College Honors Program

Date of Creation

Spring 2026

Degree Type

Thesis

Department

Political Science

First Advisor

Gregory Burnep

Abstract

The United States’ decentralized system of incarceration leaves individual states largely responsible for criminal justice policy, yet the country continues to maintain the highest incarceration rate in the world, prompting growing interest in reforms that both reduce incarceration and improve outcomes. One such approach emphasizes rehabilitation over traditional goals such as deterrence and incapacitation, drawing on the example of Scandinavian prison systems as an evidence-based practice. This thesis examines how states, as laboratories of democracy, are experimenting with rehabilitation-centered models of incarceration through different mechanisms of policy change. Focusing on two case studies – Pennsylvania’s Scandinavian Prison Project as a form of bottom-up reform and California’s California Model as a top-down initiative – it analyzes how these approaches shape the scope, resources, and effectiveness of reform efforts. The difference in policy experimentation methods further influences the potential for future policy diffusion; Bottom-up policies may take longer to diffuse but likely in a more bipartisan pattern, while top-down policies have more predicted success at immediate diffusion but are likely limited to ideologically similar states. Together, these cases highlight both individual states’ potential to create broader institutional change and the political, economic, and structural challenges that states and smaller actors face in implementing innovative correctional policies.

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