Rehabilitation Of Prisoners Research Articles

Rehabilitation of Prisoners: A Debatable Issue

Prisons are no longer considered as punitive places, rather they are termed as correctional homes. People coming here after committing an offence and standing trial commonly wait for their conviction which often takes place after a considerable time. During this period the offender is expected to utilize his time in learning various skills which will enable him to transform himself from a disorganized and disturbed person with criminal tendencies to a sensible person filled with remorse preparing to turn a new leaf for himself. In India according to the prescribed rules of the Indian Jail Manual only a convicted prisoner whose sentence is confirmed is made to participate in the activities of the prison. They are paid a nominal amount in the form of wages. This has a two-pronged effect, one it motivates the prisoner to learn new skill, and second it enables the convict to help his family financially even when he is in the prison. A proactive approach is practiced to reform the prisoner. His mind set is being studied and he is further provided with therapeutic treatments to stabilize his emotions and improve his mental conditions. Meditations and Yoga are taught in many Indian jails for the inmates to reckon their mistakes and to turn a new leaf. All these programs and practices are effective as long the person remains incarcerated. What happens next though is a thought provoking question yet it lies dormant in one of the pockets of the correctional system. How far is reformation effective? Who are the recidivists, and what are the crisis in the re-entry of the prison back in the community? And what is the role of the criminal justice system in the resettlement of the offender in the society are among the numerous questions which the present paper attempts to explore. A debate on these questions is necessary. The idea of rehabilitation is given a later priority by the criminal justice system as its foremost effort is to reform an offender when he is in prison. The security and the safeguard of the community take the upper hand Yet rehabilitation is an important chapter in the prisoner’s life when he steps out from the secured gates of the prison into the insecured world which holds out new challenges for him with an option to adjust or not to adjust. Return of the prisoner to the free community reveals a major lack of service which can assist the offender to become an effective participant in the life of the community. The society finds it difficult to cope with the crisis of re-entry into the community. This incongruity reflects a lack of coordination among the various segments of the system of criminal justice. Inmates discharged on completion of sentence without parole and having no family support, encounters difficulties in rehabilitation. The correction system endeavors to get the protection of the community in the rehabilitation of the offender emphasizing at the same time on developing self discipline and strengthening his potential to achieve his goals through law abiding behavior. Rehabilitation usually refers to intervention that are nice, benevolent well intended helping a prisoner to adjust back in the society. A psychologist might define rehabilitation as the effect of positive reinforcement such as counseling rather than negative reinforcements such as imprisonment. All however do not agree with this view. Scientifically there is no difference between a positive and a negative inducements. Behavioral psychologists are of the opinion that both the reinforcements have a comparable effects. It is not always true that rewards will change behavior more than punishment or vice versa. Rehabilitation can involve a substantial degree of coercion even of intimidation like making the prisoner understand that he has to change to get rehabilitated. Participation in the programs are focused as a step towards rehabilitation. Behavior modification therapy helps further in guiding an offender to reform himself according to the norms of the free world.

PRISM: A Promising Paradigm for Assessing and Managing Institutional Violence: Findings from a Multiple Case Study Analysis of Five Scottish Prisons

PRISM: Promoting Risk Intervention by Situational Management (Johnstone & Cooke, 2008) provides a systematic process for evaluating a range of situational risk factors known to influence institutional violence in prisons and secure hospital settings. This paper reports on findings from the first multiple case-study evaluation using this protocol. We applied PRISM in the Scottish Prison Service (SPS). The SPS is a modern prison system. It respects prisoners’ human rights, maintains order and control via humane and dignified means, and works towards the rehabilitation of prisoners and reducing reoffending rates overall. The SPS comprises a national headquarters where relevant policies and protocols are derived but governors and senior management teams are based within the local prisons to ensure the effective running of the organisation. While the SPS can boast decreasing rates of serious violence, there are significant variations across sites. We used PRISM to explore the relevance of situational risk factors to understanding these variations. Results suggested that the protocol was a promising paradigm for assessing risk factors unique to each site as well as showing utility for exposing problems related to the national policies and practices. The risk assessment led to a range of risk management interventions being proposed. The implications of the findings are discussed.

