Mr. Harcourt writes in two languages.  The first you have already recognized as a servic[e]able kind of American.  The second, just quoted, is the tongue indigenous to the race of college professors who inhabit Planet Tenure.  One can tease out some meaning from this tribal patois, but only with application.

James Grant, "Price and Punishment", The Wall Street Journal, Dec. 20, 2010, A21 (reviewing Bernard E. Harcourt, The Illusion of Free Markets).

Bonus:  The sentence that provoked the quote — "Neoliberal penality and its earlier iterations have fertilized the carceral sphere."