Reconceptualising ‘risk’: Towards a humanistic paradigm of sexual offending

Anne-Marie Mcalinden

doi:10.1177/09646639211032957

Abstract

Within Western criminal justice traditions, the ‘risk’ paradigm has become the defining logic of contemporary laws and policies on sex offender management. This article critically examines the limitations of current technocratic and algorithmic approaches to risk in relation to sexual offending and how they might be addressed. Drawing on nearly two decades of theoretical and empirical research conducted by the author, it applies the learning on sex offender reintegration and desistance to advance a ‘humanistic’ paradigm of sexual offending. The paper attempts to counter some of the dangers of algorithmic justice and shift risk-based discourse away from its predominantly ‘scientific’ origins. It argues that such a move towards a more expansive and progressive version of risk within criminal justice discourses would better capture the realities of sexual offending behaviour and its real-world governance.

Highlights

‘Risk’ has become a dominant framework for conceptualising the social problems of advanced post-industrial societies
In order to make these arguments, the article draws on key learning from academic discourses on sex offender reintegration and desistance including nearly two decades of theoretical and empirical research conducted by the author
This paper makes a scholarly contribution on two principal fronts. It furthers the dialogue between desistance and public protection practices and, more broadly, provides challenges to the technocratic and algorithmic epistemology of risk which is beginning to pervade risk-based scholarship and decision-making

Summary

Introduction

‘Risk’ has become a dominant framework for conceptualising the social problems of advanced post-industrial societies. Part II examines four of the core generic critiques suggested by risk scholars (see e.g. Mythen, 2014; O’Malley, 2004) as applied to sex offending policies: (a) the assumed homogeneity of risk, (b) zero-sum thinking in terms of the polarised identities of victims and perpetrators, (c) the focus on offender agency rather than the social aspects of risk management and (d) elitist modes of risk governance and decision making.

Results

Conclusion