Gualitative education for prisoners: a panacea to effective rehabilitation and integration into the society

Incarceration of offenders has increased dramatically over the years. Nonetheless, more ex-prisoners still go back to the prison. The failure of correctional institutions to reduce crime needs to be addressed. Rehabilitation of prisoners via qualitative and vocational education is necessary. This study investigated the perception of prison staff and the academic staff of College of Education, Agbor on the effect of qualitative education on prisoners as a panacea for their rehabilitation and integration into the society. A 24-item questionnaire was developed and administered to 200 subjects randomly drawn from staff of five prisons in Delta State and the staff of College of Education, Agbor. The result showed that the respondents agreed that qualitative and vocational education for prisoners were inadequate. There was no relationship between prisoners’ rehabilitation and formal education. Based on the finding, it was recommended that prisoners should be given qualitative and vocational education for rehabilitation and integration. Keywords: Prison, Prisoners, Prison Education, Vocational Education, Rehabilitation, Integration, Counselling.

Kicking the National Habit: The Legal and Policy Arguments for Abolishing Private Prison Contracts

Privatization overall negatively impacts the treatment, rehabilitation, and care of prisoners, indicating that the market-driven business model is fundamentally incompatible with an effective and humane corrections system. There are several reasons for this tension. First, private prison companies are primarily profit-seeking entities, working to reduce costs wherever possible. Cost-cutting measures promote inferior contract performance, undue safety risks, and poor delivery of inmate services. The profit motive also encourages private prison companies to disregard the principles of inmate rehabilitation and criminal deterrence; if advanced, these principles would undermine profits and reduce the demand for these companies’ services. Finally, to expand their markets, private prison operators are exhorted to advance harsh criminal sentencing policies and to dilute early-release, parole, and good-behavior programs within their facilities. All of these market-based incentives, as applied to the field of corrections, operate to the detriment of the Government, prison inmates, and society as a whole.

Prison Islam in the Age of Sacred Terror

Research indicates that Islam is the fastest growing religion among prisoners in Western nations. In the United States, roughly 240,000 inmates have converted to the faith since the 9/11 attacks. According to federal law enforcement, Saudi-backed Wahhabi clerics have targeted these prisoners for terrorist recruitment. The present research examines this claim from several different perspectives. First, it reviews the literature on prisoner conversions to Islam and concludes that there are opposing viewpoints on the matter. One side of the debate takes an alarmist stance, arguing that prisons have become incubators for Islamic terrorism; the other side asserts that Islam plays a vital role in prisoner rehabilitation. Second, results of a two-year study of prisoner radicalization and terrorist recruitment in US prisons are reported. The motives for prisoner conversions to Islam are discussed along with the effects of conversion on inmate behaviour; the role played by gangs and charismatic leaders in radicalizing prisoners; and the social processes by which inmates move from radicalization to operational terrorism. Third, two case studies are presented. One involves a terrorist plot waged by a gang of Sunni prisoners at California's New Folsom Prison; the other looks at the inmate-led Islamic Studies Program at Old Folsom Prison, which has adopted a de-radicalization agenda. It is argued that inmate self-help programmes may do more than the state to prevent radicalization and terrorist recruitment behind bars.

