Profiting from the Poor: Offender-Funded Probation in the USA
| Author | Michael Teague |
Introduction
The study of cross-cultural and cross-national criminology and penology has the potential to offer a range of insights into our own system of criminal and community justice (Nelken, 2010; Pakes, 2015). With the advent of globalization, the speed of interchange in penal developments has accelerated (Nelken, 2011). This involves not just the exchange of academic and practice ideas, but also the ability of multi-national global corporations to become active players in criminal and community justice systems around the world. Cavadino and Dignan’s (2005) definitive comparative study of international penal systems analysed the key differences in punitiveness between countries with neoliberal, corporatist or social democratic political systems. They viewed the USA and the UK (along with Australia and New Zealand) as exemplars of neoliberalism, and mounted a persuasive argument that neoliberal countries have the highest incarceration rates, not least because of the impact of their political and economic structures.
An area in comparative criminology which has attracted substantial academic interest is the ‘apparent convergence of penal policy between ‘neoliberal’ Anglophone jurisdictions (which is) exemplified by the adoption of a punitive and politicized approach to crime and punishment’ (Jones & Newburn, 2013:439). Attention has been focused on the way in which crime control policies have been imported to the UK from the USA (Newburn, 2002; Jones & Newburn, 2006, 2013). To achieve insight into how probation may operate in future years in England and Wales, it is worth turning to our neoliberal American counterparts for a comparative vision of probation in different jurisdictions. Some southern US states (for example, Georgia) offer a dystopian vision of how for-profit probation may function without proper regulation. An example of probation delivery from California is also examined.
Garland (2002) argued that the penal welfarist philosophy underpinning our criminal and community system was being supplanted by popular, and populist, punitiveness. His analysis of the culture of control noted the increased focus on risk assessment and public protection, both of which paralleled the embracing of incarceration as the answer to crime control. As the shift to punitivism gained purchase in USA during the 1970s and 1980s, probation’s rehabilitative impetus waned and political support for a more punitive, ‘tougher’ orientation grew. The result of this was as unsurprising as it was inevitable: towards the end of the twentieth century, more weight was accorded to probation’s law enforcement role, while rehabilitation and reintegration were deprioritised.
The American probation system
While it is inherently difficult to measure punitiveness, it is common currency amongst criminologists that, if imprisonment rates are employed as a barometer, America is the most punitive country in the world (for example, Teague, 2008; Pratt, 2009; Travis, Western et al., 2014). Though mass incarceration has been an intrinsic part of the nation’s penal culture for around four decades (Gottschalk, 2006, 2015), the punishment imperative has also firmly expressed itself within probation. Phelps (2013) analyses the upsurge of community supervision as a US criminal justice sanction and considers its relationship to mass incarceration. Her theoretical model locates probation within the wider continuum of punishment, and concludes that the paradoxical impact of probation is that it ‘exerts both a prison alternative and net-widener effect, with the two forces often cancelling one another out’ (2013:72). ‘Net widening’ refers to the potential of community sentences to convey the unintended consequence of widening the overall net of social control and punishment, resulting in those who might otherwise have been dealt with informally being channelled into the justice and penal systems (McMahon, 1990).
As in the UK, the role of the US probation practitioner was originally designed to promote rehabilitation, and provide social support geared to prevent reoffending. However, as Clear and Frost (2014:156) ruefully conclude, the punishment imperative imposed a more nuanced effect, that of ‘distorting the role of the probation or parole officer’. This distortion facilitated a shift in probation’s role, leading them to conclude that probation and parole practitioners in the USA now ‘mostly function as community surveillance workers’ (2014:157). While this may be contested - it has, for example, been argued that the role of contemporary US probation practitioners is less law enforcement-oriented than it was two decades earlier (Hsieh, Hafoka et al., 2015) - there has been a broad shift in correctional ideology away from rehabilitation oriented intervention.
The criminal and community justice system in the United States is not a monolithic or homogenous entity, and attitudes to - and levels of - correctional intervention vary at a local, state, and national level. The decentralised and sometimes fragmented nature of contemporary US probation can mean that large cities, for example, have two or three probation agencies. The first manifestations of what we would now recognise as probation intervention appeared in America in the mid to late 1800s, though it was not a national phenomenon, evident in every state, until 1956 (Petersilia, 1997; Barton-Bellessa & Hanser, 2011). Phillips (2010) offers comparative insight into the origins of probation in England and Wales and the USA, and way in which these origins have influenced the agency’s organisational structure, value base, and professional practice. Teague (2012a) provides a comparative assessment of the contemporary position of probation in both countries within the context of neoliberal political and economic structures. It is evident that probation in both nations has become progressively more concerned with what we might label as ‘managerialism’ (Garland, 2002). The target and audit culture of key performance indicators, efficiency, measurable outcomes and cost-effectiveness (Whitehead, 2007; Ashworth, 2009; Phillips, 2011) which manifested itself in England and Wales was equally evident in America.
There are areas of US practice that will immediately resonate with UK probation workers. For example, American probation practitioners have confronted ‘enormous challenges in their work, including large caseloads, limited resources, offender management difficulties, and criticism of high recidivism rates and the related threat to public safety’ (Hsieh, Hafoka et al., 2015:2). Even so, there is evidence that the role of the probation officer supervising service users in the community has evolved in recent years from that of ‘a condition-driven brokerage and monitoring specialist to a risk-focused direct-service interventionist that uses behavioural change strategies to promote public safety and reduced victimization’ (Robinson, Lowenkamp et al., 2015:3). What this appears to mean in practice is that US probation workers are now required to score and utilize validated risk and needs assessment instruments in order to measure risk factors and needs that, if addressed, may lower the prospect of reoffending. This would also be recognisable to the UK practitioner.
The qualifications to practice as a probation officer in the USA differ according to the specific state in which they train, but a degree in criminal justice, social work, or an associated field is generally required (Clear, Reisig et al., 2016). In addition, some states seek previous practice experience in either criminal justice or a treatment related field. This is not dissimilar to the way in which UK probation officers have been trained. While the UK observer may recognise some of the intervention in the USA, other spheres of practice...
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