The Future of Correctional Rehabilitation

Moving Beyond the RNR Model and Good Lives Model Debate

Ronen Ziv

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781138095960
• eBook ISBN: 9781351601313
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Criminology
• Index: Social Sciences

In the aftermath of Martinson's 1974 "nothing works" doctrine, scholars have made a concerted effort to develop an evidence-based corrections theory and practice to show "what works" to change offenders. Perhaps the most important contribution to this effort was made by a group of Canadian psychologists, most notably Donald Andrews, James Bonta, and Paul Gendreau, who developed a treatment paradigm called the Risk-Need-Responsivity (RNR) model, which became the dominant theory of correctional treatment. This approach was more recently challenged by a perspective developed by Tony Ward, Shadd Maruna, and others, called the Good Lives Model (GLM). Based in part on desistance research and positive psychology, this model proposes to rehabilitate offenders by building on the strengths offenders possess. GLM proponents see the RNR model as a deficit model that fixes dynamic risk factors rather than identifying what offenders value most, and using these positive factors to pull them out of crime.

Through a detailed examination of both models' theoretical and correctional frameworks, The Future of Correctional Rehabilitation: Moving Beyond the RNR Model and Good Lives Model Debate probes the extent to which the models offer incompatible or compatible approaches to offender treatment, and suggests how to integrate the RNR and GLM approaches to build a new and hopefully more effective vision for offender treatment. A foreword by renowned criminologist Francis T. Cullen helps put the material into context. This book will be of much interest to scholars and students studying correctional rehabilitation as well as practitioners working with offenders.

Part I
Beyond Nothing Works

1
The Rise and Fall of the Rehabilitative Ideal

Since the founding of the penitentiary nearly two centuries ago, American corrections has been marked by the belief that offenders should not only be punished but also rehabilitated. This uplifting belief reflected Americans’ wide agreement that rehabilitation should benefit both the public and the individual offenders, and bolstered by their confidence in the state’s capacity to attain this goal. Starting in the late 1960s, however, ongoing social unrest in American social and political institutions triggered a deep challenge to the ideological hegemony of rehabilitation. At that time, both conservative and liberal scholars asserted that correctional rehabilitation had reached a dead end—that it did not work—and they joined forces to eliminate offender treatment as a guiding principle of the correctional system.

This concerted attack involved tempting reasons against the theoretical assumptions of rehabilitation and its manifestation in the correctional system. Scholars argued, for example, that rehabilitation is a futile theory because it is based on the assumption that the roots of crime lay in individual defects rather than in the defects of an inequitable social structure. In addition, scholars looked inside the correctional system and concluded that state officials were no longer committed to the rehabilitative ideal. Thus, by the mid-1970s, American scholars had closed ranks to attack corrections as a system that was both ineffective and unjust.

In a classic 1974 essay, Robert Martinson summarized the results of a comprehensive review of 231 studies evaluating rehabilitation programs. The dismal findings led him to question whether “nothing works” in corrections to reform offenders. This widely read and cited work provided critics with scientific confirmation that their loss of faith in rehabilitation was justified. His research project equipped policy makers and criminologists with a very rational reason to reject rehabilitation—correctional interventions cannot demonstrate success in changing offenders’ behavior. Despite the dark future that Martinson’s article cast on the field of correctional rehabilitation, his “nothing works doctrine” came with a silver lining. The status of offender treatment was now a matter of evidence. For rehabilitation to regain its legitimacy, advocates would have to produce scientific data showing that programs could reduce recidivism.

In the aftermath of the Martinson article, few scholars in the United States were inclined to embark on this task (see Cullen, 2005). However, a critical challenge to the “nothing works doctrine” would come from north of the border. Since the 1970s, a group of Canadian psychologists—most notably the late Donald Andrews, James Bonta, and Paul Gendreau—had worked across both university and correctional settings to design effective programming. Viewing themselves “scientist practitioners” (p. 15), they collaborated in the development of a theoretical framework that aimed to explain, predict, and influence criminal behavior. During the 1980s, they continued their scientific journey to demarcate the theoretical, empirical, and practical bases for intervening effectively with offenders. In the early 1990s, these Canadian scholars had accumulated sufficient research to propose a general correctional framework—a set of testable principles for correctional interventions designed to reduce reoffending (see Andrews & Bonta, 1994). Since then, their theoretical approach and recommended correctional practices have developed into a powerful treatment paradigm—the Risk-Need-Responsivity model. It is most often referred to by its acronym, the “RNR” model.

