Due to the complex nature of prisons and the many purposes they serve, it is difficult to create a prison performance measurement which would encompass both the complexity and multitude of purposes and interests. In the book, Prison Performance: Laying the Groundwork to Compare Public and Private Prisons, co-authored by Gerald Gaes, Scott Camp, Julianne Nelson, and William Saylor, these are some of the questions raised. This article is a chronological presentation of the book’s contents. The book is divided into 12 chapters. Chapter 1 discusses the purpose of prison. Chapters 2, 3, 4 and 5 examine different ways prison jurisdictions can monitor prison performance by focusing on numerous approaches that have been used by a variety of jurisdictions. Chapters 6 and 7 examine the costing of government services and some of the economic theory behind the assumed efficiencies in prison privatization. In chapter 8, the possibility of making performance measurement comparisons across jurisdictions is raised. Chapter 9 returns to the measurement of recidivism. In chapter 10, all the ideas from the previous chapters are reviewed to show how one can measure all of the prison functions. Chapter 11 shows how prison performance fits into the larger framework of government performance and accountability. Lastly, the final chapter summarizes the major themes of the book and the agenda for the future.