Recent developments in community punishment

Throughout the latter part of the 20th century, punishment in the community underwent a considerable ideological shift across many Anglophone jurisdictions. Cultural and political shifts have influenced the terminology and the motives behind the use of community sanctions and measures (Robinson et al., 2013). The introduction and use of ‘intermediate sanctions’ in the US reflected the need to “impose order and coherence on penal policy” (Nellis, 2001, p. 18). Across the UK the ‘punishment in the community initiative’ aimed to delimitate financial, community and custodial penalties and

highlight that penalties such as community service, probation orders and others were in fact penalties in their own right rather than ‘less’ than or ‘alternative’ to imprisonment (Nellis, 2001).

Nellis (2001) argues that economic, political and cultural changes influenced the

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punishments are considered and promoted as alternatives to imprisonment, the height of the custody threshold requires consideration. The use of court missionaries to supervise offenders took place in Britain at a time when the custody threshold was set quite low, but throughout the 20th century this threshold was increasingly elevated, requiring community punishments to adapt accordingly.

During the mid-20th century there was a considerable increase in the numbers of offenders convicted and received into prisons across England and Wales (Kilcommins, 2002). Disillusionment with imprisonment was evident, not only in the UK, but across many other jurisdictions (Young, 1979). During the following decades amidst this clear disenchantment with incarceration, community-based punishments were overhauled (Kilcommins, 2002; Young, 1979). Markedly, the introduction of CSOs requiring offenders to complete unpaid work in the community signalled a shift in penal thinking at the time; however its primary purpose was the redirection of offenders from

overcrowded penal institutions, a theme returned to in later chapters.

More recently, the amalgamation of prison and probation services into the National Offender Management Service (NOMS) in England and Wales is an example of the political drive towards a more managerial and ‘effective’ service for punishing offenders in the community (McCulloch & McNeill, 2007). Punishment in the

community, and the systems by which it is administered are increasingly influenced by ‘managerial’ strategies. This move towards a ‘system’ approach to crime reduction and offender management combines what were once independent agencies involved in the criminal justice system into one large interlinked ‘system’. Often associated with inter- agency co-operation, this increased managerial emphasis has resulted in ‘key

performance indicators’ being of primary importance to the detriment of ‘effectiveness’. It has also resulted in community sanctions and measures being developed with their

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ability to help other parts of the system in mind; an example, the development and use of community-based alternatives to deal with prison overcrowding (Robinson et al., 2013). The emphasis on how such sanctions can benefit offenders and communities alike is also lost.

In England and Wales the caseload of the Probation Service increased by nearly 40 percent between 2000 and 2008, this rise has been attributed to the introduction of new orders, an increase in post-release supervision due to an increase in prison committals, as well as the greater time offenders spend on licence. From 2008 to 2014, the number of offenders supervised in the community continued to fall, however by September 2015, caseloads had increased by seven percent when compared to the previous year. This recent rise, according to the Ministry of Justice, can be attributed to requirement of “statutory supervision” for all prisoners released after a custodial sentence under the Offender Rehabilitation Act 2014. (Ministry of Justice, 2016, p. 11). Of relevance to this study is the continued decrease in the use of community orders, although only marginal in recent months (Ministry of Justice, 2016).

The custody threshold is significant when discussing the use of alternatives to custody and debate continues to surround the severity and legitimacy of community

punishments (Robinson et al., 2013). A key question has emerged: have community- based sanctions become increasingly punitive in recent times (Cochran, Mears, & Bales, 2013)? It is clear that policy makers have attempted to make community-based

sanctions appear more punitive to both the general public and the judiciary; however offenders often cite their preference for imprisonment instead of a community sanction (Crank & Brezina, 2013; Crouch, 1993; Petersilia, 1990; Petersilia & Deschenes, 1994; Wood & Grasmick, 1999). The effect of more onerous and punitive community

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If the practices of supervision are focused primarily on punitive monitoring or require such onerous commitments that they hamper probationers’ ability to lead law-abiding lives, probation is more likely to contribute to back-end net-widening. Conversely, to the extent that the monitoring and services of probation are

supportive and/or rehabilitative (or simply not disruptive), probation may be able to function more successfully as a prison diversion (p. 59).

In the majority of jurisdictions in the Anglo world, the number of offenders subject to some form of supervision or community punishment outnumbers those detained in prisons and other detention facilities (McNeill & Beyens, 2013; Robinson et al., 2013). McNeill and Beyens note that growing prison numbers have largely pre-occupied scholars working in the area of criminal justice. Examination of the upsurge of offenders subject to supervision in the community has largely been neglected. The consequence of which:

Skews academic, political, professional and public representations and understandings of the penal field, and in consequence it produces a failure to deliver the kinds of analyses that are now urgently required to engage with the challenges of delivering political, policy and practice communities (McNeill & Beyens, 2013, p. 3).

The role a community plays in the punishment of offenders also requires some discussion. Restorative justice sanctions and the development of community courts attempt to afford communities an active role in the punishment and rehabilitation of offenders. Once excluded, offenders are now considered active agents of their

communities and “their memberships and affiliations need to continue, or be repaired if they are to be reintegrated into normal membership of communities” (Raynor &

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Robinson, 2005, p. 29). According to Clear, Hamilton, and Cadora (2010) “restorative justice is a new version of an ancient idea: the outcome of a transgression against the community ought to be some process that restores the community from the effects of that transgression and thereby allows the transgressor to be restored as well” (p. 80). There has been a considerable increase in the use of reconciliation programmes that attempt to repair the resultant harm of criminal activity. According to McIvor (2007), in England and Wales the community now seems to be the ‘intended beneficiary’ of community service work where previously unpaid work was understood to benefit the offender. There is therefore ideological confusion and incoherence about what

community punishment is supposed to achieve and whom or what it is supposed to benefit.

A penal welfarist approach has continued to dominate Irish probation practice (Healy, 2015). Goals such as rehabilitation and inclusion have remained at the fore of strategy. Until very recently, the Probation Service’s commitment to “advise, assist and befriend” as stated in section 4 of the Probation of Offenders Act 1907, had predominately

remained unchanged. Initiatives based around ‘What Works’ principles have only recently been established, a managerial discourse is now somewhat evident in policy, although this may be more of an ‘austerity narrative’ evident from the recent financial crisis. Use of structured assessments and centralised data systems point to a more evidence based approach, however clinical judgement and skills remain an intricate part of probation practice with all probation officers requiring a social work qualification (Healy, 2015). These initiatives have, however, not been studied extensively in Ireland.

39 3.2.4 Conclusion

Across many jurisdictions punishment in the community has evolved alongside

political, ideological, and scientific advances. For the most part scholars have been pre- occupied with imprisonment and the notion of mass incarceration resulting in a lack of enquiry of community penalties. In Ireland to date ‘mass supervision’ (Phelps, 2013) has not occurred. The numbers subject to community supervision have not outstripped those committed to prison, as in other jurisdictions (Carr, 2016). This dissimilarity in Ireland can be attributed to a combination of political neglect (Rogan, 2011), the survival of penal welfare ideals and periods of economic instability.

In Ireland “the work of the Probation Service does not bear the hallmarks of the culture of control” (Healy, 2015, p. 152) nor has it been overly influenced by the ‘punishment in the community initiative’ witnessed in neighbouring jurisdictions. Therefore the examination of more recent developments in community sanctions, as well as outcomes of recent policy changes in Ireland are of much interest both domestically and

internationally, in order to understand developments in community punishment more fully.

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