On What Grounds?
| Date | 01 March 1982 |
| Published date | 01 March 1982 |
| Author | Richard Pinder |
| DOI | 10.1177/026455058202900107 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
19
ON
WHAT
GROUNDS?
Negotiating
Justice
with
black
Clients
Richard
Pinder
Applied
Anthropology
Group,
University
of
Leeds
In
the
December
1981
edition
we
printed
an
article
on
’Young
Rastafarians
and
the
Probation
Service’.
The
authors
drew
attention
to
the
extent
of
changes
in
understanding
and
practice
which
were
needed
if
the
Service
was
to
be
seen
as
other
than
irrelevant
or
hostile
to
young
blacks.
Here,
we
publish
an
account
of
unorthodox
work
by
one
probation
officer,
who
has
been
struggling
to
negotiate
the
establishment
of
practice,
acceptable
to
his
black
clients
and
his
employers.
We
started
having
this
thing
on
a
Mon-
day
night...
Whtrt
used
to
happen
was,
we
used
to
have
shouting
and
jumping
up
and
down
sessions,
people
just
being
exhibitionist
or
awkward,
then
you
would
get
a
period
of
serious
conversation,
when
an
issue
would
arise
and
people
would
seize
on it
and
we
would
try
to
seize
on it
and
try
and
push
it
forward
a
bit,
but
obviously
the
group
dictated
what
they
w~r~nted
to
talk
abou,t
in
the
end.
MARTIN
AUSTWICK
’This
thing’
was
an
informal
report-
Ing
session
run
by
Martin
Austwick,
a
Leeds
probation
officer,
at
the
Palace
Hostel
in
Chapeltown
from
1979
to
1981.1
The
Hostel
served
not
only
as
home
for
up
to
a
dozen
lads
but
also
as
focal
point
for
the
other
activities-
youth
club,
workschemes,
playschemes-
undertaken
over
several
years
by
the
Palace
Youth
Project2
with
and
for
young
black
people
in
trouble.
In
its
time,
the
Palace
has
aroused
suspicion
and
hostility.
It
has
also
developed
a
critical
role
within
Chapeltown,
best
demonstrated
In
its
success
in
organising
peaceful
bonfire
night
celebrations
in
1980
and
1981,
bringing
to
an
end
what
had
become
a
tradition
of
violent
con-
frontations
between
black
lads
and
the
police
on
that
night.
The
Palace
is
thus
caught
un
in
various
wavs
in
issues
of
justice
in
Chapeltown.
Lads
subject
to
various
kinds
of
order
were
to
be
found
at
the
Palace.
As
they
would
report
to
a
probation
office
only
intermittently,
Martin
promoted
the idea
of
a
reporting
session
at
the
Palace.
He
later
summed
up
the
logic:
&dquo;I
don’t
think
the
probation
officer
is
that
signi-
j
ficant:
you’ve
got
to
make
yourself
significant ...
by
getting
to
see
them
on
their
own
ground.&dquo;
To
be
a
probation
officer
’on
their
ground’
is
a
matter,
not
of
imposing
terms
on
them,
but
of
coming
to
terms
with
them.
This
article
is
about
’getting
to
see
them
on
their
own
ground’.
It
is
based
on
a
far
from
extensive
research
investiga-
tion.
During
April
and
May,
1981,
I
made
six
visits
to
the
Palace:
on
five
of
them
I
observed
Martin’s
work
at
the
two-hour
reporting
session;
the
sixth
was
to
a
management
committee
meeting.
I
also
studied
files
on
seven
of
the
lads
supervised
at
the
Palace
and,
finally,
tape-recorded
an
interview
with
Martin.
The
question
throughout
was:
What
form
does
probation
practice
take
in
such
a
context?
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