folks are overrepresented in prisons. Are you seeing similar racial disparities in your prisons?
Speaker 0 00:04:59 No, we don't see that. Uh, many, uh, many of them, uh, who comes from other countries are from Eastern Europe. Mm. And they are white as US
Speaker 4 00:05:10 <laugh>. Right.
Speaker 0 00:05:11 And many of them are drugs smugglers. So, um, uh, we don't see that racial, uh, thing here in Norway. Right.
Speaker 4 00:05:19 Okay. Let's get into Halden. So Halden was built originally when
Speaker 0 00:05:26 They start building it in 2006, open in 2010.
Speaker 4 00:05:32 So what was the philosophy behind building this new prison?
Speaker 0 00:05:37 I think, uh, it's the same philosophy of Howden. This had been for the last 20 years before Hilton. They started this building prison in early 1990. Then they build the one, a prisoner called Bergen Prison. And it's the same architect that planned Bergen Prison and Halden Prison. So I think it started long before Halen. And, uh, we focus a lot on, uh, what we call the normality principle, that if you shall stay in prison, it shall be as normal as the society outside mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So, uh, prison life shall be quite like life outside in, in the society. So therefore, after 1919, they have built prisons like I will say, like small villages, <laugh>,
Speaker 4 00:06:30 Mm-hmm. <affirmative>.
Speaker 0 00:06:30 Mm-hmm. <affirmative>
Speaker 4 00:06:31 Like campuses,
Speaker 0 00:06:32 The campus. Yes. Very, very much like campus. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> as, of course, Halen prison is also quite special here in Norway. Uh, because, uh, it was very important for architects that this prison should not look like a prison. The other prison you can see when you come inside the wall that they are prisons. But in Holden, you don't feel that when you walk around. It's a lot of nature of trees, very green, small buildings, low buildings. So it looked very much like a campus.
Speaker 4 00:07:08 You said that this started around 1990 with the building of this other prison by the same architect. Was it the architect that came forward and proposed this? Or where was this shift in philosophy stemming from?
Speaker 0 00:07:21 Oh, I think that came from, uh, minister Justice. So it's a philosophy that we have, uh, in the criminal justice in Norway that shall be as normal as possible to be in prison. We have a lot of focus, as you know, on rehabilitation that everyone shall be released after the sentence and released as, uh, hopefully good neighbors.
Speaker 4 00:07:46 Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, in America, 95% of those that we incarcerate are ultimately going to be released back into the community. So yeah, this idea that you're taking someone from their home, the comfort of society into this drastically different dehumanizing institution, and then expecting them to reintegrate smoothly back into a place that they've been totally removed from for however many years, is kind of a, a strange <laugh> way of thinking. And so, first of all, how did the culture within Norway take to this idea of normalcy? Was there acceptance of this new philosophy? Was there pushback?
Speaker 0 00:08:34 Every political party in Norway support this philosophy from the left to the right. So we don't focus so much on what I think you do on revenge when a person has done something wrong. We don't like that, of course. So we have to put them into a prison. But when that person are in prison, we hopefully can, uh, help him. We use the, the word help to help him to be a better citizen. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, that's one of our main focus areas that we want this person when they come out, but you shall stop being a criminal that's, uh, very important, uh, for, um, norian society, that they don't come back to prison. Right. And if, if we shall manage that, I think we have to treat them like human beings. We cannot treat them like animals, <laugh>. Right. We have to, we have to treat them, uh, with respect, even if they have done something very wrong things. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, they cannot kill some, uh, persons and done something very wrong. But still, we want this person to be a better citizen.
Speaker 4 00:09:39 There is data behind this, and I, I always have an issue with just focusing on the measure of recidivism. I feel like it's a really false measure of success because there are so many factors that go into reoffending or re-arrest. But if we're just going to use that measure to understand the differences, I think that, I read that Norway has a 20 to 25% recidivism rate as compared to America that has close to 70%. And so when some people would potentially criticize your model as being too soft on crime or, you know, coddling these murderers and violent people, it, it demonstrates that a human focused approach, a respectful approach, actually has a positive impact on public safety.
