Introduction: Interpreting Penal Policymaking
| Date | 01 September 2018 |
| Author | JOHN BOSWELL,HARRY ANNISON,MARK TELFORD |
| Published date | 01 September 2018 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/hojo.12282 |
The Howard Journal Vol57 No 3. September 2018 DOI: 10.1111/hojo.12282
ISSN 2059-1098, pp. 295–301
Introduction:
Interpreting Penal Policymaking
HARRY ANNISON, JOHN BOSWELL and MARK TELFORD
Harry Annison is Associate Professor, Southampton Law School, Southampton
University; John Boswell is Associate Professor, Politics, Southampton
University; Mark Telford is Principal Teaching Fellow, Southampton Law
School, Southampton University
This special issue contributes to the efforts to understand and explain pe-
nal change by exploring and illustrating what it means to examine penal
policymaking through a range of interpretive lenses and via a number of
specific case studies. There is, at present, renewed interest in the explo-
ration of penal change and the political dynamics that drive, underpin,
and relate to, developments in penal policy and practice (see, for example,
Barker and Miller 2017; Birkett 2018; Goodman, Page and Phelps 2017;
Jennings et al. 2018; Lacey, Soskice and Hope 2018; Loader and Sparks
2016; Reiner 2017). This latest wave of scholarship is situated within, and
owes great intellectual debts to, a rich extant literature whose foundations,
due to the interdisciplinary nature of penological scholarship, span law,
sociology, philosophy, social theory, political science, and beyond.
Underpinning all of the articles in this special issue is a motivation
elucidated recently by Barker and Miller (2017), who have emphasised the
value of case study research in examining the complex dynamics between
State power and penal order.Close analysis of specific developments allows
for ‘complex causality, multiplicity of tools, high internal validity, and levels
of analyses that can open up internal workings of institutions and their
relationships to historical processes’ (Barker and Miller 2017, p.421). We
entirely agree. The articles contained in this special issue demonstrate the
value of such approaches and the potential for valuable dialogue between
studies that analyse different ‘levels’ of policymaking and through different
theoretical lenses in order better to understand penal change.
As Rogan argues in her article, one of the most attractive features of
interpretive policy analysis is its ability to provide a detailed and nuanced
account of how the actions of policymakers interact with, shape, and are
shaped by, broader social and cultural forces. For, as she has asserted
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2018 The Howard League and John Wiley & Sons Ltd
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