James William KilgoreRecensioni

Electronic Monitoring is a very big business. America is closing in on half a million people on ankle bracelets that can not merely give their precise location, but biometrics like heartbeats and even their tone of voice. At the slightest suspicion, the police can show up, without warrants, and haul them in again. This is the world of James Kilgore, who has written Understanding E-Carceration from his own experience and his work to stop it.

As America moves through mass criminalization, it has branched out beyond the walls of prisons, which are not merely bursting at the seams, but horrendously understaffed and underequipped as well. And since they represent far more than their share of prisoners, Blacks and immigrants also represent far more than their share of electronic monitoring (EM) clients.

While most will think EM is a privilege over being in prison, the truth is far different. Police add so many restrictions to movement that life becomes all but impossible on EM. The slightest infraction, from not having the bracelet charged, to stepping out to say, take out the trash, could have a patrol car screaming to a stop at the house, and the wearer being taken in and sent back to prison, no questions asked. Getting to a job interview takes days to negotiate with the minders, and employers are not thrilled to be told the candidate will try to get back to them later in the week.

Examples of reasons for being sent back to prison are the stuff of Alice in Wonderland: “These alerts,” Kilgore says, ”could have been triggered by anything from the wearer scratching their leg under the device to the user entering a concrete building where the signal could not penetrate. In 2013, journalist Mario Koran of the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism reported on a number of cases where people were sent back to prison because of false alarms triggered by their ankle monitor.”

And if that weren’t bad enough, it costs plenty for the privilege. Daily fees range from $5 to $40, up to $300 for setup and over a thousand if lost or damaged. For people arrested over crimes of poverty, being without work and saddled with this new bill of $240 a month can mean going without food. It can dramatically increase stress in the family.

EM is a new profit center, not a step up from prison. It is an open air prison to those in its grip. They are angry and bitter that they took this option rather than rot in jail. It is not only no better, it is often significantly worse. Going to see a doctor or the emergency room requires permission days in advance. And if the hospital happens to prevent the signal from reaching the monitoring center, the police will show up and take the patient away for breaking parole.

In other words, EM is far more intrusive and restrictive than prison. It is walking on eggshells within the tiny space of a home. And it’s not like wearers can move to another town and start over. They are confined to quarters.

It is also far more common than we think. In Marion County, Indiana, more than 14,000 people are on EM at some point in the year. “Students in a Los Angeles high school reported the presence of special rooms for students to plug in their monitors. For those without houses or without power in their houses, the local McDonalds has become a hangout not for the fries or the Egg McMuffins, but because it has wall plugs to connect and ankle monitor.”

So EM is in no way rehabilitation. It in no way reacclimates prisoners to life on the outside. It doesn’t help them socialize, or train or adapt to society. It is instead a further burden, a strain on finances and on family relationships. For the homeless and impoverished, it takes over their lives, if only in the search for recharging the thing before the cops find out. One man was commanded to go back into his burning house to retrieve the base unit or he’d land back in prison, Kilgore says.

EM is not so much an alternative to incarceration as a condition of release. It does not ease petty criminals back if they had committed minor offenses. It bears no connection to freedom. It is the most invasive surveillance Americans undergo. And there’s more to come, Kilgore shows.

Kilgore follows developments in hardware and software, as firms like Palantir develop platforms to help police predict where and when new crimes will be committed, based on all the data collected from EM, cellphones, security cameras, social media, facial recognition, police records and even drivers’ licenses. He says to beware of the internet of things, which will soon be contributing to tracking everyone’s activities – when they change the thermostat settings, turn the lights off and close the blinds, open the refrigerator door or watch tv.

But there’s more to Kilgore than that. He reaches out to Gaza, where millions have been prisoners in an overstuffed refugee camp for multiple generations now, with absolutely zero hope of becoming citizens of any country. They are monitored continuously, providing endless data with facial recognition, movements, communications and existence. He also enlarges the scope of the book with his takes on abolition – the potential to live without prisons at all. This all seems to be too much and off topic until you read about Kilgore himself.

If the name is at all familiar, it is because of Kilgore’s prominence in the Symbionese Liberation Army, of Patty Hearst fame. He escaped the clutches of justice and lived vicariously for a quarter of a century before being re-captured. He had managed to build a new life, even earning a Phd under an assumed name. After over six years in prison back home, he was released – onto EM. But his politics shine through. His bent towards reversing inequality and overcoming racism are present throughout.

