Transcript Interpreting responses to crime and crime policy

Professor Paul Senior
Director,
Hallam Centre for Community Justice,
Sheffield Hallam University,
Sheffield, UK.
 Consider
the question ‘what is criminology’?
 The relationship between research, policy
and practice
 Understanding the ‘crowded’ arena of policy
making
 Explore the case example of ‘reducing reoffending’ as a core goal of modern crime
policy
 Lessons for policy and practice - policy-based
evidence or evidence-based policy?

What is criminology?

‘criminology seeks to generalise on the basis of evidence. It is therefore
neither purely deductive nor purely descriptive; theorisation needs both to
guide the collection of data and to be grounded in evidence. Similarly,
interpretation of data has to be guided by theorisation’ Subject benchmark
statements Criminology 2007 QAA 171 03/07


Booming yet divided and fragmented?


The vitality of the discipline also requires a continuous interchange
between theory and analytic and evaluative research, and attention to
increasingly salient ethical debates about crime, security, and human
rights at international, national, regional and local levels. (ibid 3.5)
Criminology can be seen as a rendezvous discipline, a site at which
social scientific disciplines interact. (ibid Appendix C)
Differing types of division
Disciplinary
Theoretical
 Methodological
 Subject matter


contested and often contentious discipline
which is very likely to reflect current social,
political and public disputes (ibid 6.2)
biology
psychology
Law/socio-legal
studies
sociology
•Geography
•History
•Health/forensic
•Environmental
•media
psychopathology
penology
victimology
bodies of evidence are often consistent
with alternative interpretations embodied
in rival theoretical perspectives. (ibid 6.2)
Neo-classical
Marxist
Positivist
•Control theories
•Social
disorganization
•Conflict
•Labelling
•feminist
Administrative
Critical
Developmental
range of different strategies and methods and use appropriate
research tools in relation to criminological problems, including
quantitative, qualitative and evaluative techniques (ibid 7.3)
Quantitative
Maryland Scale
Qualitative
Mixed methods
Crime, victimisation and responses to crime and deviance
Local, national and
international contexts
different stages and agencies of the criminal
justice process
the causes and
organisation of crime and
deviance
official and unofficial
responses to crime,
deviance and social harm
processes of preventing
and managing crime and
victimisation
the administration of
sentences and of
alternative responses to
offending incl. offender
management and offender
rehabilitation
An understanding of the
social and historical
development of
punishment including
courts and hearings for
adults and young people
representations of crime,
offenders, victims and
agents and agencies of
control
social and historical
development of public
policing
social divisions and social diversity
such as age, gender, social class,
race and ethnicity
crime, security, and human
rights
the use of discretion in
relation to justice processes
understanding of contested
values in the constitution and
application of criminological
knowledge
role of non-governmental
agencies
Adapted from Subject benchmarks for Criminology
‘In addition, and increasingly, professional criminologists and graduates
are being called upon to advise and inform the work of crime control
agencies: from preventing youth offending to advising the prison service
about deaths in custody; from the role of the police in community safety
teams to the structure and functioning of the people trade; from how to
count family violence to how to prevent it; from institutional racism to
the management of diversity. Criminology must develop in its own way to
meet these challenges of the twenty-first century’ (ibid Appendix C)
Research
and
Theory
Policy
networks
Ideology
and
Politics
Key
Influences
on the
Policy
Process
Public
Opinion
Penal
Lobby
Official
Advice
•European Community Sanctions
network
•Legislative changes
•Key stakeholder groups
Policy
networks
Ideology
and
Politics
•‘Law and order’
•‘tough on crime….’
•‘Big Society’
Research
and
Theory
•Penal reform groups
•Unions
•Professional associations
Key
Influences
on the
Policy
Process
Public
Opinion
Penal
Lobby
•Civil servants
•Govt research depts.
•Select Committees
Official
Advice
•Media
•Public enquiries
•Infamous cases
Defining the Problem
Problem
Issue
Trigger
Event
Initiation
Formulation
Finding
Alternatives/
Solutions
Placement
on Agenda
Evaluating
Alternatives
Selecting from
Alternatives
Evaluation
Implementation
Feedback
Impact of Policy
The varied foci, complexity and heterogeneity of
criminological research and theory makes
simplistic solutions problematic
 Research and theory is only one element of the
decision making process
 In recent periods in neo-liberal societies in
particular public opinion, has had a distinct sway
 The policy cycle occurs in real time
 Each element of the cycle overlaps
 The limitations of policy transfer between
differing jurisdictions often underplayed
 Financial tsunami has begun to dictate policy
responses


