Women Prisoners and the Drive for Desistance: Capital and Responsibilization as a Barrier to Change

Abstract

Abstract:There is a significant and growing volume of research into the way in which offenders desist from crime, their resettlement and re-entry into society following a custodial sentence. As is too often the case in criminological research, women are underrepresented in these areas of investigation. This research aimed to investigate how women in the last three months of a prison sentence plan and prepare for their release. Using data generated from qualitative interviews with women prisoners and prison staff over a 13 month period in a closed women's prison in England, this paper will argue that women prisoners have motivation and desire to desist from crime post release but their attempts to plan for release are hindered by a responsibilisation discourse that runs throughout the institution and by a severe lack in all forms of capital (social, cultural, economic and symbolic). This not only results in many women being released with little support in place to help them achieve their aims of a crime free life in the future but also highlights the problems with a prison system based on male centred knowledge.

Good Intentions: Women’s Narratives of Post-Release Anticipatory Desistance in the Context of Historical and Contemporary Disadvantage and Trauma

“…The accumulation of severe trauma and disadvantage over the life course had a significant impact on the women's post-release pathways, in particular their inability to integrate into the mainstream community. It has been acknowledged previously that following imprisonment most individuals do not return to the mainstream community (Hart, 2017;Wacquant, 2010). The enduring and persistent nature of marginality for the women in this study demonstrates that they were not reintegrating into the mainstream following incarceration but rather were reintegrating into exclusiona concept that may serve to broaden the existing discourse to reflect the complex reality of returning for many formerly incarcerated persons, not just women.…”

“…Not only does incarceration punish the individual for what is a health problem, it is also an ineffectual mechanism to address the trauma and disadvantage that often underlies such addiction. It is unsurprising, then, that imprisonment impedes desistance from crime, a point to be emphasized through a critical approach to desistance theorizing (Hart, 2017).…”

“…Representing a critical feminist approach to understanding desistance is an emerging body of work focused on the structural conditions of women's criminalization and desistance (Barr, 2019;Barr & Christian, 2019;Hart, 2017;Hart & Van Ginneken, 2017;Österman, 2018). Bearing witness to the detrimental impacts of gendered disadvantage and trauma, Hart (2017) explored how 19 women serving prison sentences of 3 years or more in England prepared for life on the outside, finding that inadequacy of all forms of capital impeded the ability of the women to engage with resettlement services, hampering their chances of desisting long-term.…”

“…In the imagining of future possible worlds (Bruner, 1986), narratives can reveal the goals that individuals seek to accomplish and the strategies they intend to employ to achieve them (McAdams, 1996). As such, narratives have emerged as a useful tool in studying desistance, enabling researchers to disentangle the meaning of relationships, events, and experiences for male offenders (Maruna, 2001;Maruna & Farrall, 2004;Halsey, 2008) and more recently for criminalized women (Barr, 2019;Hart, 2017;Österman, 2018).…”

Zelfredzaamheid in detentie

“…Onder gedetineerden is de motivatie om een 'normaal' leven te leiden vaak wel aanwezig, maar ontbreekt het -zeker na vrijlating -vaak aan kansen en sociaal en economisch kapitaal om deze wens te realiseren. 42 Nadruk op zelfstandigheid en eigen verantwoordelijkheid zonder baankans of ondersteuning bij problemen kan hierdoor leiden tot frustratie en averechtse effecten. Een LVB hangt ook samen met een beperkt zelfredzaam vermogen.…”