He is still passionately against inequality in the justice system. He cites Dorothy Roberts: ”All institutions in the United States increasingly address social inequality by punishing the communities that are most marginalized by it.” And it is rapidly getting worse, as 12 states now permit not merely parole EM, but lifetime EM with GPS.

People on EM are discriminated against. Kilgore tells of one woman who gave birth in a hospital, when a staffer noticed her ankle bracelet and called the police. That forced her to remain there for an extra (and expensive) day and half while an investigation took place. EM carries the same sort of stigma that sexual offenders lists (with nearly one million listed) provide, with similar prohibitions on movement. EM can also be used to ensure wearers don’t come too close to someone carrying their own device, provided to protect them from the presence of the wearer. Anyone can call the police with suspicion of malfeasance, just because they notice the ankle bracelet. Charging it in a public place makes the wearer stand out, an obvious target for the paranoid or prejudiced.

And the courts don’t help. Wearers must sign away their constitutional rights to unreasonable search and seizure, unannounced, at any time and for no reason at all: “The US Supreme Court agreed that people on parole ‘agree in writing to be subject to a search or seizure by parole officer or other peace officer at any time of the day or night, with or without a search warrant and with or without cause.’ The ‘no-knock’ open-door applies not only to their person but to their residence, workplace and other surroundings. For people who are under some sort of carcereal control or surveillance, social impact bonds may ultimately expand state and corporate access to data related to new aspects of their daily lives, without the requirement of even a digital search warrant.”

The first half of the book is the strongest, as Kilgore has himself worked to reign in the use and abuse of EM. He reveals a subworld most readers will visit for the first time here. But when he branches out to Gaza, abolition, rights and freedoms, it’s more superficial. Those chapters lack the depth of his explanations of EM. Kilgore has not visited Gaza to bring back any sort of firsthand experience or reporting, while the various US community groups against prisons all seem to spout the same complaints, adding heat but not light to the argument. But through it all, Kilgore is organized, competent and authoritative, exposing yet another way life being made untenable in the age of high tech.

David Wineberg

Understanding E-Carceration by James Kilgore is an excellent primer on the broad topic of the surveillance state and how it serves to expand the number under the carceral umbrella while reducing the number in physical prison.

While a significant portion of this book, and indeed much of what I have read elsewhere, highlights the conditions in the United States, the problem is both international in scope and used in different ways under different regimes around the world. This is included here and needs to be addressed but many readers of this book will likely be in the US and, since we imprison a far greater percentage of our citizens than other nations, it makes for an excellent example of the harm being done.

No doubt those happy to have a so-called justice system that unequally applies and enforces the law will find fault with the idea that someone convicted (not always guilty but convicted nonetheless) is still human and deserves to be treated as such. While this book would do them the most good they likely won't read it with an open mind, so I am finished discussing them.

For those unsure why some of what has been touted as prison and/or justice reform is not as positive as it might sound, I would suggest reading this. The writing is straightforward and will lend itself to a quick reading. I would suggest slowing down and maybe looking up some of the sources mentioned. If you see the merit in Kilgore's argument but want to learn more before making up your mind, that makes perfect sense.

I didn't go through the notes and jot down every resource, so I may be redundant here. But here are a few books that I am familiar with that would make excellent companion reads. I know he mentions Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow, and that is an excellent place to start. I would also recommend "I Have Nothing to Hide": And 20 Other Myths About Surveillance and Privacy by Heidi Boghosian, Prison and Social Death by Joshua M Price, and Prison By Any Other Name by Maya Schenwar and Victoria Law. There are other very good books as well but these are ones I know very well.

I would recommend this book to anyone, no matter where they may currently stand on the issue, who truly wants to make society as a whole better and more equitable for all. The writing is clear, the examples and analogies make sense, and the suggestions are, at the very least, good starting points.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.

The back cover describes this as a thriller, but I think that really doesn't apply. Instead it's a look at Zimbabwe after independence through the eyes of a white American history student who visits and tries to understand it. As the book starts he's an idealist who doesn't want to believe anything back about Mugabe, but as the political becomes personal and he gets involved with Zimbabweans his understanding becomes more nuanced.½

James Kilgore's novel, 'We Are All Zimbabweans Now' is a very solid outing. The book went very quickly and was easy to become interested in.

