Dictionary of Prisons and Punishment

Yvonne Jewkes, Jamie Bennett

• Publisher: Willan
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781843922919
• eBook ISBN: 9781134011902
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Criminology
• Index: Social Sciences

Contemporary prison practice faces many challenges, is developing rapidly and is become increasingly professionalized, influenced by the new National Offender Management Service. As well as bringing an increased emphasis on skills and qualifications it has also introduced a new set of ideas and concepts into the established prisons and penal lexicon.

At the same time courses on prisons and penology remain important components of criminology and criminal justice degree courses. This will be the essential source of reference for the increasing number of people studying in, working in prisons and working with prisoners.

This Dictionary is part a new series of dictionaries covering key aspects of criminal justice and the criminal justice system and designed to meet the needs of both students and practitioners:

• approximately 300 entries (of between 500 and 1500 words) on key terms and concepts arranged alphabetically designed to meet the needs of both students and practitioners
• entries include summary definition, main text and key texts and sources takes full account of emerging occupational and Skills for Justice criteria
• edited by a leading academic and practitioner in the prisons and penology field entries contributed by leading academic and practitioners in prisons and penology.

A

ABOLITIONISM

A term used to describe a number of positions and movements that seek to challenge the existence of prison as the answer to problems of crime. Abolitionists argue that prison has failed, is beyond reform and needs to be eradicated. They further contend that prisons sustain existing social and racial inequality and division. More broadly, abolitionism argues that crime is a social construct, a consequence of the structure of society, and it advocates the correction of the dominant culture rather than the prisoner.

Abolitionism questions the need for prison and asks whether it is the answer to protection for the public and to the problem of crime. Further, it seeks to promote a system in which crime is recognized as a social construct and in which the discourse of those supporting prison must be challenged. Thus, to refer to prisoners as ‘inmates’ and to speak of imprisonment as ‘treatment’ is to shift the focus away from the realities of prison. The Dutch abolitionist, Willem de Haan, notes that abolitionism aims for ‘compensation rather than retaliation; reconciliation rather than blame allocation’ (1991: 211).

Abolitionists argue that the traditional justifications for prison — deterrence, rehabilitation, incapacitation and retribution — do nothing more than justify the existence of institutions of pain delivery and social control. The abolitionist position contends that prisons fail those incarcerated within them and have a devastating effect on prisoners' families and friends. Fundamentally, prison abolition challenges the taken-for-granted nature of prisons' existence. Angela Davis, founder of the American abolition movement, Critical Resistance, has noted that:

people tend to take prisons for granted. It is difficult to imagine life without them. At the same time, there is a reluctance to face the realities hidden within them, a fear of thinking about what happens inside them. Thus the prison is present in our lives and, at the same time, it is absent from our lives

(2003: 15).

Abolitionism is not a monolithic term however, and some have considered it unhelpful in attempting to challenge the prison industrial complex in late modernity, allowing detractors simply to label such a movement as a longrange goal in the face of a prison crisis firmly located in the here and now. As a movement, abolitionism includes academic writers from the UK and Europe — Thomas Mathiesen, Nils Christie, Willem de Haan, Mick Ryan, Joe Sim among others — as well as activist groups such as Radical Alternatives to Prison in the UK in 1970s and 1980s and, more recently, No More Prison. In the USA, Critical Resistance is the largest abolitionist movement with ten ‘chapters’ across America.

The abolitionist movement draws a clear distinction between itself and prison reform. It contends that the notion of improvement, restructuring and/or modifying the prison is based upon the premise that prisons, fundamentally, should exist and can perform socially useful functions in a criminal justice system. Consequently, reform groups help to bolster and reinforce the prison system. In response to this position, critics of abolitionism argue that it is preferable to work with, reform and challenge existing state structures rather than attempt to remove them. This is closely linked to the accusation that abolitionists are unrealistic idealists and dreamers, preoccupied with large-scale fundamental ideologies that can never deliver tangible or practical solutions to crime in society. Often, the abolitionist is faced with the reductive argument about public safety from dangerous prisoners. The essence of such an argument is: ‘what are you going to do with the rapists and paedophiles?’

