A longer prison term as a way of punishing those who break the law is not as good as other methods. To what extend do you agree or disagree?

There is a widely accepted notion that criminals can only be punished through imprisonment. However, the crime rate still remained high these days, even though the number of prison has increased. Therefore, I think long term sentence is not as effective as other methods

Firstly, it is an inescapable fact that punishment, such as long period sentence has deterrent effects to both potential offenders and habitual offenders; however, this actually does not reduce the crime rate as much as other methods do, for example, community service. This has been proved by some findings that community service is more effective than imprisonment in terms of reducing reoffending. This is due to the fact that rehabilitation program changes criminals’ minds and behaviors, allowing them to embrace the society with a positive attitude after release. Conversely, traditional imprisonment could cause mental disorder, which is believed to have a strong correlation with reoffending.

Secondly, although long-period sentence consoles victims and their families, it deprives prisoners’ abilities to re-adapt to the society. Thus, criminals are more likely to fall back into a cycle of offending. As when they sent into a prison they often lose their jobs, home and social relationships. In contrast, attending community sentence helps them keep the basic working skills and regain their confidence. For example, the cooking skills they acquired from the rehabilitation program enable them to seek employment in the culinary industry. This is particularly true for juvenile and first time offenders, who are more likely to become productive members of society.

In brief, it appears that long term imprisonment is not an adequate option in terms rehabilitating criminals. By contrast, community services demonstrate more positive effects on this matter.