The ‘rational comprehensive’ v ‘bureau-incrementalist’ model

‘rational decision-making involves the selection of the alternative
which will maximise the decision-maker’s values, the selection being
made following a comprehensive analysis of alternatives and their
consequences’

YET incrementalists argue:

lack of correspondence between what is intended and the actual
outcome

Powerful, sometimes unknown, contradictory and conflicting forces
intervene

Policy makers inherit a given situation which they change
incrementally

Policy process is ‘serial in nature’ - multiple gradual changes

Problem 'shifting’ rather than ‘problem solving’

Small-scale institutional adaptations based on pragmatism,
accommodation of interests, money

Essentially conservative and dedicated to maintaining the status
quo

Implementation of policy may bring change and policy drift – the
impact of the ‘street level bureaucrat’ (Lipsky, 1980)

Discretionary relationships between legislation and regulation

Policy can be top-down or bottom-up


Impact of non-decision making


E.g. What Works drive in UK
“power is … exercised when A devotes his energies to creating or
reinforcing social and political values and institutional practices that
limit the scope of the political process to public consideration of only
those issues which are comparatively innocuous” (Bachrach and Baratz,
1963)
Hierarchy of evidence

‘the privileging of particular bodies of ‘evidence’ and, conversely, the
negation of ‘inconvenient evidence’ (Goldson, 2010)

Reducing re-offending is a theme of international interest and
concern
Big focus in last 20 years on identifying ‘What Works’ - identifying and
accrediting CBT programmes and their impact
 Context of Public Safety – assessment and management of risk and public
protection
 Recognition too that there are key dynamic risk factors family,
accommodation, education, employment, drug and alcohol counseling,
mental health support, debt advice impacting on re-offending (SEU, 2002)






Dominated by psychological and quantitative research analyses
Policy implementation inevitably finds gaps/questions concerning
effective offender rehabilitation
Less focus on the way programmes of intervention might fit into
an integrated, holistic solution which reintegrates offenders back
into society –
Driven more by social policy context and qualitative analysis
The policy context thus is complex…………
Acknowledge
the work of
Fergus
McNeill
Social
Context
Interventions
Offender
Organisational
Context
Desister
Relationships
and Staff
Skills


3 discernible ‘schools’ or perspectives in the literature:

Those that focus on the significance of aging and/or maturation in desistance (e.g.
Gluecks 1940; 1943; 1950; 1968; 1974; Gottfredson and Hirschi, 1990: 136)

Those that focus on the significance of social bonds and informal social control
(social capital) across the life course in desistance (e.g. Laub, Sampson and Nagin,
1998; Sampson and Laub, 1993)

Those that focus on the significance of subjectivities in desistance including how
individuals’ interpret life events and changes in an individual’s narratively
constructed self-identity (e.g. Giordano et al.,2002; Liebrich, 1993; Maruna, 2001)
Most scholars now stress the interplay of these three dimensions ; “the
‘objective’ and ‘subjective’ aspects of pathways to desistance interact in
complex ways” (McNeill and Weaver, 2010: 18)

‘desistance resides somewhere in the interfaces between developing personal maturity,
changing social bonds associated with certain life transitions, and the individual subjective
narrative constructions which offenders build around these key events and changes. It is
not just the events and changes that matter; it is what these events and changes mean to
the people involved’
18

Complex processes, not events, characterised by ambivalence and
vacillation

Involves re-biography, re-storying, telling the story of yourself
differently, changing narrative identity so that's more than simply
learning new skills.

Prompted by life events, depending on the meaning of those events
for the offender; inherently subjective, hence individualised,
sensitive to difference/diversity

No homogenous theory of change here, there's no simple answer or
recipe for desistance because it's inherently subjective and individual.

The process, the journey can be solicited or sustained by somebody
‘believing in’ the offender or prevented maybe by someone giving up.
Adapted from McNeill (2010)
19

the discovery of agency is a significant and necessary aspect of the journey

Requires social capital (opportunities) as well as human capital
(capacities/skills)

Certified through ‘redemption’ or restoration; finding purpose in
generative activities [constructive reparation ] (Maruna, 2011)

Construct a network of reciprocity around the offender

Need to maintain focus and have a clear agenda and a clear plan for the
journey

you can desist by default or by accident – stuff just happens and in the
course of a life the stuff that happens sets you on a journey which just
takes you in a different direction
Adapted from McNeill (2010)
20
21
Motivation
(Counsellor)
Capacities
(Human
Capital)
Interventions
Opportunities
(Social Capital)
Social Networks
and supports
Adapted from McNeill (2010)
Eight Principles for Supporting Desistance in Criminal Justice
(Weaver and
McNeill, 2007)

