Individualizing Risk: Moral Judgement, Professional Knowledge and Affect in Parole Evaluations

Risk and punishment: The recent history and uncertain future of actuarial, algorithmic, and “evidence‐based” penal techniques

“…A growing body of scholarship questions, challenges, and ultimately complicates this earlier body of research (e.g., the “new penology”) on both conceptual and empirical grounds. A number of authors caution against overemphasizing the extent to which risk technologies, logics, and goals have colonized and transformed penality (Cheliotis, ; Hannah‐Moffat, ; Hutchinson, ; Kemshall, ; Maurutto & Hannah‐Moffat, ; O'Malley, , , ; Robinson, ; Rose, ; Sparks, ; Werth, ; see also Coleman & Sim, ; Hallsworth, ; L. Miller, ). For instance, Pat O'Malley (, , , , ), whose work has been particularly influential, questions how different risk is from approaches that came before, problematizes the idea that risk is displacing other techniques of penal evaluation and management, and challenges the idea that risk is only—or even primarily—aligned with a project of incapacitation and the management of “risky” groups.…”

“…Some view them as effective predictors while some see them as a check on inconsistency and potential bias (Hannah‐Moffat et al, ; Robinson, ; Rudes et al, ). Practitioners also utilize these tools to protect themselves professionally: Utilizing risk instruments complies with institutional mandates and can provide a mechanism for justifying decisions, thereby potentially providing “institutional insulation” from professional censure or job loss (Ballucci, ; Hannah‐Moffat et al, ; Robinson, ; Rudes et al, ; Werth, ).…”

“…As Cheliotis (, p. 314) contends, it would be a mistake to view “penal agents as executive automata or docile bodies entrapped in the “iron cage” of an over‐rationalized criminal justice system.” Rather, we can conceive of correctional personnel as more akin to “street‐level bureaucrats” (see Lipsky, ) responsible for the everyday interpretation and enactment of penal policy (see Garland, ). A number of studies show that practitioners sometimes “push back” against risk techniques: They alter, minimize, subvert, or resist them in various ways (Ballucci, ; Bonta, Rugge, Scott, Bourgon, & Yessine, ; Bullock, ; Ibarra, Gur, & Erez, ; Kemshall, ; Kemshall & McGuire, ; Lynch, ; McNeill, Burns, Halliday, Hutton, & Tata, ; Rengifo, Stemen, & Amidon, ; Robinson, ; Rudes et al, ; Werth, ). Even when promoted by policy makers and upper managers, practitioners sometimes view actuarial assessments as less effective and trustworthy than their own clinical, professional evaluations (Hilton & Simmons, ; Krysik & LeCroy, ; Lynch, ; McNeill et al, ; Werth, ).…”

Juvenile Facility Staff Contestations of Change

“…Recent work has pointed to the role of state actors in their responses to and within systems of punishment and social control (Garland, 2013, Cheliotis, 2006. Scholars have highlighted the practices and perspectives of state actors, such as prosecutors, prison guards, and police officers, in the context of a penal field that is often deeply contested and dynamic, and where punishment and 'treatment' often merge (Page, 2011, Rubin and Phelps, 2017, Barker, 2009, Lacey and Soskice, 2015, Pfaff, 2017, Werth, 2017, Rudes et al, 2011, Stuart, 2016. Youth justice scholars have revealed the role that workers play in contesting and managing reforms, expressing divergent and sometimes contradictory narratives about punishment and change, and shaping ideas about youth criminality (Kelly and Armitage, 2014, Gray, 2013, Ward and Kupchik, 2008.…”

Discourses of Mass Probation: From Managing Risk to Ending Human Warehousing in Michigan

“…McCorkle and Crank (1996) argue that departments adopted “organizational ceremonies … to demonstrate to a political constituency that they could relieve prison crowding, control crime, and provide adequate punishment to offenders,” (3) while changing little about the daily routines of probation supervision. Ethnographic accounts across countries show that parole and probation officers in the 1990s through the 2010s resisted the push to become “waste managers,” and instead continued to articulate rehabilitative logics (or a social work orientation) and selectively implemented actuarial tools to reinforce their own judgement (in the U.S., see Bayens, Manske, Smykla 1998; Lemert 1993; Lynch 2000; Rudes 2012; Werth 2016; for European countries, see Bullock 2011; Hannah-Moffat, Maurutto, & Turnbull 2009; Robinson 2002). However, in the U.S., massively expanding caseloads throughout this period meant that resources were stretched thin, particularly for treatment-oriented services, and revocation rates increased precipitously (Caplow & Simon 1999; Lynch 2000).…”