Abstract
The purpose of this article is to analyse the experiences of probation officers who supervise women in the community in Catalonia. To this end, qualitative research involving 15 semi-structured interviews with probation officers in Barcelona and Girona was carried out. The results show that professionals agree that there are important gender differences in relation to: (a) personal and penal characteristics and (b) supervision style. The perceptions of practitioners and existing empirical data are broadly consistent. Women who serve community sentences have a wide range of problems, needs and responsibilities compared to men, which is often reflected in the fact that women's attendance is much more irregular, an issue that presents multiple challenges for practitioners. Probation officers already carry out different gender-responsive practises, however, they face different challenges in a gender-insensitive probation system. Furthermore, given the great heterogeneity of the female service users compared to the men, service provision for women in the community also needs to be intersectionally-responsive. Based on these disparities, the elements of probation that the professionals believe work better with women and those that could be improved are discussed.
Introduction
This article explores the extent to which Catalan probation officers adopt a gender responsive approach when working with women who offend. It argues that probation officers are aware that there are important gender differences with regard to personal and penal characteristics and supervision styles. Furthermore, it is highlighted that there are specific practises that work with female offenders and professionals perform some of these. In Spain, there is a lack of research about the experiences of probation officers working with women in the community. As in other jurisdictions, the few studies on the experiences of women serving sentences in the community conclude that women have specific needs, characteristics and problems that should be taken into account during the implementation of community sentences (Vasilescu, 2020). This study analyses whether professionals working with the community-based population are also aware of these factors and the implications they have on the implementation of community measures.
Internationally, there are numerous studies on women serving community sentences that examine both the experiences of the women themselves and the experiences of the professionals who supervise them (Gelsthorpe et al., 2007; Sheehan et al., 2007, 2011; Worrall and Gelsthorpe, 2009). This research has pointed out that interventions and practises that simply ‘add and stir’ do not work for female offenders (Annison et al., 2018; Barry and McIvor, 2010; Gelsthorpe and Hedderman, 2012) because generally, community sentences, like prison sentences, have historically been designed with men in mind (Gelsthorpe et al., 2007: 7).
In fact, in jurisdictions like Kenya, but especially in the Anglosphere (United Kingdom, Canada, United States and Australia), there has long been talk of introducing a ‘gender-responsive approach’ into the criminal justice system (Fulham, 2019; Phoenix Khan, 2017, 2018) based on the need to recognise the differences between women and men (Covington and Bloom, 2006) in order to provide a more equitable response to all users (Wright and Kemshall, 1994). The UN Bangkok Rules (2011, Article 57) were also key in pointing out that community sentences should be adapted to women's needs. In fact, the development of these rules was so significant that, as a result, various alternatives to prison designed on the basis of female users have been implemented around the world (Fulham, 2019).
In Spain, there is a need for research that focuses on analysing whether, from the perspective of probation officers, there are also significant gender differences in the characteristics of the user population and in the implementation of community sentences. These professionals have the important task of supervising and intervening with women service users and their experiences will allow us to know which elements work and which could be improved to achieve a gender-responsive probation service. To analyse the experiences of probation officers, 15 semi-structured interviews were carried out in Barcelona and Girona. Those factors that professionals identify as specifically positive for women users coincide to a large extent with those that women themselves identify as good practises (Vasilescu, 2020). However, the lack of a gender-responsive approach within the Catalan Probation System will also be discussed.
Probation officers in the Catalan probation system
In Spain, there are two probation systems, one in Catalonia under the direction of the Department of Justice of the Catalan Autonomous Government, and the other for the rest of the Spanish territory, under the direction of the General Secretariat of Penitentiary Institutions. Both have different professional cultures and practises (further detail available in: Blay and Larrauri, 2016). This research has been carried out in Catalonia, where the Department of Justice has developed a system for supervising offenders in the community similar to probation systems in other jurisdictions (Blay, 2019).
Catalan probation users can be made subject to community service orders or unpaid work that could be in the form of work, of compulsory attendance at an educational programme, therapeutic treatment or mixed (group or individual therapeutic sessions for women who have experienced abuse, basic skills programmes and programmes to help young mothers with parenting, among others); suspended sentences with requirements which can be carried out in groups or individually, with conditions such as educational programmes for people who have committed specific offences like motoring offences, domestic/gender-based violence offences or job integration programmes, literacy or language learning programmes, among others; and suspended sentences for drug users and ordinary suspended sentences.