Re-imagining DDR

Drawing upon criminological studies in the field of prisoner rehabilitation, this essay explores the relevance of the Demobilisation, Disarmament and Reintegration (DDR) framework to the process of conflict transformation in Northern Ireland. In a similar fashion to the critique of `passivity' offered by, for example, the `strengths based' or `good lives' approach to prisoner resettlement and reintegration more generally, the authors contend that the Northern Ireland peace process offers conspicuous examples of former prisoners and combatants as agents and indeed leaders in the process of conflict transformation. They draw out three broad styles of leadership which have emerged amongst ex-combatants over the course of the Northern Ireland transition from conflict— political, military and communal. They suggest that cumulatively such leadership speaks to the potential of ex-prisoners and ex-combatants as moral agents in conflict transformation around which peacemaking can be constructed rather than as obstacles which must be `managed' out of existence.

Testing the Impact of Racial Attitudes and Racial Diversity on Prisoner Reentry Policies in the U.S. States

AbstractScholars have done an admirable job explaining the political forces behind the build up in punitive crime policies over the past three decades. This research investigates whether one of these factors—the politics of race—structures the extent to which crime prevention-centered policies are incorporated into states' correctional systems. Using the General Social Survey to create reliable aggregate measures of racial attitudes across the states, I question the extent to which racial attitudes and racial context impact states' propensity to incorporate “softer” prisoner rehabilitation services into their correctional systems. Results show that whites' attitudes toward African Americans and the size of a state's minority population influenced the percentage of prisoners in each state that receive access to education and mental health services in 1995 and 2000. In states with greater racial diversity and states in which whites are less tolerant toward African Americans, state prisoners are less likely to receive rehabilitation services.

Global Jihadist Recidivism: A Red Flag

This commentary examines the issue of global jihadist recidivism and identifies it as a potential long-term international counterterrorism concern. Although there are no comprehensive and accurate statistics on global jihadist recidivism, there is sufficient anecdotal evidence that suggests that the tendency for released imprisoned global jihadist terrorists is to return to terrorist activity. It is important to understand that arresting, indicting, and sentencing a captured global jihadist terrorist is not the end of the counterterrorism skirmish. In fact, the next stages of incarceration and reformation are more crucial to the endgame. The problem of global jihadist recidivism is at the core a manpower issue. Prisons have always been an important front for all types of terrorist groups. Recidivism or the failure of prison rehabilitation programs is simply one component of this front. Terrorist groups do not want their imprisoned members to reform and resign from the organization. Further research needs to be conducted on the recidivism rate for terrorists and whether religious terrorists would have a higher rate than secular ones. The academic, think tank, and U.S. government communities need to examine this issue to determine if it is a long-term international counterterrorism problem. The author believes it will be.

Basic Rights and Rehabilitation of Prisoners

Basic Rights and Rehabilitation of Prisoners

Testimonial Politics: The Christian Right's Faith-Based Approach to Marriage and Imprisonment

This article examines how Christian Right organizations such as Prison Fellowship Ministry, the ex-gay movement, and Focus on the Family utilize evangelical testimonies of conversion to argue against same-sex marriage and for a mode of prisoner rehabilitation based on transformation as a born-again Christian. The premise is that belief in Jesus will transform a person: from homosexual to married ex-gay Christian, from prisoner to upstanding Christian citizen. Advocates for heterosexual-only marriages and the evangelical prison programs consider their mandate as the imposition of Christian laws and values onto laws and policies about same-sex marriage, crime and rehabilitation. Testimonial politics emphasize how the experience of becoming a born-again Christian transforms individuals, eliminating the need for social programs focused on structural economic issues. Testimonial politics bolster a vision of social welfare in which social services are privatized rather than funded by the federal government. The rationale behind the federal office of faith-based initiatives created by President Bush is that faith-based organizations can provide services more efficiently than social service organizations. Testimonial politics support the faith-based policies of economic privatization that place the onus for solving social problems on the individual and on Christian faith in the power of God to transform lives. The testimonies of individuals provide an explanation or cause for both homosexuality and criminality. Through testifying, individuals express remorse and an explanation for who they were before they became born-again as Christians. Their answer to imprisonment, homosexuality, drug addiction, and poverty is conversion to evangelical Christianity. Christian Right activism against gay rights, same-sex marriage and for evangelical prison programs stress that their movements are local and grassroots. However, they are part of a larger network and tied to major organizations of the Christian Right. Testimonial politics enable issues to appear to be about individual transformation, even if they are highly coordinated national political campaigns in which Christian Right organizations dictate policy stances and provide political resources.

