Honour and respect in Danish prisons: Contesting ‘cognitive distortions’ in cognitive-behavioural programmes
| Author | Ben Laws,Julie Laursen |
| DOI | 10.1177/1462474516649175 |
| Published date | 01 January 2017 |
| Date | 01 January 2017 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Punishment & Society
2017, Vol. 19(1) 74–95
!The Author(s) 2016
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DOI: 10.1177/1462474516649175
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Article
Honour and respect
in Danish prisons:
Contesting ‘cognitive
distortions’ in cognitive-
behavioural programmes
Julie Laursen
University of Aalborg, Denmark
Ben Laws
University of Cambridge, UK
Abstract
Using empirical data from prison-based cognitive-behavioural programmes, this article
considers how prisoners’ subcultural capital shapes their responses to demands for
‘cognitive self-change’. We argue that accounts of ‘respect’ in the prior literature fail
to capture how prisoners react to these programmes, and that a discussion of honour
(and what we term ‘respect plus’) needs to be incorporated. The empirical material
derives from four different cognitive-behavioural programme setups in three Danish
prisons and semi-structured interviews with participants and course instructors. By
attempting to create accountable and rational actors, who ‘self-manage’, the therapeutic
ethos neglects participants’ life experiences and subcultural capital. Open expressions of
moral values by prisoners (such as displays of honour and respect) are considered to be
cognitive distortions which are dismissed by instructors, while alternative and ‘correct’
thinking styles are prescribed. Our findings advance understandings of the meanings of
honour and respect in prisons in general and in cognitive-behavioural programmes in
particular.
Keywords
cognitive-behavioural programmes, honour, prisons, respect, subcultural capital
Corresponding author:
Julie Laursen, Department of Sociology and Social Work, University of Aalborg, Denmark.
Email: Laursen@socsci.aau.dk
Introduction
Denmark has one of the world’s strongest welfarist profiles. In the sphere of pen-
ology, this translates to an emphasis on rehabilitation, normalisation, low incar-
ceration rates and humane prison regimes – a clear example of what Pratt (2008)
terms ‘Scandinavian exceptionalism’. However, Denmark was not immune to the
so-called punitive turn that emerged in the 1990s which resulted in longer sentences
for violent crimes and ‘tough on crime’ rhetoric (Balvig, 2005; Smith, 2015). This
shift has not rejected, but instead merged with the older, rehabilitative ideals, fusing
punitiveness and penal-welfarism. This combination creates complex demands for
the professionals in prison as well as the prisoners on the receiving end of these
changes. More broadly, the changes in the penal field are related to ideological
shifts in the Danish welfare state across a wide array of otherwise diverse fields,
such as young offender institutions, unemployment policies and cognitive-beha-
vioural programmes (hereafter CBPs) in schools and kindergartens (Jensen and
Prieur, 2015: 1).
In the context of these concerns, this article shows how prisoners’ distinctive
relationships to subcultural capital, masculinity and respect, all intersect and often
undermine the programming goals of the Danish Prison and Probation Service.
In a penal context which is internationally renowned for its ‘uniform’ culture,
where prisoners, officers and citizens share similar forms of social capital, these
results may seem surprising. However, Denmark is an example of how Anglophone
penal policies are translated, negotiated and transformed in a penal-welfare para-
digm. The seemingly contradictory ideologies of welfare and risk are now operating
simultaneously in a ‘late-modern hybrid’ in an unanticipated manner (Kolind et al.,
2015: 316). We can observe, for example, how CBPs and risk assessment tools (such
as the Risk-Need-Responsivity instrument, Andrews and Bonta, 2010) originally
developed for an Anglophone prison system are implemented in the Danish system
and transform penal practices, prisons and relationships between officers and
prisoners (Laursen, forthcoming). This article thus reveals a fair amount
of cultural resonance (despite the obvious differences in sheer size and breadth of
the penal regimes) between Anglophone prison research and the current state of
Danish prisons. We draw on Anglophone research (such as Crewe, 2009; Fox,
1999, 2000) both due to the usefulness of these studies and for a more pragmatic
reason; hardly any Scandinavian research has been done on CBPs.
Taking inspiration from penal developments in Canada (Philip, 1996; Smith,
2006), the Danish Prison Service bought and implemented CBPs in 1994: currently,
seven programmes are available across the Prison and Probation service. The pro-
grammes were selected because of their promise to reduce recidivism and improve
the prisoners’ social and interpersonal skills. The Canadian programme developers
(Ross and Fabiano, 1985) claim that ‘offenders’ are more likely to be impulsive,
egocentric, rigid in their views, and poor at problem-solving, perspective taking and
critical reasoning. The CBPs focus on individual responsibility and expect partici-
pants to set their own standards for appropriate conduct through self-reflective
analysis of their own thoughts and behaviours (Sjo
¨berg and Windfeldt, 2008: 39).
Laursen and Laws 75
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