In Catalonia, community sentence management has been carried out by non-profit organisations since 2010. Each of the four territories (Barcelona, Girona, Tarragona and Lleida) has probation teams that are generally made up of a manager and between six and eleven probation officers per team. For this study, probation officers from Barcelona and Girona were interviewed. In Girona there are currently two teams: Team Girona South and Team Girona North. The non-profit organisation responsible for community sentence management is INTRESS (Institute of Social Work and Social Services). In Barcelona, there are ten teams and unlike the other territories, there are specialised teams for each type of community sentence. There are teams that only manage service users who are sentenced to unpaid work and other teams that manage users undertaking community sentences with therapeutic and educational content and suspended prison sentences with requirements. In addition, in Barcelona, two non-profit organisations coexist: APIP-ACAM (Association for the Promotion and Professional Insertion and Civic Association of Mutual Help) and IRES (Institute of Social Reinsertion Foundation). The former is responsible for management of community service involving unpaid work, and the latter for all other community sentences.
The probation officers play an essential role in the Catalan Probation System (Blay, 2019). These professionals, who have training in criminology, psychology, social work and law, are distributed throughout the Catalan territory and are responsible for supervising and monitoring people placed on probation. Each probation officer supervises between 60 and 70 probation users through periodic interviews, but in practise, the frequency and the content of the interviews depend on the problems and needs of users and the community sentence they are serving (Vasilescu, 2020). Their tasks also include regular reports to the judge on the progress of probation users and maintaining contact with the supervisors of the unpaid work placements, the training and educational programmes and the drug rehabilitation centres (among others). According to the regulations 1 , probation officers are also tasked with providing appropriate socio-educational support to facilitate successful compliance with the community sentence and the reintegration of people into society. However, it should be noted that probation officers, especially the teams with responsibility for service users undertaking unpaid work, complain about the high caseload and an increasing number of management tasks, which they perceive as obstacles to establishing quality relationships and to more effective interventions in general.
Given the important task that probation officers carry out and given the lack of studies on the subject, this study provides an important and necessary examination of their experiences and perceptions of working with women.The methodology used and also some characteristics of the profile of the probation officers interviewed will be presented below.
Methodology
This research draws on a completed doctoral thesis which aimed to make visible women serving community sentences and to learn about the experience of probation officers supervising the probation population. As a result, the data collection technique used was semi-structured in-depth interviews. The first interviews were held in Girona in November 2018 and the last in Barcelona in June 2019. The research deployed a snowball sampling method, whereby the author's previous contacts with some probation officers facilitated the rest of the contacts. This is not an insider research, but the previous contact was based on professional relationships with some probation managers and probation officers through the university. The only condition was that the professionals had experience supervising both men and women. The two Girona teams are made up of 15 probation officers. The two Barcelona teams are made up of 14 probation officers. The sample resulted in 15 interviewees and is considered representative in terms of age, training, gender, and experience (Ruiz Olabuénaga, 2012: 51). No further information is provided on the sample because of the risk of identifying the professionals interviewed. Interviews were conducted until saturation. An effort was made to seek out probation officers to maximise the diversity of the data and to ensure that saturation was based on a wide range of experiences and perceptions of supervision of the female and male user population. In addition, although 15 of the 29 probation officers were interviewed, the perceptions of some of the probation officers who were not directly interviewed were also explored during the fieldwork (usually during breaks) and coincided with those of the interviewees. This allowed for confidence in the sample saturation.
The interviews took place in the INTRESS offices in Girona and the Ciutat de Justícia (´City of Justicé) in Barcelona. The data collected has been kept within the parameters of confidentiality as required by law. Before starting the interview, the purpose of the research, the procedure for data collection and the guarantee of anonymity were explained. Participants were informed that the data would not be used for any purpose other than academic reports or publications and that the results would always be presented in an anonymised form, so that it is not possible to identify the participants. Protecting the anonymity of the participants was of paramount importance throughout the process, particularly due to the sensitive nature of the research topic. At no time were participants pressured to answer any questions and they were free not to continue with the interview or to leave altogether. Therefore, all details that could identify participants were also omitted, most importantly their name, so pseudonyms were used. Interviewers had to give their consent to continue with the interview. The interviews lasted between one hour and three hours. Interviews were recorded and subsequently transcribed. A scripted outline with pre-established topics was used for the interviews. However, during the interview other topics were left free to emerge.
