Review: The Prisons Handbook 2000 Mark Leech & Deborah Cheney (eds) Waterside Press, 1999; pp528; £43.50 + £4 p&p, pbk ISBN 1872870821
| DOI | 10.1177/026455050004700322 |
| Author | Neil Stone |
| Date | 01 September 2000 |
| Published date | 01 September 2000 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
but that I may already have dealt with
them unknowingly and oppressively due
to my own stereotypical assumptions. This
is not in any way a &dquo;How to avoid
oppressive practice&dquo; style manual, but it is
difficult to imagine that anyone reading it
could fail to engage with and consider at
least some of the issues raised.
The content ranges from the
implications and effectiveness of
community notification of sex-offenders
to working with offenders with gender
dysphoria, challenging racism, sexism
and heterosexism en route. It considers
the ramifications of dealing with
dangerous women, for whom many of the
tools used to address male offending
The Prisons Handbook 2000
are
unavailable or inappropriate. A chapter on
Mark Leech &
Deborah Cheney (eds)
gay male domestic violence contains a
Waterside Press, 1999; pp528; £43.50
well placed warning about the accurate
+ £4 p&p,
pbk
assessment of risk in such situations.
ISBN 1872870821
When making risk assessments we cannot
This fourth edition of the Handbook
afford to regard sexuality as the personal
contains, in the Home Secretary’s words:
business of the offender if it impacts on
&dquo;an awesome amount of information.&dquo;
their offending, and we will not know this
And he’s right! According to one of the
if we do not ask. There is a fine line
editors, Mark Leech, himself a former
between non-judgemental acceptance of
prisoner, the Handbook is designed to
an alternative lifestyle and a collusive
provide information for the 65,000
failure to address areas of real potential
prisoners in England and Wales (that
danger.
figure would have been 47,000 ten years
&dquo;To honestly contemplate one’s own
ago) and their families as well as Prison
investment in society means accepting
staff and associated professions.
that one may be oppressive to some
The brief that this book takes on is as
others.&dquo; This is an uncomfortable
wide as it is heavy and there is a wealth of
challenge, and faced with the increasingly
...
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