By the early 2000s, consensus grew that the RNR model had advanced the status of correctional rehabilitation and became the dominant theory of offender treatment (Ogloff & Davis, 2004). Nonetheless, a group of mostly non-American scholars questioned the RNR model’s underlying theoretical premises. Based in part on desistance research and positive psychology, Tony Ward, Shadd Maruna, and others criticized the RNR model for using recidivism as its major measure of success while neglecting offenders’ general well-being. They contended that any treatment model must include this essential psychological outcome. These scholars also criticized the RNR model for focusing on what was wrong with offenders—deficits or “criminogenic needs” that should be fixed—rather than on what was right with offenders—their strengths—and how these positive characteristics could be used to achieve reform (see Ward & Maruna, 2007). They also argued that beyond assessing the risks individuals posed, therapists should give priority to identifying what offenders want from their rehabilitative process and how to help them attain their “good life.” These ideas coalesced into form an increasingly popular alternative framework for correctional rehabilitation, which Ward and colleagues called the Good Lives Model. It is now known by its acronym, the “GLM.”

Taking together, advocates of the RNR model and GLM provide a broad outlook on the boundaries of offender treatment and enrich the field of correctional rehabilitation with two legitimate approaches to conducting interventions. The chapters that follow, describe the development and content of each of these treatment paradigms, and then detail the nature of the debate between the RNR and GLM approaches. This debate has raised important questions about the purpose of changing convicted offenders’ behavior offenders through planned interventions and how to achieve this outcomes. Although often portrayed as rival and incompatible perspectives, the argument is made that they can also be considered as models that should be integrated. This book sets forth a conceptual integration of these models and ends with thoughts on the future of correctional rehabilitation.

As a prelude to this analysis, Part I provides an overview of the emergence and impact of the rehabilitative ideal. Within this overview, four historical periods are identified—the rehabilitative ideal’s discovery, dominance, decline, and reaffirmation. Chapter 1 presents the first three historical periods. First, this discussion highlights how, during the 1800s, the rehabilitative ideal was discovered and developed. Thoughts of how best to reform offenders changed from a belief in the curative powers of the internal regimen of the prison to the view that the unique criminogenic circumstances of each offender must be treated individually. Second, the rehabilitative ideal then became the dominant correctional ideology, shaping the development of the criminal justice and juvenile justice systems and being consolidated with the rise of modern “corrections.” Third, in a sudden reversal, the rehabilitative ideal came under withering attack during the late 1970s—notably not only from conservatives but also from liberals. In 1974, Robert Martinson published a classic essay in which he challenged the effectiveness of correctional treatment. This essay solidified the idea that “nothing works” to change offenders. At this point, the rehabilitative ideal was in steep decline (Allen, 1981; Cullen & Gilbert, 1982).

The Discovery of the Rehabilitative Ideal

As Rothman (1971) has documented, the origins of the rehabilitative ideal in the United States extend to the 1820s. Reformers in New York and Pennsylvania developed prisons—which they called penitentiaries—intended not to punish offenders but to rehabilitate them. According to Rothman, these institutions were created in response to a changing social context that resulted in new ideas about the causes of criminal conduct.

By the 1820s, the United States experienced unprecedented urban and economic growth, followed by social and geographical mobility. Americans viewed these social changes as a process that imposed a real threat to the order and cohesiveness of the nation. They claimed that social institutions (e.g., family, church, and school) were losing the capacity to stabilize the social order (Morris & Rothman, 1995). Americans of that era perceived the weakening of discipline and obedience in these institutions as an expression of social disorder. They argued that there was a link between the breakdown of traditional principles and criminal behavior. Although the actual crime rate “probably did not increase over these years,” there was a broad consensus that the origins of crime locate in the society disorder (Rothman, 1971, p. 69).

