If the war on drugs has proven to be a failure, why are most governments focused on incarceration instead of rehabilitation?
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Not most. Lets pick on the US: the reason why prisons in the US in particular are so focused on incarceration instead of rehabilitation is because prisons are a for-profit industry. Few state or federal prisons are run directly by the various departments of corrections, the majority of them are run by contract prison companies. These in turn seek to maximize profits by cutting costs, cramming prisoners into otherwise deplorable conditions (look at any jail cell in say Sweden or Denmark vs. a US prison) and seeking to keep as many people incarcerated as possible. Not only that, they have a huge lobby group who wine and dine congressmen and senators to ensure legislation that continues to prosecute and keep incarcerated as many people as they can.
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