This criticism, steeped in populist mediagenerated fear, shifts the justification for prison away from fundamental questions, and from the vast majority of the crimes committed by the prison population, to a small minority of prisoners. However, and in response to feminist disquiet about male violence, abolitionists would point to the socially situated nature of dangerousness as a construct and suggest that prison as a response to such crimes does nothing more than exacerbate misogyny and hegemonic masculine culture. In countering suggestions of the impracticalities of abolitionism, and as Ryan and Sim have regularly noted, abolitionist positions have had a number of successes — for example, in forcing accountability for deaths in custody through the organization Inquest and preventing at least one new prison wing from being built.

The challenge for abolitionism in the ‘new punitive’ climate of populist punishment, screaming tabloid headlines and a crimeobsessed media ecology, is to offer radical alternatives to the failures of the present system. With politicians and publics in agreement that fundamental changes must be made to the current system, abolitionists need to carve out a space to promote such a position.

Paul Mason

Related entries

Dangerousness; Deaths in custody; Families of prisoners; New punitiveness; Public perceptions.

Key texts and sources

Davis, A. (2003) Are Prisons Obselete?. London: Open Media.

De Haan, W. (1991) ‘Abolitionism and crime control: a contradiction in terms’, in K. Stenson and D. Cowell (Eds.) The Politics of Crime Control, London: Sage.

Mathiesen, T. (2000) Prisons on Trial. Winchester: Waterside Press.

Prison Research Action Project (1976) Instead of Prisons: A Handbook for Abolitionists. Syracuse, NY: Prison Research Action Project (available online at http://www.prisonpolicy.org/
scans/instead_of_prisons).

Ryan, M. and Sim, J. (2007) ‘Campaigning for and campaigning against prisons: excavating and reaffirming the case for prison abolitition’, in Y. Jewkes (ed.) Handbook on Prisons. Cullompton: Willan.

See also the websites of No More Prison (http://www.alternatives2prisons.ik.com/) and Critical Resistance (http://www.criticalresistance.org/).

ACCOUNTABILITY

Accountability refers both to the responsibility prisons have to deliver punishment for the state — or democratic accountability — and to their responsibility for meeting standards and targets set regarding the quality and quantity of that work — operational accountability.

Accountability is important in good governance and in the legitimacy of public power. It is associated with such concepts as democracy and the rule of law. In Britain, accountability has been identified as one of the ‘seven principles of public life’ by the Committee on Standards in Public Life. Accountability may come in two forms: democratic accountability and operational accountability.

Democratic accountability concerns the authority to punish. Some people argue that punishment is the quintessential function of government. To delegate this task impoverishes the public sphere and weakens the bond between citizen and state. Others argue that a distinction can be made between the allocation of punishment (which, under social contract theory, is one of the core state powers) and the administration of punishment (which is not a core power and can therefore be delegated).

However, the devil of this is in the detail. How exactly does one distinguish between the allocation and administration of punishment? Does the allocation of punishment begin and end in the court? Are prisons only concerned with the administration of punishment? Arguably not, when one considers adjudications, parole reports, sentence planning and categorization. All these affect prisoners' experience of imprisonment and may be seen as part of the allocation and not simply the administration of punishment. A contemporary concern is how far the authority to punish can be delegated to the private sector before democratic accountability is undermined (Harding 1997; Genders 2002).

Operational accountability concerns the administration of punishment. Prisons operate within a legal framework that derives from the Prison Act 1952. Section 47 of the Act allows the Secretary of State to issue more detailed Prison Rules. Prisons must also comply with legal requirements, including health and safety, employment, race relations and data protection.

Other mechanisms exist to promote good governance in prisons, including HM Inspectorate of Prisons and the independent monitoring boards, which provide independent, external scrutiny. The move to new public management in the 1990s saw the introduction of additional mechanisms of operational accountability, including audit, key performance indicators and key performance targets. In the case of contracted-out prisons, supplementary means of accountability compensate for the fact that they are not under the direct line management of the public sector. The main additional mechanisms for ensuring the accountability of private sector prisons are through the contract and through the Home Office Controller, whose duty to monitor and to report to the Secretary of State derives from the Criminal Justice Act 1991 (s. 85).

