Parole, parole boards and the institutional dilemmas of contemporary prison release
Published date | 01 July 2023 |
DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/14624745221097371 |
Author | Thomas C Guiney |
Date | 01 July 2023 |
Parole, parole boards and
the institutional dilemmas
of contemporary prison
release
Thomas C Guiney
University of Nottingham, UK
Abstract
The decision to release is a defining feature of the carceral experience: at once a neces-
sary function of a dynamic penal system, and a highly contested form of symbolic com-
munication where the anxieties and contradictions of contemporary penality begin to
coalesce. In this paper I argue that the institutions we rely upon to make these determi-
nations in a fair, consistent and efficient manner are under increasing strain. Drawing
upon insights from historical institutionalism, I seek to show that the parole board
model of discretionary decision-making that first emerged during the highwater mark
of mid-twentieth century penal modernism has proved remarkably resilient to reform,
but is slowly fracturing into a more complex, multi-layered prison release landscape. I
explore the implications of this gradual historical transformation and conclude this
paper with a call for new ways of thinking about prison release as an increasingly inter-
connected sphere of penal governance.
Keywords
parole, prison release, sentencing, penal policy, institutions
Introduction
The decision to release is a defining feature of the carceral experience: at once a necessary
function of a dynamic penal system, and a highly contested form of symbolic
Corresponding author:
Thomas C Guiney, School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Nottingham, University Park,
Nottingham, NG7 2RD, UK.
Email: thomas.guiney@nottingham.ac.uk
Article
Punishment & Society
2023, Vol. 25(3) 621–640
© The Author(s) 2022
Article reuse guidelines:
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DOI: 10.1177/14624745221097371
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communication where the anxieties and contradictions of contemporary penality begin to
coalesce. Over time, a myriad of penal practices have developed to manage this decision-
making discretion in ways that are consistent with broader political, penological and
administrative aims (van Zyl Smit and Corda, 2018). However, as I seek to show here,
the institutions we have relied upon for more than a generation are under increasing
strain. The decision to release is now highly contested and a bewildering array of
penal developments continue to destabilise existing decision-making structures with sig-
nificant implications for the humanity, fairness and effectiveness of the penal system (see
Freiberg et al., 2018; Padfield, 2020; Reitz and Rhine, 2020)
While by no means exhaustive, this general picture suggests that an ascendant ‘parole
populism’(Moffa et al., 2019) has eroded the rights of prisoners and relegated the careful
work of rehabilitation to the imperatives of an all-encompassing public protection.
Moments of crisis, such as the Worboys case in England and Wales, or the Dutroux
scandal in Belgium, continue to undermine public confidence in the parole system (see
Fitzgerald et al., 2021), while a host of previously excluded policy actors are now ‘press-
ing in’on prison release decision-making with growing assuredness (Annison, 2020: 11).
Release from prison is subject to a plethora of licence conditions (Padfield, 2019) and
parole boards are now firmly established within a broader apparatus of risk management,
community supervision and control (Barry, 2021; Hannah-Moffatt and Yule, 2011). The
extraordinary growth of indeterminate sentencing in some jurisdictions has seen the locus
of sentencing discretion move ‘downstream’from the criminal courts (Rhine et al., 2017)
and an expanding cohort of recall prisoners has renewed longstanding concerns about
executive overreach and the limits of the liberal democratic state (Padfield and
Maruna, 2006).
In this context, the decision to release has become the subject of intense public scru-
tiny and marked differences can now be observed in the recent developmental trajectories
of English-speaking and European penal systems (see van Zyl Smit and Corda, 2018).
The United States has experienced a troubling increase in the number of prisoners
serving life sentences without parole (Seeds, 2021). While in Australia a series of legis-
lative initiatives have restricted the discretion afforded to state-level parole boards, pro-
moted the use of ‘no body no release’clauses and, in some cases, resulted in the use of
emergency legislation to prevent the release of certain named individuals (Moffa et al.,
2019). In many European jurisdictions the direction of travel has been altogether less
punitive, but no less consequential. In the early 2000s, Denmark, Finland and Sweden
acted upon recommendations from the Council of Europe by introducing judicial
systems of release for life-sentence prisoners (Schartmueller, 2019: 392). More recently,
the Republic of Ireland has passed legislation that will place the parole board on a statu-
tory footing and, it is hoped, signify a long-term shift towards a more continental
rights-based approach (Griffin, 2018).
In this paper I want to argue that these examples of contemporary institution building
should be of considerable interest to academic researchers and must be understood as
important objects of study in and of themselves, rather than the simple corollary of
legal powers, individual actions or political calculation. That greater analytical sensitivity
to these meso-level dynamics can open up new vistas for the study of prison release and
622 Punishment & Society 25(3)
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