Global Perspectives on Interventions in Forensic Therapeutic Communities

A Practitioner’s Guide

Geraldine Akerman, Richard Shuker, Geraldine Akerman, Richard Shuker

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN:
  9780367322397
  9780367322380
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000512328
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Applied Psychology
• Index: Psychology

Global Perspectives on Interventions in Forensic Therapeutic Communities: A Practitioner's Guide explores the validity and effectiveness of secure settings as therapeutic communities (TCs). Rooted in practice, this book examines the transferability of approaches within international TCs to other forensic settings, while considering how the environment contributes to effectiveness.

In this volume, Akerman and Shuker bring together leading clinicians from across the world to offer insight into critical topics, including the impact of gang membership on therapeutic process and the community, how core creative therapies are integrated and how the model is applied in international settings and across varied contexts. Leading clinicians draw on rare reports and papers to explain the therapeutic community model while keeping in mind the diverse contexts within which it is practiced. The book provides a much-needed global perspective on the diverse role TCs have across forensic services.

This groundbreaking book is valuable reading for forensic and clinical psychologists, counsellors, social workers and psychiatrists working in secure prison or rehabilitation settings, as well as students in these fields.

Part IPractice perspectives

1Changing the gameAn intervention addressing the impact of former gang members on the therapeutic process

Geraldine Akerman and Carine Minne

DOI: 10.4324/9780429317460-2

During years of studying the impact gang members had on the safety and management of prisons in general, it was noted (Griffin & Hepburn, 2006) that prison gangs can severely undermine the ability of prison staff to maintain a safe and orderly environment. This can result in staff and prisoners believing that officials are not in full control of prisons, and create fear and unrest (Wood & Adler, 2001; Wood, 2006; Wood, 2017). Camp and Camp (1985) and Fong (1990) described how prison gangs in adult institutions function on the acquisition of money and power, and how they use threats and violence to dominate staff and other prisoners, and such behaviour could clearly impact on relationships and the power balance within an establishment. Examples could be using illegal mobile phones to take photographs of staff and sending these to criminal associates outside and using this to threaten them. Smart phones enable users to find out information on other prisoners, which also empowers them. Wood (2017) noted that criminal activities can continue in custody, undermining the belief that once convicted a gang member will stop offending. Offences included car crime, burglaries, stolen goods and burglaries, as well as organising more serious assaults on those in the community or in other establishments.

Context for the intervention

HMP Grendon was opened in 1962 as a means of managing prisoners who were not responding to standard incarceration (for more details, see Shuker & Sullivan, 2010). The DTC model has subsequently been accredited by the Correctional Services and Advice Panel (CSAAP). Throughout its history HMP Grendon has housed men who have committed a wide range of offences and who have experienced events in their lives which have affected how they view the world, relationships and themselves. Many of those who participate in therapy at HMP Grendon have reported adverse childhood experiences in their formative years and this has clearly impacted on how their personality developed and formed.

The DTC provides an opportunity for a corrective emotional experience and a safe space in which to develop its residents understanding of themselves and their interactions which led them to offend. The programme is explained extensively elsewhere (Akerman, 2019; Akerman & Mandikate, 2018; Brookes, 2010; Campling & Haigh, 1988; Genders & Player, 1995; Shine & Morris, 1999; Shuker & Sullivan, 2010; Stevens, 2010), but in brief is an intensive living-learning experience through which the residents are given an opportunity to explore their day-to-day living in custody and how that parallels their past. This involves them considering their thoughts, feelings and behaviour in the present day, making links to their past and gaining a chance to practise alternative ways of managing their responses. It is expected that in this environment a certain amount of behaviour from the past will be evident. Indeed this provides the work for therapy groups but at times this can be problematic. For instance, if alliances are formed which impact on groups and group work and communities, this can impede the work being undertaken by others. One such example is that of men who have been involved in gangs in the past (and sometimes in the present) and how this affects a culture which promotes an equal voice for all and a lack of hierarchy, one of the DTC core principles. The DTC principles will now be discussed briefly.

Democratic therapeutic community principles

In a DTC there are a number of principles (described fully by this volume) which guide the behaviour of those in it, for instance:

• Prisoners form positive relationships with staff and with each other, and are involved in planning and sharing in activities and making decisions. To be involved in the treatment of others and in all aspects of the day-to-day caring of the living environment. To abide by rules that have been agreed by the community (communalism).
• The environment is developed and maintained such that trust, safety and openness are promoted, and in which it is possible to challenge each other’s inappropriate behaviour. To take responsibility for residents own behaviour, learning from instances when behaviour related to offending is shown in the community, and establishing links between current behaviour within treatment setting and offending patterns, for example, taking control, manipulating others, using aggression (known as offence paralleling) (reality confrontation).
• There is a certain level of tolerance so that behaviour similar to that which happened in the lead-up to offending is played out. Such behaviour is then explored, contained and challenged in a safe environment (permissiveness or more recently tolerance).
• All community structures are subject to influence by those who live and work in them (democratisation).
• There is the ability to question, inquire and explore reasons behind own and organisational decisions (culture of inquiry).
• To create an environment in which all interactions are seen as a learning opportunity. All aspects of the community are fed back to the wider community, and exclusive relationships are discouraged to avoid secrecy and collusion (living-learning environment).

Some of the principles may not align with previous beliefs and values of the community member, and so they may well feel uncomfortable and unconsciously seek to recreate what is familiar to them from their past.