Speaker 0 00:10:29 When I started in this business in the, in the eighties also, Norway had a 60 70%, uh, reoffending rate. Mm. 60, 60, 70%. And we have had a lot of troubles in the prisons, but we have a big change in the middle of the nineties when they, we changed the whole, um, prison officer role was, uh, totally change from, uh, being, uh, on, on their guard, but also to work more like a social worker.
Speaker 4 00:10:56 Can you speak a little to that? Did the qualifications of what you needed to be a guard change with that additional duty?
Speaker 0 00:11:04 Yeah. Yeah. It, uh, changed a lot before this big change. You could just come from the street and work in the prison of the change. Totally. The education for the officers,
Speaker 4 00:11:15 Was there any kind of pushback amongst the staff to adopt this new way of thinking?
Speaker 0 00:11:23 Yeah. Well, uh, I was, uh, governor in Oslo prison at that time, the oldest and the biggest prison in Norway. When this change came into the system, I was just started. And my first job was to change the whole system to work in this new way. And that was a very hard job and a lot of resistance against these changes from the old officers. So I had a, I started, started with the management. So they had to, uh, support these changes. And if you didn't support it, I had to move you move them, got management to other places. It was important for me that all the managers I had around me was on board in this change
Speaker 4 00:12:07 Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, and then it just kind of trickled down eventually. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:12:11 So, uh, when I, when I got the new manager, we started with officers and I had to change
Speaker 4 00:12:17 <laugh>. Right.
Speaker 0 00:12:18 They couldn't choose, if they didn't want to do this, they had to quit the job. Right. Or they could put them into positions where they didn't have contact with an inmates.
Speaker 4 00:12:29 What do you think was, other than being essentially forced or kind of given an ultimatum, what do you think eventually led these guards to buy into it? Genuinely,
Speaker 0 00:12:41 Many of them. I think this was a more interesting way to work. And, uh, we get some new officers from the, the new staff academy, and they was very motivated. So it took some times before everyone, of course, was supporting this change. But it is more interesting way of work. And we have support from the unions. They supported this change because I think also the salary went up.
Speaker 4 00:13:09 So many people I'm sure would hear about the Norwegian prisons and how humane they are, and just think, oh, well, they were always this way. Their culture is just different. But to show that there was some resistance and a difference in, you know, you all had similar recidivism rates to us, which is for listeners who don't know what that term means, it's just the reoffense or re-arrest or re-incarceration rate. It depends on who's using the term, but to show that that change could happen with due time is really important. So you mentioned this idea of normalcy. Can you really walk us through just what that actually looks like? What does it mean to have a normal life within a prison?
Speaker 0 00:13:55 The normality principle, I have, uh, the defi definition here. <laugh>. So, uh, perfect. It's, um, both inter international conventions and recommendation. And in the Norwegian law is it stipulated that inmates have the same rights as other citizens. They have the same rights. So they have the same right to go to school to have, can visit the doctor and the nurses. And, um, they can also vote when they're in prison. Also, when you are in prison, you get up in the morning, eat for breakfast, go to work, go to school, or there the whole day, come back to the unit, eat dinner, and have leisure activities in the afternoon together with officers. The only right we take from them is the restrictional liberty. We take the freedom from them, but no other rights has been removed from, from the person.
Speaker 4 00:14:50 Hmm. Are they working within the prison or, I heard there's an open campus model too, right? Where they're actually working within the community and then they come back to the
Speaker 0 00:15:01 Prison. Yeah, we have, uh, in, in hall we have, uh, 221 inmates behind the wall. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, and they work inside the wall. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> and outside the wall. We have a halfway house with, with 24 inmates, and they work outside in the community.
Speaker 4 00:15:19 Of the 200 that are behind the wall, is it kind of a step down program where when they get closer to their release, they're then transferred into the halfway house? Is that how it works?
Speaker 0 00:15:31 You start inside the high security prison because Hal is a high security prison. Very often you start in custody, in the pretrial detention, and, uh, then you get a sentence, and then you serve your sentence, uh, until it's one and a half year left of your sentence, you can go out to the halfway house.