WHO IS THE “REAL” FATHER OF HPT?

SEVERAL AUTHORS HAVE identified Tom Gilbert as the father of human performance technology. We respectfully disagree—and think he would have too. Gilbert was a brilliant and creative professional who made major contributions to the field, and it seems safe to say that HPT would not have progressed as far as it has without him. But he was not alone. Those of us who have been in the field since the early 1960s can identify a number of other contributors who were significant and even crucial to the early development and expansion of the technology. The early days of HPT were an exciting time. We had a powerful technology that many of us believed could change the world, but it was a new technology and limited in its scope and applications at that stage. Conferences and meetings were characterized by lengthy discussions (sometimes heated, and often extending into the hallways, coffee shops, and bars) about the technology itself, what the field really was, and its potential applications. If we were forced to point to a single initiator of HPT, it would probably be B. F. Skinner, with the publication of The Science of Learning and the Art of Teaching in 1954. But the development of the basic principles that Skinner articulated into a far-reaching technology was the work of many. A number of those people (including Gilbert, Ogden Lindsey, and Dale Brethower) were graduate students under Skinner; others were attracted by the potential power of the principles in Skinner’s writings. Among the candidates for “father” of HPT, in addition to Gilbert, are Lloyd Homme, Jim Evans, Charles Slack, George Geis, Donald Cook, Frances Mechner, Stewart Margolis, Lew Eigen, Bill Deterline, Bob Corrigan, Robert Glaser, Bob Mager, Bob Gagne, Norman Crowder, Bob Morgan, Bob Branson, Walter Dick, Arthur Lumsdain, Dave Klaus, Matt Israel, Jim Holland, Gabriel Ofiesh, and Harvey Block, to mention just a few (including both of us). And they were not all “fathers” either; people like Susan Markle (another Skinner student) were also contributing. In addition several “youngsters” who worked with many of the people listed above also contributed to the growth and development of HPT. These include Brethower, Geary Rummler, Danny Langdon, Joe Harless, Don Bullock, Margo Murray, Stephanie Jackson, and Roger Addison. In this zeitgeist, ideas were pouring in from everywhere. At least a hundred or more names could be added to this list of HPT heroes. It would be impossible to discuss everyone who contributed to the birth of the field, so we have presented just a few of the people we worked with to give a taste of that early formation period. Many people were involved in the early days of instructional systems design, and just as important, many of them were also working to extend the principles of HPT into other areas: juvenile crime reduction; business operations and management; prison rehabilitation; classroom design; mental health; group processes; Job Corps; and a host of other areas, including continual, disappointing forays into the world of education. In the interest of capturing some of the heritage of HPT, each of us has written short sections on the contributions of a few HPT pioneers we worked with. We will dispense with the term “father of . . .” and identify some of the people whom we consider to be an important part of HPT history: a few of our HPT heroes.

Rehabilitation of Released Prisoners in the Kibbutz

The present research examines 110 released prisoners who were sent for rehabilitation to the Kibbutz Movement by the Israeli Prisoner Rehabilitation Service between 1983 and 2001. The research examines several measures of their adjustment towards normative life during and after their stay at the kibbutz. The research was based on interviews with each of the offender's adoptive families and with the released prisoners themselves. Program participant's reincarceration rate was 22.7%, which is much lower than the 63% reincarceration rate in the general population of released prisoners in Israel. Findings show that the most significant predictors of successful rehabilitation were length of stay in the kibbutz, work and social integration, and adherence to kibbutz norms.

