Martinson, Robert

The Research

These authors analyzed 231 studies of rehabilitation and treatment programs conducted over a 22-year period from 1945 to 1967. The study was sanctioned by the New York State Governor's Special Committee on Criminal Offenders and was funded through the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act. Although final revisions for the report were completed in 1971, for political reasons associated with the nature of the findings, the publication of the full report was withheld by the Governor's Committee for more than four years. Following a district court case in Bronx, New York, however, Martinson was able to publish, reportedly without the authorization of his coauthors, the first official account of this research in the widely recognized and distributed magazine Public Interest.

Known as the Martinson Report, his article contains one of the most oft-cited statements in the history of criminal justice: “With few and isolated exceptions, the rehabilitative efforts that have been reported so far have had no appreciable effect on recidivism” (Martinson, 1974, p. 25). In the matter of just one sentence, Martinson challenged the conventional wisdom about rehabilitation that had prevailed for nearly a century. His article also provoked criticisms of the effectiveness and viability of parole, early release, and indeterminate sentencing.

Impact and Consequences

The rehabilitative model that for so long had dictated sentencing policy shifted during the 1970s to a crime-control model focused almost entirely on retribution and deterrence. Of course, this change came about not simply because of one article. Instead, the ready acceptance of Martinson's conclusions was as much due to the political context of the time as it was to the substance of his claims. A number of high-profile prison revolts, including events at San Quentin and Attica, brought to light the deplorable conditions of U.S. prisons. There was also a spike in crime rates and a growing climate of political conservatism. This combination of factors set the stage for Martinson's report [Page 574]and commenced the demise of the rehabilitation paradigm.

The Academic Response

Many direct challenges have been made against the “Nothing works” doctrine in the three decades since the publication of Martinson's article. Though some conclude that the body of evidence is now robust enough to proclaim that Martinson's report has been discredited and that his extreme pessimism was unfounded, most reappraisals of Martinson's original thesis are usually prefaced with such qualifying phrases as “guardedly optimistic,” “cautious hopefulness,” and “‘promising.” Given the fervor in energy and resources devoted to the search to prove Martinson wrong, such tempered statements do little to justify with a high level of confidence that Martinson was simply wrong. There are, however, enough modest success stories to suggest that the bleak outlook may have been premature. Indeed, Martinson himself provided a retraction to his originally pessimistic view in a 1979 article in the Hofstra Law Review. Nonetheless, his later modification of his extreme position did little to dispel the acceptance of the original thesis or to curb the enthusiasm of those who saw Martinson's original conclusion as politically appealing.

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