Speaker 4 00:15:50 I see. I think one of the things that a lot of people see and feel shock around is the ability to move around freely within the units behind the wall. The fact that individuals can wear their normal clothes. They're not given kind of this uniform that they have to live within. And they are also given access to knives and different kinds of normal utility tools that in other, especially American prisons, would be seen as immediate weapons. I mean, we don't even give pens. So, um, <laugh>, so can you speak to how that works and how, you know, access to potential weapons doesn't end up in, you know, chaos and violence?
Speaker 0 00:16:43 <laugh>, we haven't had the knives in the units for many, many, many, many years in nor in Norwegian prisons. So that's not a new thing, but it's not on big knives, killing knives. Uh, they have that also, but, uh, they are tied up <laugh> and, uh, so they cannot move around with it. Uh, in the, in the workshop, it's a lot of, uh, tools. So, so it's, it's weapons <laugh> all over the prison. And that, uh, that, that has been like that for, for many, many, many years. And we had two killings of officers in the eighties, and that's 40 years ago. Wow. And that was one of the killing was that one inmate went to a cinema outside with one female officer, and he was in love with that officer. He just strangled her. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, on that cinema trip. So that was one. And, um, and the next one killing more what was with weapon, uh, that he had smuggled in from, uh, outside into the cell. And, uh, his shot down one officer, but that's only two killings we had had in Norway for many, many, many years.
Speaker 4 00:18:00 If something like that happened in America, which, you know, we think about Willie Horton or some of these people that have been used as examples, you know, one wrongdoing closes the idea down for the entire country. And so what was it about the Norwegian culture that you all were like, you know, th this was essentially a fluke and statistically so minor, you know, and we compare to all of the other opportunities that people aren't taking to do these things, that it didn't shut down the whole idea of going out to the cinema or going out to work.
Speaker 0 00:18:38 I think, uh, we can call it the Scandinavian model. It's not only Norway, but it's also Sweden and Denmark. I will say it. Uh, very focused on the human rights, very focused on, uh, reading people <laugh> in a, a good way to treat people with res with respect.
Speaker 4 00:18:59 So there's this open model where people are able to kind of go about their day doing the things that they would normally do, going to school, going to work, but there's also unit A at Halden, which is for those who are particularly, who need extra attention, we'll say. One of the concerns that I think a lot of Americans have is, you know, they'll often say, if we talk about changing the system or transforming the system or abolishing the system, one of the things that they often express concern about is, you know, well, what about the, the worst of the worst? So I'm wondering if you can speak to who qualifies or who ends up in Unit A and how Unit A is different than, um, the rest of the prison population.
Speaker 0 00:19:51 A unit, they have 60, 60 inmates and, uh, half of them are in what we call the reception unit. So it's the unit where they start. They stay in Hilton Prison. So everyone who's coming into Hilton Prison start in this reception unit. And there we have a questionnaire, we have a assessment, and we try to find out what they inmates want to do <laugh> when they are in Halen prison. And if they want to go to school, uh, we try to send them up to unit B and C. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So that's a part one, part of Unit A. And, um, a small part with eight inmates are what we call the retreat unit. It's very difficult to explain, but the inmates are in, we can call it mo, monastery. Monastery. Mm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> mm-hmm. <affirmative>, total silence for one week or up to three weeks. Mm. So that's a little part.
Speaker 0 00:20:56 And the 20 and unit with 20 inmates, are they inmates who don't want to work, don't want to go to school, don't want to use the facility, they don't want to do anything, they just want to be still criminals. Mm-hmm. And they don't want to use the facility we have and the possibilities we have. And then they are staying in unity. Mm-hmm. They, they are, many of them are not aggressive. They are just don't want to participate. Well, it's not that trouble unit. I see. It's a unit for inmates who don't, you know, you are not motivated to work with themselves. And that's the important part of health. In prison, if you shall be in unit B and C, you have to go to work or to school. Five inmates totally. Over, over 220 inmates are what we call aggressive.