Traitement comportemental et discipline carcérale

This paper offers a descriptive and systematic review of behavior modification programs in penal settings. The following aspects are considered : the clinical relevance of behavior targetting, the problems related to the evaluative methodology and the limits of the effectiveness of these experiments. A brief historical overview points out the very special position of behavior modification programs in the field of prisoner rehabilitation.

Is Corrections Correcting? An Examination of Prisoner Rehabilitation Policy and Practice in Queensland

This article provides an analysis of the policy and practice of prisoner rehabilitation in Queensland, and the extent to which they accord with international best practice. Actual practice was identified through interviews and written submissions from 20 ex-prisoners and 18 prisoner service providers (including two past staff members from Queensland prisons), as well as through an examination of reported judicial review decisions and Department of Corrective Services statistics. The results demonstrate that although the legislation and procedures suggest that a best practice system of prisoner rehabilitation exists in Queensland, there is a significant gulf between policy and practice. Far from being sufficiently prepared for release, Queensland prisoners are generally released directly from high security facilities into a community which they have great difficulty reintegrating into. The results suggest that the corrective services system in Queensland is not succeeding in fulfilling its primary purpose, ‘correction’, or in meeting its well-publicised goal of ensuring community safety.

Prevalence and characteristics of trauma and posttraumatic stress disorder in female prisoners in China

Objective Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and its relationship with a range of traumatic events have previously been documented within various traumatized groups in Western countries. In the present study, the authors investigated the relationship between the frequency and type of traumatic events and the prevalence of PTSD among female prisoners in China. Method A structured psychiatric interview, the self-report Traumatic Life Events Questionnaire, and Symptom Checklist-90-Revised were administered to a subset of 471 female members who were randomly selected from Hunan female prison, China. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition ( DSM-IV) diagnoses were assigned by consensus after the interviews were evaluated by independent raters. Results The prevalences of lifetime and current PTSD were 15.9% (n = 75) and 10.6% (n = 50), and 82% (n = 386) of the subjects had experienced at least 1 traumatic event. The whole sample was divided into 2 groups according to age: the younger group (age ≤25 years) and the older group (age >25 years) .The most predictive factor for lifetime PTSD among the younger age group was the experience of sudden death of a close friend or a loved one, childhood physical abuse, intimate partner abuse, and sexual abuse before the age of 13 years by someone at least 5 years older. For the older group, the most predictive factors were a history of motor traffic accident, sudden death of a close friend or a loved one, severe assault by acquaintance or stranger, witness to family violence, having experienced more than 5 traumatic events, intimate partner abuse, and sexual abuse before the age of 13 years by someone at least 5 years older. Those females with PTSD tended to demonstrate higher levels of anger/hostility or interpersonal sensitivity than those without either partial or full diagnosis. Conclusions In this sample of female prisoners in China, although exposure to traumatic events was common and the rate is nearly as high as that in western countries, the prevalences of lifetime and current PTSD were relatively lower. Moreover, the prevalence of current PTSD among younger prisoners was significantly higher than that among older prisoners. The risk of developing lifetime PTSD was significantly greater only for older prisoners with a history of more than 5 traumatic events, whereas the types of specific traumatic events with the risk of developing lifetime PTSD among younger prisoners were similar to that among older prisoners. Administering specialized treatments for anger dyscontrol and interpersonal sensitivity may be useful for rehabilitation and reform of female prisoners.

Criminals or citizens? Prisoner councils and rehabilitation

Far too many of the 75,000 prisoners in our jails spend their sentence passively serving time not having to take responsibility for their day to day activities. Regimes are highly structured and prisoners have minimal control over their lives. They are treated as passive recipients of decisions made by management that they have no stake in. And any responsibilities that they might have had to their families, friends and communities are taken away. In effect their citizenship and the norms of behaviour that are part of it are suspended. Prisoners are viewed as offenders and criminals not as citizens.

