Co-producing digitally-enabled courses that promote desistance in prison and probation settings
| Pages | 269-279 |
| Published date | 03 December 2018 |
| Date | 03 December 2018 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JCRPP-07-2018-0023 |
| Author | Jason Morris,Victoria Knight |
| Subject Matter | Health & social care,Criminology & forensic psychology |
Co-producing digitally-enabled courses
that promote desistance in prison and
probation settings
Jason Morris and Victoria Knight
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to set out an approach to innovation in criminal justice settings that
gives service users a “voice”through the co-production of digital content designed for services that promote
desistance. The authors describe the benefits and challenges of involving service users in co-creating
mediated digital content within a co-production framework.
Design/methodology/approach –This paper presents a new methodology for developing
desistance-oriented programmes. The authors draw on a distinctive co-production exemplar within a
prison setting that captures the perspectives of people who have sharedtheir voices and the authors begin to
explore the impact that co-production has had for them and for the service.
Findings –The testimonies of service users involved in this exemplar provide insights into the benefits and
challenges of co-production in the criminal justice system more broadly.
Practical implications –Co-production is a credible service design strategy for developing digital services
in prisons and probation; Complementary Digital Media (CDM) provides a promising pedagogical approach
to promoting desistance; CDM enables service users to share their voice and stories to assist their peers.
Digitally enabled courses to promote desistance can be well suited to peer support delivery models.
Originality/value –CDM is a novel approach that uses co-production to create highly tailored content to
promote desistance in discrete target groups. CDM can be used to digitalise processes within traditional
offending behaviour programmes (OBPs). It can also enable the development of innovative toolkit
approaches for flexible use within day-to-day therapeutic conversations between service users and criminal
justice staff or peer supporters. CDM thereby offers practitioners in criminal justice settings an entirely new set
of evidence-informed resources to engage service users.
Keywords Treatment, Offenders, Risk, Management, Evidence-based practice, Throughcare
Paper type Viewpoint
Digitalisation of justice
Van De Steene and Knight (2017) identify a range of opportunities and challenges associated
with the digitalisation of prisons. Our justice system is at the cusp of a digital revolution and
expectations that all service users will engage with digital services are gaining momentum.
Advancements in the use of technology in the criminal justice system (CJS) have led to
suggestions that “the inevitability of digital transformation is set to shape the way justice is done
and experienced”(Van De Steene and Knight, 2017, p. 256).
The deprivation of digital technology whilst in prison has the potential to create hidden harms by
rendering people in prisons as digital “cavemen”(or women) (Jewkes and Johnston, 2009) and
leading to “digital jet-lag”upon reentry to the community (Knight, 2016). In the context of prison
settings, digital services have the potential to transform people’s imprisonment and their journey
towards desistance (“the long-term abstinence from criminal behaviour”; McNeill et al., 2012,
p. 3). Knight (2015) highlights that the benefits of maintaining digital engagement as therapeutic
and contributing to the safer custody and decency agendas. Moreover, in an academic context,
Received 31 July 2018
Revised 18 September 2018
Accepted 18 September 2018
The authors acknowledge that the
authors have to be sensitive and
responsive to the service’s
perspective and have to balance in
delicately and diplomatically how
this paper is written. As a result
the innovation described here has
been peer reviewed by not only
scholars but practitioners and
managers also. NB –This paper
provides an exposition of the
authors’views on co-producing
technology that supports
desistance. It is not intended to
set out HMPPS policy on digital
rehabilitative services nor
co-production methods.
Jason Morris is National
Specialist Lead –Domestic
Violence at the Her Majesty’s
Prisons and Probation Service,
London, UK.
Victoria Knight is Senior
Research Fellow at the De
Montfort University,
Leicester, UK.
DOI 10.1108/JCRPP-07-2018-0023 VOL. 4 NO. 4 2018, pp.269-279, © Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 2056-3841
j
JOURNAL OF CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH, POLICY AND PRACTICE
j
PAGE269
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