Before proceeding to the results of the interviews, some characteristics of all Girona and Barcelona probation officers are presented below to better contextualise the present research.
As can be seen in Tables 1 and 2 above, and as in other countries (Dominey, 2015; McCulloch et al., 2020), there is a clear feminisation of the Catalan Probation System. More than half of the probation officers in both provinces are women. On the other hand, the vast majority of professionals are Spanish. These predominant characteristics may have subtle consequences for the relationships between professionals and users established during community sentence implementation (Dominey, 2015; McCulloch et al., 2020). Broadly speaking, in the case of Catalonia, 92% of the user population is male and 8% of the user population is female; approximately 30% of the population is immigrant and more than half of the population is over 36 years of age. For reliable data on the population serving community sentences in Catalonia and specifically on women offenders, see Vasilescu (2020, 2021; Vasilescu and López-Riba, 2021).
Characteristics of Girona probation officers.
Characteristics of Barcelona probation officers.
Given recent evidence, which identifies a clear relationship between pro-social modelling and desistance, it should be a priority to balance the characteristics of professionals in such a way that they are more representative of the service users (Howard League for Penal Reform, 1999; McCulloch et al., 2020). For example, international literature highlights as a specific good practise for women the possibility of being supervised by a probation officer of the same gender (Barnett, 2012; Clarke, 2004; Women’s Breakout, 2016). Other studies also show that immigrant users would benefit from being supervised by a professional of the same ethnic origin (Dominey, 2015). This will not only be useful in improving the experiences of individual users, but primarily because it could bring about a major change in the culture of the probation system (Howard League for Penal Reform, 1999: 15).
In any case, the interviewees are considered representative in terms of gender and nationality. Despite not being able to provide more detailed information about the professionals interviewed because there would be a risk of identifying the participants, it could be said that generally speaking, probation officers in Catalonia are young Spanish females. The issues which are the focus of the qualitative interviews, and which will be presented in this article are: experiences of probation officers supervising women and men offenders with respect to personal and penal characteristics and supervision style.
Interview findings: working with women offenders in the community
Personal and penal characteristics
When probation officers were asked about possible differences between men and women under supervision, all professionals, without exception, agreed that there are important gender differences. ‘Of course, there are differences. The reality is that we have few cases of female offenders but they are much more extreme and complicated cases than those of male offenders. I’m not saying that there aren't male offenders with complicated histories, but I think that for every man like that, there are 5 women, really.’
The professionals interviewed agree that although the number of female users is low - on 31 December 2019, there were 740 women serving community sentences and 7,042 men - women present more problems and needs compared to men. In fact, the words that were most repeated regarding the cases of female offenders were ‘more problematic’ and ‘more complex’. When asked why they had this perception, probation officers firstly referred to the traumatic experiences of women. ‘Most, if not all women, have in fact suffered violence of some kind and I think that these complicated life circumstances are a result of the basic problem: the gender-violence suffered. It has marked them for life and many times, unfortunately, the consequences are not easy to detect. You have to dedicate time. It is something very serious and it is clear that it can affect the course of their whole life and of the community sentence.’ ‘The women who come here show you how the violence they suffered previously has led them to do things they would not have done otherwise and yes, some are here because they committed a crime against their partner, but usually a partner who was an aggressor with her first It is a very complicated circle.’
Unfortunately, this is characteristic of women in the criminal justice system globally (Barr, 2019; Hedderman et al., 2008). In our jurisdiction, this element stood out in most of the interviews that have been conducted with women offenders (Vasilescu, 2020) and also in a quantitative study that analysed the gender differences between women and men serving community sentences (Vasilescu, 2020). Furthermore, the relationship that may exist between the prior victimisation of women and their subsequent criminalisation has been highlighted in the extensive literature on this issue (Barr, 2019; Prison Reform Trust, 2018). However, according to probation officers, these traumatic experiences presented by a large number of female users, interact with other needs and problems. ‘Many women have a history of horrible drug dependency. Also, some have prostituted themselves, women I have had and those of other probation officers. But you don't really know if they have prostituted themselves or if they have been sexually assaulted. And women with more serious disorders than men or multiple mental problems.’ ‘Lack of resources, evictions, many mental problems, more than men, and working life is worse, much more precarious.’
