One of the arguments against using efficiency as a measure of corrective reform was explored by Heather (1978) in his analysis of theories about criminal behavior. Efficiency theories, according to Heather, ignore human agency. They are free from an obligation to examine or to influence a change in social conditions; they need not change their stance; and their concept is not the concept of mutual interaction and communication. Rather, efficiency theories represent scientific utopianism that spurns that status and rights of the criminal. Discussions about the efficiency of prisons result in arguing in a circle that encompasses rehabilitation proposals and increased crime rates. Between these extremes stand ideas about punishment as diverse as justice models to deterrence, all for the good of the individual and the system. The appropriate question that should inform corrections policy is not "What works?" but rather "What current treatment of prisoners is morally justified?" We lack criteria for the morality of prison procedures. Current values speak of punishment-oriented social systems in which there is no room for contemplating our attitudes. The substance of new values is the persecution of others and hostility toward all those who are not like us. Apparently those who shape current penal policy do not remember what rehabilitation ideology represents. It was a policy free of abuse that sought to treat delinquents by creating communication between staff and inmates. It was a practice that constantly examined its assumptions. The creation of penal policy for the 21st century must create institutions based upon a moral justification for the treatment of delinquents. A 21-item bibliography