Reformers created the prison as a way of addressing the problem of disorder causing crime. The prison was designed to be a model institution in which an orderly society might be recreated. Reformers believed that prison’s walls would isolate offenders from the corruptive, disorderly environment that prevailed in the outer community. In addition, they argued, the prison’s internal routine would regenerate the order and discipline offenders would need to be transformed into law-abiding citizens (Cullen & Gilbert, 1982). Overall, reformers agreed upon the rehabilitative goal of prison and on the theoretical outline to achieve this goal—isolation, discipline, obedience, and a steady routine of labor. However, reformers in New York and Pennsylvania implemented two rival approaches for achieving the goal of rehabilitation.

In Pennsylvania, the reformative discipline in prison was maintained through the solitary confinement of inmates, called the “separate” system. During their entire period behind walls, inmates “remained in solitary cells for eating, sleeping, and working, and entered private yards for exercise” (Rothman, 1971, p. 85). Under this regimen, the rehabilitation process had three phases. At the initial stage, offenders who entered prison experienced total isolation. They were expected to devote this time to a deep examination of their bad decisions in life. While isolated, reformers tried to restore the offenders’ morality by forcing them to listen to “reproach of conscience” and “expostulation of religious” (p. 85). In the second phase of rehabilitation, the Pennsylvania reformers aimed to cure idleness by allowing offenders daily work in their cells. Such activity, they assumed, would instill habits of order and regularity. In the last phase of the process, the reformers’ schema allowed individual treatment for inmates, rewarding inmate’s good behavior with books and visitors.

Reformers in New York developed an alternative approach to organizing the prison. As opposed to the separated system in Pennsylvania, inmates in New York were not totally isolated, which is why their model was called the “congregate system”. Prisoners were allowed to eat, work, and exercise together during the day. According to the reformers’ theoretical principles, such lack of absolute isolation was a substantial threat to rehabilitation. Because inmates had contact with one another, the possibility of criminal contamination could not be precluded. To overcome the risk posed by daily contact with other offenders, the “congregate” system in New York enforced a strict code of silence—often with the lash. The reformers bolstered their rehabilitative discipline through rules that prohibited “all talking and even the exchanges of glances” (Morris & Rothman, 1995, p. 106). In addition, the reformers secured the rehabilitative process by compelling inmates to spend the night in individual cells and isolating them from contact with relatives and friends. Another substantial aspect that reformers in New York addressed was offenders’ idleness. In the congregate system, reformers tried to instill good habits to inmates through a daily routine of hard labor in prison workshops.

During the 1820s and 1830s, Americans considered the prison to be “the pride of the nation,” a place that would both reform offenders in a humanitarian way and stabilize the social order (Rothman, 1971, p. 79). During this optimistic period, the reformative models in New York and Pennsylvania spread throughout the country and trumpeted the correctional doctrines of separation, obedience, and steady labor. A few decades later, however, it was clear that the reformers’ early expectations were unrealistic and increasingly irrelevant. The typical image of prisons in the post–Civil War era is of disorderly places filled with chronic offenders, lower-class citizens, and immigrants. In addition, ongoing stories from incarcerated offenders exposed the effects of prison overcrowding and the brutality used by officials to impose discipline. This reality blurred the appeal of the prison as a humanitarian enterprise, and undermined the notion that prison was a place where offenders should or could be rehabilitated.