Therefore, there are multiple needs and problems that differentiate women and men users, among which the following stand out: mental health problems, which according to the probation officers, in the case of women are multiple or aggravated by previous traumas, economic precariousness due to an unstable working life and situations of extreme poverty, evictions, drug use and sex working.
Another added difficulty for female offenders that many probation officers highlight is that ‘many of them are in charge of everything. Or they have children in their care and their husband is in prison’ (Ida) with a ‘recurrent, very recurrent family overload, as they say “I have to take care of the child, the grandfather, the brother-in-law, the mother, it‘s all my responsibility’ (Mario).
In fact, during the interviews, the professionals were also asked to think specifically about the women they had supervised and the results show that the cases with women users involved multiple problems and needs. This is exemplified by those characteristics that were repeated most frequently: incarcerated partners, being single mothers with dependent children, children with special needs, victims of gender-based violence, street prostitution, drug use, precarious economic situations, mental health problems, lack of family support, housing problems such as squatting, the burden of maintaining a family and domestic responsibilities, and serious physical health problems. Therefore, and in the words of probation officer Maria, ‘it is a much more punished gender’.
However, another feature that many of the probation officers pointed out is the heterogeneity of female users. ‘A young woman is not the same as a mother, a lesbian woman or an immigrant woman. They have different needs and you have to get to know them as a probation officer, you know? It's just that women users have the least standardised profiles. When you’ve been around for a long time you end up generalising a little bit or making two or three profiles, but as far as women are concerned, I’ve never been able to do it and neither have my colleagues. Each one has a different personal situation compared to men’.
This is a clear example that it is no longer possible to speak of girls or women in the criminal justice system as unified categories and in fact, the gender-responsive approach aims to recognize the diversity that exists among women offenders (Malloch, 2012). However, the analysis of the interviews shows that supervising transwomen is complex for professionals given that they experience discrimination and have complex lives which has implications for the community sentence to be served and for their personal experience. ‘We can't even imagine how much people with changed gender identities have suffered or are suffering. We talk about discriminatory experiences in many areas of life, about anxiety, depression, lack of family and social support, drug abuse and if we sometimes add that the woman is an immigrant, then you can imagine. There you have to use all the tools you have and more.’
In addition, professionals perceived that Roma and immigrant women are over-represented in the Catalan Probation System and require specific supervision. ‘An added problem for immigrant women is the issue of getting their resident status in the country regularised. That is the centre of everything in their lives because their work, family, economic situation, everything depends on it. And if they end up in the criminal system, a criminal record is the worst thing that could happen to them. Too much frustration, very complicated situations.’ ‘Right now, I supervise quite a few Roma women. Do you know what's going on with them? They carry the weight of everything, of the whole family. If women already carry a lot of weight, they carry more. And we talk about it a lot with our colleagues, about Roma women and immigrant women, because they have a lot more.’
Despite the fact that this article initially places the gender perspective at the centre as a relevant variable in the implementation of community sentences, people experience gender differently and there are occasions where other elements of the social structure overlap with gender and become more important (Barberet and Larrauri, 2019; Chesney-Lind, 2020; Wilczak, 2017). Through the experiences of the professionals who supervise and intervene and of female offenders who have been previously interviewed (Vasilescu, 2020), it can be clearly seen how class and ethnicity often interact in the relationship between gender and crime (Malloch and McIvor, 2013; Wilczak, 2017).
Having considered the personal characteristics of female service users, we now turn to penal characteristics. All the probation officers interviewed considered that there are gender differences, not only in the type of crime, but also in the reasons behind it. However, according to the professionals interviewed, the main difference is that men commit (more) violent crimes compared to women. The other big difference, according to probation officers, is the perception that women's needs, problems, trauma and the lack of other alternatives lead them to commit crimes (Barr, 2019; Gelsthorpe et al., 2007; Sheehan et al., 2007, 2011), while they have the perception that men act more impulsively and are less reflective. Therefore, the reasons behind their crimes are often more cognitive-behavioural. This is well reflected in the explanation given by one of the probation officers: ‘Most men commit crimes of gender-based violence. So, it's a question of a patriarchal and sexist society, which is why I don't think they even take responsibility for their actions. Likewise, women offend less because of the costs, because the consequences of committing crimes are worse for them. So, most women, when they commit a crime, I think it is as the last option because before committing a crime they do everything possible to survive in other ways.’