Advocates of the privatization of prisons argue that the separation of the day-to-day administration of prisons from the state's supervisory responsibilities leads to an enhanced system of accountability and higher standards of service. An alternative view is that this separation of functions removes public accountability from the private sector, and this is what enables it to cut corners in pursuit of efficiency and increased profits.

Elaine Genders

Related entries

HM Inspectorate of Prisons, Independent monitoring boards; Legitimacy; New public management (NPM); Performance management; Power; Privatization.

Key texts and sources

Genders, E. (2002) ‘Legitimacy, accountability and private prisons’, Punishment and Society, 4: 285–303.

Harding, R. (1997) Private Prisons and Public Accountability. Buckingham: Open University Press.

ACTIVITIES

Prisons provide a range of activities for prisoners, including activities that are considered ‘purposeful’ because they provide some benefit in terms of health, well-being and personal development or in reducing reoffending.

Prisons provide a range of activities for prisoners in custody. These include recreational activities, association with other prisoners and what are classified as ‘purposeful’ activities. Keeping prisoners engaged in activity is important for their individual well-being, to help reduce reoffending, for managing security and for manitaining order and control. The amount of time spent in these activities is monitored and recorded. Each establishment has key performance targets for the amount of time each prisoner spends on average in purposeful activity and the amount of time prisoners are unlocked on average each day.

HM Prison Service groups purposeful activities under four headings: work, education, resettlement and other. Work covers all forms of prison industries and employment in other areas, such as catering, farms and gardens, and cleaning. Education covers assessment and teaching, and physical education. Resettlement covers such issues as sentence planning, offending behaviour programmes, work to tackle problems with drugs, bullying and self-harm. This heading also includes visits and temporary release. The ‘other’ category includes health promotion, religion and voluntary work. Activities that are also recorded but that are not considered ‘purposeful’ include exercise, association, medical treatment, drug testing, legal visits and time visiting court.

Prisons have not performed well in terms of the level of purposeful activity over the last ten years. In 1994–5, almost 26 activity hours were achieved per prisoner per week. However, this steadily declined until it reached 23.2 hours per prisoner per week in 2003–4. During that period, the national target was missed for eight consecutive years (HM Prison Service 2004). In 2004–5, this was dropped as a national target and, as a result, figures are now only reported for each individual prison. The level of purposeful activity hours varies across different prisons. Local prisons generally have the lowest levels of activity. For example, in 2005–6 the prison with the lowest reported hours was a local prison, Pentonville, with 13.3 hours per prisoner per week. High-security prisons also generally have lower levels of activity due to security restrictions. Training prisons have a higher level of activity, although it is open prisons that have the highest. For example, in 2005–6 the highest reported hours were at Latchmere House, an open prison, with 58.6 hours per prisoner per week.

HM Inspectorate of Prisons assesses purposeful activity as part of its ‘healthy prison’ criteria. It describes a healthy prison as one which provides prisoners with access to activities that are likely to benefit them, although it distinguishes this from resettlement, which covers activities aimed at preparing prisoners for release and at reducing reoffending. For HM Chief Inspector of Prisons, purposeful activity includes education, library access, physical exercise, health promotion, work, religious activities and association. Its perspective is more qualitative and it has frequently criticized the recording of purposeful activity hours and the activities that are included — in particular, the high level of employment in domestic cleaning.

In summary, activities are an important and potentially beneficial aspect of prison life. However, access varies across different prisons, activity hours have declined and the focus on quantity has sometimes been at the cost of quality.

Jamie Bennett

Related entries

Education and training; Employment and industries; Farms and gardens; HM Inspectorate of Prisons; Offending behaviour programmes.

Key texts and sources

HM Prison Service (2003) Regime Monitoring Guidance Notes, 2003–04 (PSO 7100). Lond...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Full Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of entries
• List of contributors
• About this book
• Introduction and overview
• Prisons and punishment timeline
• Dictionary of Prisons and Punishment
• List of references
• Index