Ben Dabney is a likeable character and his journey is developed nicely. As a reader I could sympathize with his hesitation to let go of his fantasy notion of Mugabe and the appreciation he develops for the unseen fighters in the liberation.

I also enjoyed the character of Florence. I found her take on revolution to be refreshing: knowing when to fight her battles and knowing when she had to let injustice go because fighting just wasn't worth it.

There were two things that really bothered me: I felt that the high-level Zimbabwean revolutionary and goverment official acceptance of Ben was a bit far-fetched. It didn't seem plausible that all these people (including Florence) would take such an interest in an American research student with nothing to recommend him. I also thought the end came about too abruptly. 3 pages of Epilogue to wind up 2 years did not really do the ending any justice.

Overall, a very enjoyable story with important lessions about the people who make history, the importance of history in our lives and the responsibilities that come with recording historical stories.

This review http://www.librarything.com/work/8666121/reviews/56048166 so fully captures my own reaction that I could practically have written it myself. Yes, a worthy first novel, one recommended to readers interested in the recent history and politics of southern Africa.

"A man doesn't sit in prison for ten years, commit himself to peace and reconciliation, and then turn around and act like his opressors. History doesn't work like that."

In the early 1980s, Robert Mugabe was widely seen as a heroic figure who had helped liberate his nation from an oppressive, racist regime. In James Kilgore's novel, an American graduate student named Ben Dabney travels to Zimbabwe to investigate the process of racial reconciliation for his PhD thesis. Ben discovers a fascinating country on the cusp of independence, and as he travels and interviews, he finds friends, a lover, and a dangerous secret that may jeopardize his own life.

The novel documents Ben's gradual disillusionment as he encounters the reality of Zimbabwean politics and the disparity between the public rhetoric and the ugly reality of betrayed ideals. The preceding quote is Ben's reaction midway through the book; but by the end, during his interview with Mugabe himself, Ben has come to see Mugabe's "reconciliation" as less of an ideal than as a political strategy, to be used or discarded as needed.

This is a worthy first novel, being both entertaining and enlightening. Kilgore's descriptions of people, places, and events ring true, and could only come from a writer who had spent time in Zimbabwe. The story line itself is engaging and suffused with an element of danger. Given James Kilgore's personal history, one must wonder how much of the protagonist's political disillusionment is autobiographical. Perhaps one day we shall have an autobiography from Kilgore -- if so, I shall read it. In the meantime, I gladly recommend this book to prospective readers.

In WAAZN, Author creates a character who is wholly believable and a portrait of a country that he loves despite its flaws. Ben is a historian who has traveled to Zimbabwe to research his dissertation. His relationship with that country reflects the course of so many relationships. At the beginning he is infatuated with the idea of Zimbabwe and its prime minister Robert Mugabe. As he meets the people of the country, he learns that the newly free country has many faults and secrets.

As he meets the heroes of the war, he is forced to reexamine what it means to be a hero and in turn what it means to be a historian. In the characters that Ben meets and gets to know, we see the same passions, mistakes, loves and losses that each of us are part of in our own lives.

My one complaint about the book is that I feel that the secondary characters are more interesting and more fleshed out than the main character. Ben is, in the end, the character I care least about. I think if the secondary characters had been fleshed out more, the book would have been much longer, but equally enjoyable.½

The idea behind this novel, and the storyline, is very interesting. The moments of personal connection are highly engaging, but the problems come with the in-between. There needed to be more of a storyline to make the history palatable. When the moments of story are not proportional to the moments of history the average reader is lost. I found myself wishing for the next scene to begin instead of wondering what was going to happen next. I learned a lot of information about a part of the world that I knew nothing about before reading this book, but I only feel comfortable recommending this book to history buffs.

Though this was a somewhat difficult book to get into, I found my efforts to be more than rewarded by the time I completed this novel. Kilgore's protagonist, Ben Dabney, is not a very likable character from the get-go, but he isn't supposed to be. Dabney expands as a character as his knowledge of Zimbabwe grows. I found this to be a very effective tool used by Kilgore to drive home the importance, and sometimes unbelievably cruel nature of, Zimbabwean history and politics in the 1980s. As Ben's eyes are opened, the reader understands the magnitude of what the character is seeing.