In any case, after analysing the responses, the word that is most often repeated in the case of women is ‘need’ although it is followed by ‘complex problems’, ‘mental health’, ‘drug use’ and ‘having been a victim of violence’. In the case of men, the perception that professionals have is that it is an ‘expression of negative emotions’ such as aggressiveness, anger and frustration, lack of self-control, impulsiveness, and is based on a patriarchal and sexist society. It is also interesting to highlight another issue that comes up frequently during the interviews when talking about women who offend. ‘Women sometimes commit crimes of domestic violence but as a means of retaliating against the abuse received from their partner. But because she is being aggressive in response to aggression from her partner. They then say: “women also commit violent acts” Yes, yes, but look what's behind their case.’
This could be a clear example of the concept of ‘blurred boundaries of victimisation and criminalisation’ (Daly, 2008). This concept is based on the idea that on many occasions, there is a link between women's experiences of victimization and their subsequent offending, resulting in an overlap of these two categories. In fact, some of the professionals, even when they talk about motoring offences and the “more standardised profiles” they have been attending to in recent years in relation to these crimes, consider that: ‘For women, mostly motoring offences. But it is true that this is what we said before, when you dig, you do find that there is a motoring offence, but for most I see that there is a much more complex problem than this crime. Crime is only the tip of the iceberg. People can say to you: “most women's crimes are motoring offences” and you think: “Oh, it's very standardised”, but the reality it that is not because there are indeed problems behind it.’
In this sense, it is interesting to briefly reflect on facts and perceptions and the relationship between the two. Regarding types of crimes and gender differences, and as professionals rightly perceive, it is a fact that men commit (more) violent crimes compared to women who serve community sentences. It is also another fact that both the majority of men serving community sentences and the majority of women, although more women than men, serve community sentences for motoring offences (Vasilescu, 2020).
As far as the perceptions regarding the reasons behind the crimes are concerned, the issue becomes more complex. The evidence is that women generally present more issues and needs compared to men serving community sentences (Vasilescu, 2020). Therefore, perhaps gender differences, especially in terms of the reasons for committing road safety offences as perceived by practitioners, are sometimes confused with these underlying needs that women present to a greater extent than men, and which generally make their cases more complex. This is not to deny the link between such issues and offending in all cases, but it is a complex issue which may also be influenced by sentencing patterns 2 and their impact on those with fewer resources and more problems. According to the professionals interviewed, driving without a licence or without a renewed licence is often related to not having enough money to get a licence or renew it, or to the need to do so in order to fulfil work or family obligations, with no other alternative. As well as driving under the influence of alcohol, which they relate to underlying problems due to alcohol use, which in turn may be caused by other more complex problems. In any case, it seems that, according to the same professionals, these are needs and problems that sometimes overlap in the case of women users. This would therefore require further research and analysis. The following table summarises the differences between men and women in terms of the type of crime and possible reasons according to probation officers (Table 3).
Most common crimes and reasons differentiated by gender according to the probation officers 3 .
Next, and taking into account the existing gender differences with regard to the criminal and personal characteristics of users of the probation system, the experiences of probation officers who supervise people serving community sentences are analysed.
Supervision style
Probation officers were also asked whether men and women subject to supervision act differently during their follow-up and intervention, and if so, they were asked to explain the differences between female and male users during the execution of community sentences. Again, professionals agree that monitoring and intervening with women and men is different. The first element that differentiates them relates to the user's commitment to the sentence. ‘We always discuss this with my colleagues. Generally, men come here angrier, with complaints and they do not show commitment to the community sentence they have to serve. Women, on the other hand, have much more respect, are more responsible, care more about everything, and “what will happen if I don't comply?”‘
The same probation officers believe that this is due to ‘..personal situations are lived very differently too. Women are more focussed on the personal situation, much more concerned about how the sentence may affect them, life in general, what will happen to the children, the family, etc. Men, on the other hand, are more carefree, I see. They have their family, their wife who always supports them, if he has to do it, he will do it and if not, he will look for a way. The involvement of women in personal matters is more noticeable, I think.’ ‘The fact that they are usually first offenders and this is the first time they enter the criminal system I think is also another factor. All of this is more imposing and it's big for them, they want to get it over with as soon as possible.’
However, despite the fact that women appear to be more committed to their sentence, the multiple problems and needs presented by women makes serving the sentence more difficult. ‘I think we all have this perception, that it is more complicated to supervise a woman than a man. All the problems they have make this more complicated. Their compliance is very irregular, very irregular. And these are real things, not excuses, because look: they work, they do the housework, they take care of the children and the others, and they have to serve this measure. It's just that men don't have a quarter of the responsibilities that they have.’
