Samenvatting

Starting point in this article is the classical work of Herman Franke on the history of the Dutch prison system. Franke showed how policymakers and other people who influence prison policy and practice tried to reduce criminal behavior in the past two centuries. These attempts had various backgrounds, among which religious, sociological and biological, and varied greatly in scientifical substantiation. Every new prison policy elicited high hopes, but in practice criminal behavior was rarely pushed in the desired direction. The means of the prison system, among which staff, buildings and regime regulations, showed to be much later realized than the formulated goals established by law. Another problem that came up more than once in history was that the urge and compulsion mechanism of a new prison policy lacked support base and (agogical) skills among prison staff. Recommendations are formulated for the (near) future in favor of more successfull prison policy implementations.