Speaker 4 00:21:52 How do you define someone as aggressive?
Speaker 0 00:21:54 Nah, it's what they say. They can be violent against other inmates. Violent against officers. Yeah, that's right. Aggressive. So
Speaker 4 00:22:04 It's their, it's their actions displayed while in prison, not necessarily because of what they've done on the outside to land them in prison. That defines them as aggressive.
Speaker 0 00:22:14 No. If you are dangerous, uh, you don't come to Halen prison, <laugh>, cause this prison, Halen prison is a prison where you shall be together with other inmates. That's the whole philosophy about Halton Prison, that you are in company with other inmates. So if you are defined as dangerous, you cannot come to home.
Speaker 4 00:22:33 I see. And so if you're defined as dangerous, you go into one of these more traditional
Speaker 0 00:22:38 Prisons? Yeah. We have a special prison in Oslo for the most dangerous inmate.
Speaker 4 00:22:43 Okay. Does that the most dangerous prison in Oslo, does that have a similar philosophy of normalcy or treating with respect? Or is that more similar to an American prison?
Speaker 0 00:22:57 No, every prisoner, nor when I work in the same way. It's not every inmate who are so motivated as the inmate in health in prison.
Speaker 4 00:23:06 I see. I see. Okay. And so would the difference be with that prison in Oslo? Simply just the amount of liberty that they're given. So the, are they not necessarily able to freely walk around the campus or to interact? Is it more solitary, more isolated? Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:23:27 Um, not so much solitary, I think, but, uh, they have much more officers than other prisons. And they have a lot of psychiatrists, uh, psychologists, uh, social workers. So that prison has a lot of resources.
Speaker 4 00:23:41 Gotcha.
Speaker 0 00:23:42 So it's, it's also the, the prison where we have this preventive detention
Speaker 4 00:23:47 With Halden. You described there are some people who stay in Unit A who are just simply not motivated. Is there, are there people who start in that way? And then eventually they're like, actually, you know what, I do wanna go to school and I do wanna work, and then they can get transferred. Does that change happen over time? Have you seen that?
Speaker 0 00:24:06 Oh, yeah. Many times. So they start being not motivated, and then they find out that this is boring.
Speaker 4 00:24:14 <laugh>
Speaker 0 00:24:15 <laugh>. So, uh, clearly the, the work of the officers is still to, to motivate also the, the, they admit who are not motivated <laugh>. I see. So it's a part of the officer's role is to motivate.
Speaker 4 00:24:29 What's the average length of stay at Halden?
Speaker 0 00:24:32 Last time I checked, that was six years.
Speaker 4 00:24:35 Because of the resources that are provided and the structure, it was pretty expensive. And it's definitely more expensive than an American prison to incarcerate an individual in Halden who pays or who funds Halden. Is it taxpayers as it is in America to fund the prison? And if so, how do people feel about that increased amount towards incarceration?
Speaker 0 00:25:08 It came from the Parliament, of course, that's the parliament is, is the people in Norway. Halton Prison was very expensive to build, therefore they haven't built any new Halton prison after Hilton prison. So, uh, they have decided that, uh, they will have a cheaper model that it, it's not expensive to run. It's a, it's the same cost to run whole Hmm. Than other prisons. And, uh, it was built in 2010 when Norway had a lot of oil, money, <laugh> mm-hmm. <affirmative> mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But we don't have so much oil money left. And, uh, we have a war in Europe, though I don't think they will build a prison like Halden for many years.
Speaker 4 00:25:52 Do you think that the cheaper model that they're proposing would be as effective?
Speaker 0 00:25:59 It's more compact. In Holden, we have, uh, the workshops and the school is in, in a separate building. So the inmates live one place and they walk down to the workshops and to the school, have to work, walk <laugh>, go outside the building and go down to the workshops. In the new prison, they have, uh, everything in, in one building.
