The Argument The Scientific Method Comes for Criminal Justice
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Feb 17, 2026 Jennifer Doleac, an economist focused on criminal justice reform and author of The Science of Second Chances, discusses treating crime policy as an empirical problem. She covers causal inference and cost-benefit analysis, controversies around evidence-driven research, DNA databases and recidivism, certainty versus severity of punishment, privacy trade-offs with surveillance, and pragmatic incremental reforms.
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Pushback After Naloxone Study
- Jennifer Doleac faced heavy pushback after a study showing naloxone access alone didn't reduce long-term overdose deaths.
- Critics feared the result would undermine life-saving interventions despite its nuanced policy implication.
DNA Databases Cut Recidivism
- DNA databases increase the chance of getting caught and reduce recidivism, especially for younger offenders.
- Natural experiments show adding arrested felons to databases can cut reoffending substantially.
Certainty Trumps Severity
- Certainty of punishment matters far more than sentence length for many offenders.
- Increasing near-term detection and consequences changes behavior faster than longer sentences do.
