By Brandon Burley of Burley Books and The Redemption Project
Over the last year, I’ve spent a lot of time listening to people who live on the margins of the criminal justice system—formerly incarcerated men and women, reentry leaders, correctional staff, policymakers, and community organizations trying to do something that sounds simple but isn’t:
Reduce recidivism in a way that actually lasts.
That work led to a new article I’m grateful to have published this week in Governing:
This piece is different from many of the “success story” narratives we tend to rely on.
It’s not about a single program.
It’s not about one charismatic leader.
And it’s not about short-term wins.
It’s about systems.
Specifically, how certain reentry models succeed not because they’re flashy or expensive, but because they combine structure, accountability, community, and long-term investment in people after incarceration.
A few themes I explore in the article:
• Why recidivism isn’t just a corrections problem; it’s a community one
• What scalable reentry actually looks like (and what it doesn’t)
• Why employment alone isn’t enough without identity, support, and accountability
• How faith-based and secular models often overlap more than we admit
• What policymakers miss when they focus only on rearrest rates
Much of this reporting is informed by conversations you’ve already seen reflected in The Redemption Project—stories from East Tennessee and beyond, where transformation didn’t happen quickly or cleanly, but it did happen consistently.
One of the biggest takeaways from this work is this:
Recidivism doesn’t decline because we punish better.
It declines when we walk with people longer.
That requires patience, coordination, and humility; three things public systems are not always built for, but absolutely capable of when the right incentives and partnerships are in place.
If you’ve been following the redemption stories, this article zooms out and asks the harder question:
What would it look like to design policy that assumes people can change and plans accordingly?
If you read it, I’d love to hear what stood out to you, what you agreed with, and where you think the blind spots still are.