By the 1860s, the arrangements in prisons no longer reflected the theoretical blueprint of the penitentiary reform movement (Rothman, 1971). First, prisons were overcrowded. As a consequence, it was no longer possible to isolate offenders from social communication. Second, prison wardens stopped focusing on rehabilitation and relied on obedience and harsh discipline to enforce order. Administrational convenience, not offender treatment, thus became wardens’ primary concern. Finally, officials allowed the leasing of inmate labor to the private sector. This new practice signaled that wardens no longer believed they had special expertise in administering inmates’ routines. Overall, the reformative enthusiasm gradually declined, and the regulation of chronic and dangerous offenders in overcrowded prisons became more and more brutal. It was clear, observed Rothman (1971), that the “all important task of administration was to safeguard the peace of the prison” (p. 246).

During the 1860s, it was evident that the internal regimen of incarceration alone could not accomplish reform. That is, prison in and of itself had no therapeutic power. Prisons failed to maintain the reformers’ theoretical framework, and gradually, the commitment to rehabilitate offenders was replaced by a custodial operation. Outside prison, politicians and the public supported custody as a ready-to-use instrument to restrain immigrants and low-class citizens. The tendency was to view inmates as persons “whose behavior might be explained in terms of social Darwinism” (Cullen, 2013, p. 311). In prison, wardens grew comfortable with focusing on simply guarding offenders rather than dealing with any high expectations of reformation. Therefore, subjecting inmates to aimless punishment became an acceptable and standard practice within the penal system. According to Rothman (1971), “this was not a good time to counter the appeal of custody” (p. 257).

Nevertheless, in the mid-1860s, Enoch C. Wines and Theodore Dwight, members of the New York Prison Discipline Association, investigated the penal system and proposed a plan to reorganize of prisons. Their comprehensive report on the Prisons and Reformatories of the United States and Canada (1867) analyzed prison systems in Canada and 17 states within the United States. The ie report presented scholarly evidence that the reformative approach of both Pennsylvania and New York penal systems had become irrelevant, and that rehabilitation was no longer the primary goal of the prison systems in the United States. In addition, the authors outlined a scheme for new directions to approach prison’s organization and discipline. Three years later, their recommendations became the theoretical base of a national consensus that reaffirmed rehabilitation.

Enoch C. Wines was the architect of the first National Congress on Penitentiary and Reformatory Discipline (1870a). In October 1870, more than 250 wardens, chaplains, judges, governors, and humanitarians from 24 states, Canada, and South America convened in Cincinnati, Ohio. (Other penologists from England, France, Italy, and Denmark sent papers to enrich the congress with their knowledge and experience.) The best thinkers and practitioners of the era discussed the next necessary changes in the American penal system, and eventually adopted the “Declaration of Principles.” Four members composed a paper outlining the principles of organization and discipline, which were eventually condensed to the 37 principles of the declaration (Pisciotta, 1994): Dr. Enoch Wines, Rutherford B. Hayes (then the Ohio Governor and, between 1877 and 1881, the 19th president of the United States), Zebulon Brockway (the superintendent of the Detroit House of Correction), and Franklin Sanborn (the secretary of the Massachusetts Board of State Charities). This document presented a “new penology” for the American penal system. The declaration coalesced ideas of new direction in penology into “a coherent correctional philosophy” (Cullen & Gilbert, 1982, p. 68).

The Declaration of Principles reestablished rehabilitation as the supreme goal of public punishment. The congress stated unanimously that criminals are capable of reformation, and that “the treatment of criminals by society is for protection of society” (Wines, 1870a, p. 541). This goal rejected the practice of inflicting aimless punishment on inmates and the administration of a merely custodial operation. The declaration also stated a clear utilitarian goal for imprisonment: to reform criminals for protecting the society. In addition, the congress rejected the use of disciplinary punishment to deter offenders. Such practice was perceived as a strategy that inflicts unnecessary pain or humiliation on offenders, and therefore would have destructive effects. Zebulon Brockway, for example, claimed that the purpose of deterrence reflects social regression, a practice that drags the society “backward to the pillory, the whipping post, the gallows, the stake; to corporal violence and exterm...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• CONTENTS
• List of Tables
• Foreword
• Acknowledgments
• PART I Beyond Nothing Works
• PART II The Risk-Need-Responsivity Model
• PART III The Good Lives Model
• PART IV The Future of Rehabilitation
• Index