Consciousness, Solidarity and Hope as Prevention and Rehabilitation

Abstract

This paper grapples with the question of how progressive criminologists might approach working with people who have committed violent or predatory crimes, or are 'at risk' of doing so. Progressives have often been uneasy about 'intervention' with people who offend: but in the face of the destructiveness of violence, especially in some parts of the world, a posture of simple non-intervention won't suffice. I suggest three central principles -which I call consciousness, solidarity and hope -that may guide us in developing ways of working with offenders that are both progressive and effective.

Against evidence-based oppression: Marginalized youth and the politics of risk-based assessment and intervention

“…Or, they can learn to deal with oppressive social conditions in ways that make them less likely to hurt themselves and others. While managing that risk may be a somewhat reasonable goal, if our interventions aspire for nothing more than this then they remain out of line with our best impulses as a discipline (Currie, 2013) and in line with a troubling, racialized history of conformist interventions in US juvenile justice (Cox, 2015a).…”

“…In his seminal work, Dark Ghetto , Clark (1965: 78, emphasis in original) observed the oppressive nature of welfarism in 1960s Harlem, noting how, too often, social workers saw their job as helping their client “adjust” to “life realities”—to better endure human suffering, without lashing out or self-destructing—“and thereby to function more effectively within the continuing pathology of his society”. While there may exist some meaningful differences in the logics and verbiage surrounding the specific “adjustment” techniques used today versus 50 years ago, both serve as examples of what Elliott Currie (2013: 5) terms “conformist intervention”: Conformist intervention is about getting people to accept the typically bleak conditions of life that have put them at risk, or turned them into “offenders”, in the first place. As a corollary, it teaches them to locate the source of their problems mainly, if not entirely, in themselves.…”

Punishment and Democratic Theory

“…29 In our view, such an extension of penal theory offers grounds for questioning the democratic credentials of a society that punishes its citizens in the way that the American polity currently does. Quite a few criminologists in the United States and elsewhere have taken steps in these directions, 32 sometimes in alliance with progressive administrators and practitioners, and those parties need to be both supported and challenged by democratic theory.…”

Potential Partnerships: Progressive Criminology, Grassroots Organizations and Social Justice

“…These organizations design and implement programs animated by social justice values, thus putting into practice the implications of critical scholarship. While many mainstream criminologists in the US devote their careers to program development and evaluation, progressive criminologists remain relatively silent on what less harmful approaches to youth crime prevention and intervention ought to look like, or how the success of these programs ought to be measured (Currie 2013b). Although many (though certainly not all) of these organizations frame their work as 'crime prevention' or 'rehabilitation', rather than partnering with criminologists, organizations work with scholars in youth development, education and social work, and other disciplines with traditions of scholar-activist projects that take seriously the considerable knowledge base of community-based organizations and other so-called 'non-experts'.…”