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January 22 @ 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm CST

Speaker Series: John Eason

Sociology and International and Public Affairs, Brown University
From the Prison Bust to Rural School Closures: Even When We Win, We Lose
Hybrid: Virtual/In-Person (ABF Offices, 750 N Lake Shore Drive, 4th Floor Chicago, IL)
During the prison boom—from 1970 to 2000 when facilities tripled across the US, prisons were more likely to be constructed in rural towns in the South with higher rates of poverty, and Black and Latino residents. By examining the period we call the prison “bust”—between 2000-2023–when prison closures eclipsed openings, we reveal how prison closures impact schools and racial equity across rural communities. Using Community Engaged Methods (CEM) we demonstrate multiple adverse effects of prison closure on rural communities of color including school closures. We argue that these findings implore us to find responsible ways of curbing demand to close prisons and reduce harm to rural communities of color. We assert this move from prison abolition as advocacy to prison abolition as policy will bear more fruit in reducing our overreliance on mass incarceration.
To register, contact Sophie Kofman at skofman@abfn.org. 

John M. Eason (he/him) is the Watson Family University Associate Professor of Sociology and International and Public Affairs at Brown University. He also works as a Senior Fellow at the Justice Policy Center/Office of Race and Equity Research at the Urban Institute.

He holds a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Chicago. Eason, a native of Evanston, Illinois, received a bachelor’s degree in Urban and Regional Planning from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and a M.P.P. from the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago.

Before entering graduate school, Eason was a church-based community organizer focused on housing and criminal justice issues. He also served as a political organizer for then-Illinois State Senator Barack Obama.

Eason’s research interests challenge existing models and develop new theories of community, health, race, punishment and rural/urban processes in several ways. First, by tracing the emergence of the rural ghetto, he establishes a new conceptual model of rural neighborhoods. Next, by demonstrating the function of the ghetto in rural communities, he extends concentrated disadvantage from urban to rural community process. These relationships are explored through his book, “Big House on the Prairie: Rise of the Rural Ghetto and Prison Proliferation” (University of Chicago Press, 2017).