Porters, watchmen, and the crime of William Sayers: the non-scientific staff of the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, in Victorian times

A careful study of the detailed archives of the Victorian Royal Observatory makes it possible to build up a picture of the employment and working conditions not only of the astronomical staff who worked at Greenwich, but also of the labourers, watchmen, and gate porters. Indeed, the archives open up a window on to how the Observatory was run on a daily basis: how its non-scientific staff were recruited and paid, and what were their terms of employment. They also say a great deal about how Sir George Biddell Airy¹ directed and controlled every aspect of the Observatory's life. Yet while Airy was a strict employer, he emerges as a man who was undoubtedly fair-minded and sometimes even generous to his non-scientific work force. A study of the Observatory staff files also reveals the relationship between the Observatory labouring staff and the Airy family's domestic servants. And of especial interest is the robbery committed by William Sayers, the Airy family footman in 1868, bringing to light as it does Sir George and Lady Richarda Airy's views on crime and its social causes and consequences, the prison rehabilitation service in 1868, and their opinions on the reform of offenders. Though this paper is not about astronomy as such, it illuminates a fascinating interface where the world of astronomical science met and worked alongside the world of ordinary Victorian people within the walls of one of the nineteenth century's most illustrious astronomical institutions.

The Rehabilitation of Indigenous Prisoners

The massive problems experienced by Indigenous Australians in their encounters with the criminal justice system have been well documented and widely discussed. This paper applies the Risk, Needs and Responsivity Model of rehabilitation to Indigenous offenders. While much of the review is devoted to a discussion of Australian Indigenous offenders, the issues raised are likely to be relevant to Indigenous groups from other countries and, possibly, ethnic minority offenders more generally. We concluded that whilst the model clearly has value, rehabilitation programs would benefit from a careful consideration of issues relating specifically to the Risk, Needs and Responsivity of Indigenous offenders.

Mass Imprisonment and the Family

ABSTRACT The new phenomena of mass imprisonment in American life has brought about the incarceration of millions of people, the imposition of draconian prison terms, and the creation of an increasingly harsh prison regime. An examination of case law, as well as legal rules and regulations, shows how these changes have affected prisoner-family relationships as expressed in law. Two issues are addressed: prisoners' rights to marry and divorce and prisoners' rights of visitation with partners, spouses, and children. The analysis of case law involving these issues provide access to the dominant forms of legal discourse shaping the relationship between prisoners and their families. The evidence shows that despite the symbolic deference given by the law to the importance of prison-family relationships in the ultimate rehabilitation of prisoners, there has been widespread deterioration of prisoner access to families. The increasingly harsh prison regimes regard families as potentially criminal and subversive and courts have been reluctant to afford prisoners any meaningful legal remedies where families are separated by prison policy or the estrangement of family members.

BETWEEN REFORM AND REPRESSION: IMPRISONMENT IN WEIMAR GERMANY

This is the first account of the prison in the Weimar Republic (1918–33), set in the context of the evolution of German social policy. In the early years, the Weimar prison was characterized by hunger, overcrowding, and conflict. At this time, leading officials agreed on a new approach to imprisonment, influenced by the demand for the ‘incapacitation of incorrigibles, reformation of reformables’. This principle was championed by the modern school of criminal law, designed to replace traditional policy based on deterrence and uniform retribution. The policy of reform and repression shaped the Weimar prison. Most prison officials supported the indefinite confinement of ‘incorrigibles’. While this did not become law, many prisoners classified as ‘incorrigible’ (increasingly after ‘objective’ examinations) received worse treatment than others, both in prison and after their release. Regarding the ‘reformables’, some institutions introduced measures aimed at prisoner rehabilitation. But such policies were not fully implemented in other prisons, not least because of resistance by local prison officials. During the collapse of the Weimar Republic in the early 1930s, measures aimed at rehabilitation, only just introduced, were cut back again. By contrast, the repression of ‘incorrigibles’ was pursued with even more vigour than before, an important legacy for Nazi penal policy.