Be realistic


Favour informal approaches


New attitudes towards offender reintegration
Mind our language


One-size-fits-all interventions run the risk of fitting no-one
Recognise the significance of social contexts


Recognize the huge significance of good relational practices
Respect individuality


Lose social ties and contamination influences
Build positive relationships


Intervene only when necessary particularly with young people
Use prisons sparingly


Lapses and relapses will occur
Negative labeling reduces reintegration – practice ‘reintegrative shaming’ (Braithwaite)
Promote ‘redemption’

Signal redemption and reinclusion into wider society

Tonry (2003) raises the key challenge for policy makers:

‘the important question ... is whether policy making gives goodfaith consideration to the credible systematic evidence that is
available, or whether it disregards it entirely for reasons of
ideology or political self-interest’.

Goldson (2010) reviewing youth justice policy in UK sees
the relationship in this way:

There is now a huge body of evidence concerning reducing
re-offending can it avoid the rupture Goldson attests is
happening in youth justice………………



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

Criminological insights should help produce a more informed policy
agenda
Its own inherent complexity and internal fragmentation by
discipline, method, theory and subject matter will produce disputed
solutions and directions for change
The policy arena is crowded and contested and other players have
as much right to be heard as criminologists
The policy arena is multi-layered – policy drift occurs producing
incremental change at different levels/times in the real-life process
Do not be surprised if the outcomes are contradictory and lead to
unintended outcomes (maybe good or not so good!)
It is arguable to assume we have policy-based evidence rather than
evidence-based policy
But to ignore growing research evidence would be folly you
need to make it work for you
 in a world where public expenditure is often threatened and cut and
 use evidence where it works in for particular policy situations

Bachrach and Baratz (1963) ‘Decisions and Nondecisions: An Analytical Framework’ in The
American Political Science Review Vol. 57, No. 3, Sep.,
Farrall, S. (2002) Rethinking What Works with Offenders. Probation, social context
and desistance from crime. Cullompton: Willan.
Giordano, P.C., Cernokovich, S.A, Rudolph, J. L (2002) ‘Gender, Crime and
Desistance: Toward a Theory of Cognitive Transformation’, American Journal of
Sociology, 107: 990-1064
Glueck, S. and Glueck. E. (1940) Juvenile delinquents grow up. New York:
Commonwealth Fund.
Glueck, S. and Glueck, E. (1943) Criminal Careers in Retrospect. New York:
Commonwealth Fund.
Glueck, S. and Glueck E. (1950) Unravelling Juvenile Delinquency. New York:
Commonwealth Fund.
Glueck, S. and Glueck, E. (1968) Delinquents and Nondelinquents in Perspective.
Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Glueck, S. and Glueck, E. (1974) Of Delinquency and Crime. Springfield, Ill.:
Charles C. Thomas.
Gottfredson, M. and Hirschi, T. (1990) A general theory of crime. Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press.
Goldson B (2010) The sleep of (criminological) reason: Knowledge–policy rupture and New
Labour’s youth justice legacy in Criminology & Criminal Justice 10(1) 155–178
Liebrich, J. (1993) Straight to the Point: Angles On Giving Up Crime. Otago, New
Zealand: University of Otago Press.
Lipsky, M., (1980) Street-level Bureaucracy; Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Services,
McNeill, F and Weaver, B. (2010) ‘Changing Lives? Desistance Research and
Offender Management’, Report NO. 03/2010, The Scottish Centre for Crime and
Justice Research, Glasgow School of Social Work.
Maruna, S. (2001) Making Good. How Ex-Convicts Reform and Rebuild Their Lives.
Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Maruna S (2011) ‘Judicial Rehabilitation and the ‘Clean Bill of Health’ in Criminal
Justice’ European Journal of Probation, Vol. 3, No.1, 2011, pp 97 – 117
Sampson, R.J. and Laub, J. (1993) Crime in the making: Pathways and turning points
through life. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Social Exclusion Unit (2002) Reducing Re-Offending SEU
Subject benchmark statements Criminology 2007 QAA 171 03/07
http://www.qaa.ac.uk/academicinfrastructure/benchmark/statements/Criminology07.asp
Tonry M (2003) ‘Evidence, Elections and Ideology in the Making of Criminal Justice Policy’, in M.
Tonry (ed.) Confronting Crime: Crime Control Policy under New Labour. Cullompton: Willan.
Ward, T and Maruna, S. (2007) Rehabilitation. London: Routledge.
Weaver B and McNeill F (2007) Giving Up Crime: Directions For Policy SCCCJ