I read this book without having much of a background in terms of other publications - fiction or non - related to Zimbabwe. Kilgore has, through this novel, encouraged me to look into more reading material about this time and about this place.

And, of course, I would love to read anything else that he has to write- about Zimbabwe or not.

This book is a fascinating tale of intrigue, political cover up, and people trying to survive in post-revolutionary Zimbabwe. Told from the point of view of an American historian, the more he learns the more he becomes disenchanted with the man he had previously revered and the Prime Minister of free Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe. It is a wonderful story set in a part of the world which I and many westerners know little.

An excellent debut novel, this is the poignant story of Ben Dabney, who [in the early ‘80s] is dazzled by Robert Mugabe’s policy of reconciliation and determined to write his thesis on Zimbabwean liberation.

Armed with a list of subjects to interview, Ben arrives in Harare in 1982, and is delighted by the helpful friendliness of the black Zimbabweans, awestruck by the capacity to forgive their former suppressers.

The few whites he encounters are, in the main, indolent, racist and unpleasant – in total contrasts to the blacks he befriends who are uniformly honest, generous, caring, good natured, polite, welcoming, appreciative – and colour-blind.

Before long, Ben has moved in with Florence, a former guerilla who lost a leg to a landmine, meets and is charmed by his hero Mugabe and other highly-placed Zanu PF politicians, and is offering regular tutorials at a farm school for war veterans.

Inspired and blinded by his enormous admiration for Mugabe and the Zanu slogan ‘We are all Zimbabweans now’, Ben is passionate about his now country and risks losing his academic grant so determined is he to describe what he sees as a miracle. But then Florence, his mistress, recommends he visit Matabeleland…

Mugabe was a Shona and distrusted the Matabele, most of whom belonged to the more reconciliatory Zapu party: by 1982 he was terrorizing Matabeleland, waging a campaign of virtual genocide in the guise of suppressing ‘Dissidents’.

While rumours of the slaughter had reached the capital, they were dismissed as “Boer Propaganda” and Ben is shocked to experience the gratuitous terrorism and barbarity waged against the Matabele first hand. His admiration for Mugabe is, just slightly, shaken, but he convinces himself the leader has no idea of what is being perpetrated in his name.

Quite rapidly, Ben’s life turns into while not a nightmare exactly certainly a deeply unpleasant dream with several bad and some tragic episodes as he is forced not only to re-assess Mugabe, and the Zanu PF, but also the entire idea of a United Zimbabwean nation.

Not a feel-good story but certainly a convincing one – most especially considering the identity of the author who, while definitely not a naïve Yankee fan of third world revolutionary leaders, once shared Dabney’s idealism.

Ben is no poster-boy for professional historical objectivity: blinkered and someone cowardly, he is easily led into blindly espousing certain causes while neglecting his moral and intellectual responsibilities.

For those who have forgotten, James Kilgore, along with heiress Patricia Hearst, was a member of the outlawed Symbionese Liberation Army in the early 70s, and one of the few who avoided capture by the authorities.

South Africa was probably the last place in which one could expect to find an anti-capitalistic anarchist and revolutionary – which might be why Kilgore fled here, escaping detection for nearly 30 years.

Is Dabney’s credulous enthusiasm, for Mugabe and his Zimbabwe perhaps a reflection of the strongly held beliefs Kilgore had as a young man? He lived in Zimbabwe himself in the 1980s so his impressions and observations are first hand.

Does Dabney’s rude awakening in Matabeleland reflect some shocking experience in Kilgore’s exile, or is it an immediately symbolic incident reflecting perhaps the author’s long disillusionment with the socialist revolutionary anarchistic ideal?

Ultimately, the suppositions are irrelevant: an impressive debut and a first-rate politico-historical literary thriller, this book is informative, thought-provoking, well-written and, best of all, entertaining.½

First, thanks to the LT review copy gods for a chance to read this book. I've just gotten started with it, but -- so far -- the author's story seems more compelling than the opening pages. But, others have suggested it gets better so I'll give it some more time before I stop reading.