Groups and gangs in a democratic therapeutic community

Groups

A group is defined by Forsyth (2006, p.3) as ‘two or more individuals who are connected to one another by a social relationship’, and larger groups tend to be comprised of smaller groups linked together for another common purpose. Within the DTC at HMP Grendon this is evident as the small (therapy) group is comprised of 8/9 people (in which all aspects of functioning are explored, including examining links between past and present behaviour, challenging anti-social beliefs, exploring attachment patterns, and discussing future relationships, etc). The large group (community) is comprised of approximately 45 residents and 16 staff members. The community meeting manages the business and organizational aspects of day-to-day living, along with conflict resolution, demonstrating the ability to manage emotions, dynamics within and between groups and so forth. There are other subgroups, for instance an art therapy or psychodrama group, groups of a particular religion, ethnicity, age, area of the country, interests, and these groups can have their own dynamics.

Yalom (1985) described the mechanisms of group psychotherapy, highlighting the catharsis gained from self-disclosure, gaining acceptance from others and seeing oneself as having similar problems/difficulties/challenges as others do (universality); feeling good about oneself by helping others; gaining greater self-insight; being able to give constructive feedback to others; seeing others progress and make changes and that they can also achieve that (the instillation of hope); exploring how they are within relationships and how their behaviour impacts on others; and seeing themselves in others. It is also worth noting that within a group, individuals can behave in a way that they would not do alone, which can be either positive or negative. Groups can be a source of great reward, for example, providing common achievement and pro-social modelling, but also of conflict and aggression, and so the work of the therapy team in a DTC is to be attuned to the dynamics on a day-to-day and sometimes hour-by-hour basis, particularly in times of tension.

Gangs

The definition of what a gang is, and what its membership entails differs across research. For instance, Klein (1971, p.13) described it as ‘any denotable adolescent group of youngsters who (a) are generally perceived as a distinct aggregation by others in their neighbourhood, (b) recognize themselves as a denotable group (almost invariably with a group name) and (c) have been involved in a sufficient number of delinquent incidents to call forth a consistent negative response from neighbourhood residents and/or enforcement agencies’. Weerman et al. (2009, p.20) describe a gang as ‘any durable, street-orientated youth group whose involvement in illegal activity is part of its group identity’. The Home Office (2011, p.17) defined a street gang as ‘A relatively durable, predominantly street-based group of young people who:

• See themselves (and are seen by others) as a discernible group;
• Engage in criminal activity and violence;
• Lay claim over territory (this is not necessarily geographical territory but can include an illegal economy territory);
• Have some form of identifying structural feature; and
• Are in conflict with other, similar gangs’.

Hallsworth (2013, p.102–3) commented, ‘the term “gang” is now so nebulous, fluid and elastic that it is randomly applied to just about any group of young people “hanging around”’. This can make the term seem overused.

Within a custodial setting a gang has been defined (Wood, 2006) as a group of three or more prisoners whose behaviour had an adverse impact on the prison that holds them, which again is a very wide definition. In a DTC, having such a group could have an adverse impact on a community, such as carrying on a code of secrecy, not exposing any anti-social activities or challenging negative beliefs is in conflict with the values of a DTC. Further, their reputation from inside or outside of custody can impact on the power they hold. Moore and Vigil (1989) referred to an ‘oppositional culture’ and Lien (2002) reports that those who affiliate themselves with such a gang could view themselves as marginalised and oppressed by others, and targets of racism and inequality; what social psychology would call in-group out-group thinking. Nitsun (1996) described the ‘anti-group’ as the destructive aspect of groups that threaten integrity and therapeutic development. Therefore, a subgroup (gang) could have that function of undermining the larger group. This dynamic can see a bid made for who will be the most powerful. Just as those who are starved of love and affection can attack it when it is seen in others, so the anti-group can seek to destroy the therapeutic culture, albeit unconsciously.

Within a DTC the expectation is that new members will learn from those who have been there longer, known as culture carriers, and these senior members of the community will model appropriate behaviour to the newer residents. This will not be unfamiliar to a member of a gang who would also have ‘elders’ modelling to the ‘youngers’ what is expected of them, ‘soldiers’ to do the groundwork and ‘wannabes’ on the periphery. Gang members may abide by a set of values, expectations and ‘codes’ which new members learn as they progress in the ranks. In therapeutic terms, as a group forms it develops with conscious and unconscious rules, which again are learned through experience rather than made explicit prior to entering the group. In group analysis terms, a group forms a matrix between its members which is comprised of the collective idea of the expectations of its members. Weinberg (2008) discusses this as a ‘social unconscious’, in that members develop basic assumptions as to what is expected of them in relation to others and share memories of their past experiences. In a DTC, one of the main principles is that there is a flattened hierarchy in that each participant has an equal voice, staff and residents alike. This may feel unfamiliar to a former gang member, who may well be used to being the person who makes the decisions and tells others what to do. Other expectations could include that they side with each other, and they don’t ‘rat’ or ‘grass’ on one another, whereas in DTC terms this would be a requirement, what would be viewed as reality confrontation, that is, pointing out inappropriate behaviour and challenging it.

Many of the men who apply for thera...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• List of Contributors
• Series foreword
• Foreword
• Acknowledgements
• Part I Practice perspectives
• Part II Research perspectives
• Part III Narrative perspectives and developments
• Index