Speaker 4 00:26:25 The architecture though of Halden, the ability to go outside and go into these other buildings was very intentional in terms of allowing people to get fresh air and see nature and feel like they're going, you know, commuting as they would in normal life. So this seems very different to just be in one building. So
Speaker 0 00:26:47 That is the biggest difference, difference between Halen and the rest of, uh, the prisons in Norway is the outdoor possibilities and the forest. We have, um, we have a lot of gardens, so the, we are focused a lot whole landscape, architecture, architecture. That's a very big difference. I will say. I say that's the biggest difference between Halden and the rest of the prisons in Norway.
Speaker 4 00:27:13 Do you know whether the outcomes of Halden are better than the outcomes of other prisons in terms of the individuals who are incarcerated at Halden have a better time reintegrating than from these other prisons? Or is it similar?
Speaker 0 00:27:33 Because Norway is a very small country with very few inmates. We don't measure reoffending rate for every prison. Many of the inmates in the, the high security prison, they apply to go to lower security prison. So almost everyone will go to lower security before they're released.
Speaker 4 00:27:55 Is it that all individuals who are incarcerated have this kind of step down approach where before they're released, they've gone into a lower level security facility?
Speaker 0 00:28:07 Yeah, that's the main rule. In Norway, we call it progression. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> towards, towards release. Almost everyone, many of the inmates start in high security mm-hmm. <affirmative>, and then they go after some time to lower security, and then they go to halfway house, and you can end up, uh, serving, uh, the rest of us your sentence in your home. Interesting. With electronic, electronic monitoring. So it's four steps, high security, lower security, halfway house, and electronic mon monitoring.
Speaker 4 00:28:42 That's very different. I mean, we have parole for many who are finishing out their sentence at home who have to check in with their parole officer. But a lot of people are released right into the community from high security or even solitary confinement. And I think people don't realize that. That's
Speaker 0 00:29:02 Crazy.
Speaker 4 00:29:02 Yeah. People don't realize the shock that occurs in someone's body and mind to go from where their autonomy is completely removed into then having to figure out how to function independently. Mm. This idea of normalcy, this idea of treating with respect, this is such a different philosophy. There are definitely prisons in America that are providing education, that are providing vocational training. That's certain, and I've seen it, but the individuals are housed in these cells that are barred where they just have a steel toilet and it's ground into, there's no sense of privacy. There's no sense of autonomy. I remember sitting in this room, it was a very bizarre, I had been spending time in prisons for a while, but I remember having this moment where I was sitting in this room and it was me and about 15 men, all of whom were black, all of whom were wearing these maroon like chore jackets and pants.
Speaker 4 00:30:25 And it was, and they had d o c, department of Corrections, d o c, written in big block letters on their arm and on their leg. It was just such a strange experience where I felt like, wow, I feel like I'm in the 1920s. Like I just, this was only five years ago and I, I was, it was such a strange experience. And so to have this other model where people are wearing their normal clothes are, are able to express themselves, I think that's something that is really beautiful and important. And there's so much fear around that. There's so much fear around that here, where people would be afraid that they would be like flashing gang colors if they were able to wear their own clothes, or they would be afraid that, um, there would just be endless chaos and violence if people were able to move about in the ways that you're describing they Ken Halden. And so I'm curious, since you were in this system and saw the change over time and saw the integration of this philosophy more deeply, how do you see, I mean, do you see a possibility? I know that there's this, this, um, you
Speaker 0 00:31:43 Know, little Scandinavia
Speaker 4 00:31:45 <laugh> Yeah. There's little Scandinavia hopping at Chester, um, in Pennsylvania, which is this kind of trial that we're trying to see. But what, what can you help us figure out in terms of how to shift our perceptions of those who commit crime?
Speaker 0 00:32:03 Yeah. Very big question. <laugh>
Speaker 4 00:32:05 <laugh>. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:32:06 But, uh, I, I think everything is possible, but it's so big over there in the US visit the prison in, in Pennsylvania, the Phoenix. Yep. And thousand inmates. <laugh>. Yeah. That's a very new prison. Yep. And it's, it's so hard. It's a tough, tough place, but it take time. You have to build stone up and stone. So if you have a long term goal, it's possible. And if you, if you look at North Dakota, if you take a trip over to North Dakota and see what they have done with the prisons there, they are inspired by the Norwegian system. Mm. And they have done something like we do in Norway and also in Oregon and in Washington state. They're working with some of these ideas. So, um, it's possible.
