Architects / Designers / Planners for Social Responsibility

Established in 1981, ADPSR works for peace, environmental protection, ecological building, social justice and the development of healthy communities.

ADPSR has organized a Prison Design Boycott Campaign, featuring a poster design competition to explain the problems with the current U.S. prison system, and why the refusal to contribute to it is an important and effective response. Featured in this issue are the winning entry and the two runners-up.

It Is Time To Stop Building Prisons

Our prison system is both a devastating moral blight on our society and an overwhelming economic burden on our tax dollars, taking away much needed resources from schools, health care and affordable housing. The prison system is corrupting our society and making us more threatened, rather than protecting us as its proponents claim. It is a system built on fear, racism, and the exploitation of poverty. Our current prison system has no place in a society that aspires to liberty, justice, and equality for all.

As architects, we are responsible for one of the most expensive parts of the prison system, the construction of new prison buildings. Almost all of us would rather be using our professional skills to design positive social institutions such as universities or playgrounds, but these institutions lack funding because of spending on prisons. If we would rather design schools and community centers, we must stop building prisons.

Please join members of Architects / Designers / Planners for Social Responsibility (ADPSR) in pledging to not participate in the design, construction, or renovation of prisons. We also invite you to learn more about the prison system, to join us in envisioning more just and productive alternatives to incarceration, and to work towards a society that treats all its members with dignity, equality, and justice.

As of July 26, 2006, 614 professionals have signed the ADPSR pledge. If you work in these industries, and would like to pledge your support, see: www.adpsr.org/prisons/form_individual.htm