Politicisation or Professionalisation? Exploring Divergent Aims Within UK Voluntary Sector Peer Mentoring
| Date | 01 September 2019 |
| Author | GILLIAN BUCK |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/hojo.12305 |
| Published date | 01 September 2019 |
The Howard Journal Vol58 No 3. September 2019 DOI: 10.1111/hojo.12305
ISSN 2059-1098, pp. 349–365
Politicisation or Professionalisation?
Exploring Divergent Aims Within UK
Voluntary Sector Peer Mentoring
GILLIAN BUCK
Senior Lecturer in Social Work, University of Chester
Abstract: Meaningful ‘user involvement’ is an established aim of social work practice,
and increasingly, an aspiration of criminal justice, yet there are unique challenges to
participatory work within punitive contexts. Drawing upon a study of peer mentoring
in the voluntary sector, this article unveils some core tensions related to (ex)service user
involvement in criminal justice. Interviews with mentors, mentees, and key stakeholders,
along with direct observations of practice, reveal that respondents often see their work as
personal-political, emphasising the value of lived expertise and of collective action to ad-
dress limiting social conditions. Simultaneously, however, mentoring is framed nationally
and shaped locally by more established aims to correct, improve, and manage, individual
‘offenders’. There is, therefore, a fundamental tension between processes of politicisation,
or coming together to assert a user voice and affect social change; and professionalisation,
wherein mentors are co-opted into forms of practice they often critique.
Keywords: criminal justice; peer mentoring; rehabilitation; user involvement
Peer mentoring in criminal justice is an approach which draws upon the
knowledge of people with lived experiences of crime and justice, to offer
‘credible’ inspiration and support to people in prison and community
justice settings (see Buck 2017, 2018; Maruna 2017). While the roots of
such ‘mutual aid’ have a long history (Maruna 2017), the approach has been
bolstered in England and Wales in recent years by policy aims to employ
(ex)‘offenders’ as ‘wise friends’ for people leaving prison (Grayling 2012).
Indeed, this supportive ‘through the gate’ approach formed a central part
of government plans for transforming rehabilitation (Ministry of Justice
2013).
The recognition of the value of lived experiences in justice settings is
not an isolated development, rather it forms part of an increasing em-
phasis on service user engagement in human services, given the necessity
for methods that better suit service users’ primary needs (Hughes 2012)
and reduce the divisions between recipients and providers (Beresford
2016, p.310). Simultaneously there has been a political drive to develop
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2019 The Howard League and John Wiley & Sons Ltd
Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK
The Howard Journal Vol58 No 3. September 2019
ISSN 2059-1098, pp. 349–365
volunteering in criminal justice (Cabinet Office 2010; Ministry of Jus-
tice 2008). In 2011, the National Offender Management Service (NOMS)
awarded grant funding to eight voluntary and community sector or-
ganisations to form the NOMS volunteering and mentoring programme
(Willoughby, Parker and Ali 2013). This constituted a strategic drive to in-
crease the number of volunteer mentors for adults with convictions. Such a
transfer of penal roles to community-level actors, Corcoran (2012) argues,
‘is premised on a blend of neoliberal political rationalities for restructuring
state welfare systems as “mixed service markets” in late capitalist societies
and communitarian aspirations to liberate the untapped social capital of the
community and voluntary sectors’ (p.17, italics added). This curious mix
of two different philosophies with overlapping interests is also present in
the history of user involvement more broadly. For example, Beresford
(2002) argues that ‘two conceptual models to participation have predomi-
nated since the 1990’s [ . .. these are] “consumerist”’ and “democratic” ap-
proaches’ (p.96). The consumerist approach is concerned with improving
welfare ‘products’ through ‘consumer’ feedback and consultation, whereas
the democratic approach is concerned with people having more say in or-
ganisations which impact on them and more control over their own lives.
While the consumerist approach emphasises ‘efficiency,economy and effec-
tiveness’, the democratic approach foregrounds civil rights and collective
action and is ‘explicitly political’ (Beresford 2002, p.97). Similarly, Cowden
and Singh (2007) trace two opposing stories of the ‘user movement’: one
story involves the success of service users gaining a voice in decision-making
spaces, research and education; the other is a story of incorporation into
a system ‘driven by managerial, rather than democratizing imperatives’,
wherein service users are framed as consultants rather than activists (p.20).
This article will explore the extent to which these different underpinning
drivers can be traced in criminal justice contexts.
The Research Study
The data presented here are drawn from a qualitative, ethnographic study
of four voluntary sector peer mentoring settings in the north of England.
In an attempt to represent the lived experiences of those involved, a mixed
methods approach was adopted, including 44 semi-structured interviews
with key players (18 mentors, 20 mentees, four co-ordinators and two re-
ferring probation officers). Semi-structured interviews were employed to
offer ‘opportunity for dialogue and exchange between the interviewer and
interviewee’ (Noaks and Wincup 2004, p.79). Observations were also un-
dertaken, including: volunteer recruitment days, mentor training courses,
a volunteer supervision session, and peer mentoring groups. The approach
was ethnographic, in that it balanced ‘detailed documentation of events
with insights into their meaning to those involved’ (Fielding 2008, p.267).
A purposive sampling method was adopted, as projects relevant to the
topic were ‘hand-picked’ (Denscombe 2014, p.41) if they were operating
in the voluntary sector and delivering peer mentoring in a criminal jus-
tice context. The final sample included: a peer-led service attached to
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2019 The Howard League and John Wiley & Sons Ltd
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