Speaker 4 00:33:00 Do you have a perspective on prison abolition? You know, when people talk about prison abolition, it would be community-based solutions to crime prevention and getting people the treatment that they need, getting people, the services they need, the healthcare, the access, the education that would ultimately prevent them from causing harm to themselves and others. And then the question remains of, well, what would we do with those who need to be immediately removed from society and need to be put somewhere where they're no longer a threat and they can gain those skills? And honestly, it sounds like Halden is that thing, right? Like Halden is the potential for where these individuals would go. That's like a campus that has this idea of normalcy or normality that has this, you know, degree of humaneness.
Speaker 0 00:33:57 When I started, it's, it's 40 years ago, <laugh>, when I started in the, in the correctional service, we had 6,000 inmates. 6,000, no, we have 3000.
Speaker 4 00:34:11 Wow.
Speaker 0 00:34:13 And, uh, many of the sentence now is, uh, what we call community sentence. So, uh, we have changed the whole thinking <laugh> in Norway from prison to have more community sentence. Mm. I think, uh, Norway have shown that it's possible to build down the prison. Many inmates that earlier was in closed prison are now in community center also with electronic monitoring. So, and that's safe and, uh, safe for the society. And, uh, reoffending rate from community sentence is lower than 20, 25%. So 25% is from the prisons. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> from the community, I think it's under 20%. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>
Speaker 4 00:35:05 You, the fact that you all cut your prison <laugh> population in half is a huge deal. I mean, that would be literally cutting a million people in America. I think, you know, that's interesting that you're saying that it's switched to more electronic monitoring, because I know that there's a lot of criticism here, at least around the fact that we're still essentially hyper surveilling certain people and not necessarily leaning into a model of humaneness because it's, it's still a level of control that the state has over certain people. And I think that the context is maybe a little different in America because it's, again, disproportionately oppressed and minoritized populations that are then being additionally hyper surveilled. And so I'm wondering if there's been any kind of pushback to the increase in community surveillance or electronic monitoring, or if people are finding that that's more beneficial for them.
Speaker 0 00:36:10 I think, uh, this is a success here in Norway, and, uh, I think there will, uh, in the future also focus even more on community sentence and, um, maybe build even more prisons, prison places. Yeah. But we see in Sweden now, and maybe we'll come after in Norway, that they are now building more prisons <laugh>.
Speaker 4 00:36:33 Mm.
Speaker 0 00:36:34 So, uh, maybe that will be a trend also in Norway. But nowadays, uh, it's a lot of focus on, uh, on probation and on, uh, community sentence in different ways.
Speaker 4 00:36:46 Well, I think that this is fascinating, and I think there is a lot to learn here. And it's so great to talk to someone who saw the change and who was part of the change. I, I don't know, as we were talking, thinking about this concept of prison abolition, I think that there's a lot of alignment here and a lot of lessons. So yeah. This is, this has been really, really awesome. And I'm, I'm so grateful for your time to speak with me about
Speaker 3 00:37:20 This system.
Speaker 0 00:37:21 It's very interesting for me too. So, uh, it's the <laugh>. It's for both of us.
Speaker 4 00:37:27 <laugh>. Okay. Good.
Speaker 3 00:37:31 Thank you so much for listening to my critical conversation with auto foal. I thought it was really interesting how this model so drastically compares and would probably be considered, quote unquote soft on crime in the American standards, and yet is so much more effective at reducing harm. I also think that this is a really great model to be incorporated in the abolitionist agenda. There's often the question of, well, what do we do with those who need to be removed from society? How can we keep people safe without prisons? And thinking about a structure like a campus where those individuals can go to get services with the intention of providing resources, getting those individuals help, that is where I think this model can fit into the abolitionist agenda. I'm curious your thoughts. So again, please send any, you have to cc office hours gmail.com and please write a review. Leave a review, leave a comment, share with your friends and family and everyone you know, and I'll see you next time.