According to the professionals interviewed, and in line with other studies, women have more erratic compliance compared to men offenders, and therefore supervising female users may present more challenges (Barry and McIvor, 2010). In fact, in a quantitative study in Catalonia, it is concluded that the percentage of women with irregular attendance was twice that of male users (Vasilescu, 2020). According to probation officers, the predominant reason behind this irregular compliance is the difficulty of reconciling the sentence with women's needs, problems, burdens and responsibilities. However, childcare deserves separate analysis because many of the professionals interviewed agree that for women childcare is the factor that makes implementation of the community sentence most difficult. ‘The issue of children always stands out in the case of female offenders, always. If she is the one who takes care of her children without any support, the problem will be who to leave them with and where to serve the measure. This leads to a lot of non-attendance, irregular compliance. And not only that, it's not those male offenders don't have children, you know? What happens is that the level of concern of women is much higher than that of men, it's like that.’
However, unlike in our jurisdiction, in other countries child-care provision exists (Fulham, 2019; Gelsthorpe et al., 2007) and, thus, it was decided to ask the professionals interviewed their opinion on the usefulness of extra support like this. The answers are varied. ‘There is no child-care provision while they serve the measures and I think it would be complicated if there were. I don't know to what extent the probation system would create such a service, so it doesn't exist’ ‘The issue of children is a problem, of course, but of course there is little that can be done here. The burden of the child is borne by the mothers, but it is difficult to solve it from here. Many times, and it seems cruel, but I don't know, they will have to look for a means, I don't know what, but they have to find a way to do it.’
The professionals do not deny that such support would be very practical and would facilitate supervision and also compliance by female users. However, probation officers also believe that it would be difficult to achieve or do not believe that it is the role of the criminal justice system to provide child-care.
So, in the face of this lack of resources for women and according to probation officers, the only option is to be more flexible, understanding and innovative. In this sense, a qualitative study in our country (Vasilescu, 2020), shows how on many occasions, the same probation officers, faced with the impossibility of women serving the measure because they could not leave their children alone, looked for different possibilities until they found an entity that would allow the women to be with their children. According to interviewees, because of these obstacles, the supervision of women becomes more complicated, and this often means a greater demand for emotional and practical help (Gelsthorpe et al., 2007: 48). ‘When we supervise women, we also find that they ask for more emotional and practical help, that's true. You stop and think, and of course they need it more than men do. From here, what we can do is refer them or link them to entities that exist in the community that can help them while serving the measure.’ ‘The women who come here are more willing to talk, to be heard, they are closer to us. And all this makes it easier to establish a link with them than with the men.’
It appears that, as previously found in research with female offenders in Catalonia (Vasilescu, 2020), probation officers consider that women have a greater need to communicate, a willingness to talk and a greater ability to build relationships of trust and proximity (Morash et al., 2014; Women’s Breakout, 2016). On the other hand, in view of the greater need for practical support, probation officers are committed to referrals and links with community agencies for women. So, because women present more complex problems, show more need for support and communicate more easily, supervisors consider that the style that works best with men and women also differs. This was well expressed by the following probation officer: ‘What works with them is that as a professional, you adapt to their problems and needs, that you are more flexible with them, that you are close to them. The authoritarian figure does not work with women. In fact, I think that being authoritarian works better with men, yes. The tolerant, flexible and understanding probation officer is what works with them. So, we already do everything in our power, but sometimes all this has to be taken into account at the time of sentencing. You have to adapt your sentences to people and not the other way around, you know?’
When probation officers mention this, they mean that although there are some regulations that allow them to be more flexible during the implementation, it is at the time of sentencing those different factors should be taken into account. In this regard, it should be noted that, in our jurisdiction there is no sentencing hearing and no pre-sentence report, which impacts on community sentence implementation (Blay and Larrauri, 2016). However, there is a regulation that allows probation officers to change the type of community service (therapeutic, work, training and mixed content) depending on the needs of users because usually, at the time of sentencing, unpaid work is imposed. In the case of women, the work format is usually changed to a therapeutic or mixed model (Vasilescu, 2020). Professionals also consider that what they can do during implementation to adapt to women's needs is hampered by several factors. ‘Do you know what you realise when women come here? Well, that alternative measures are not designed for them, they are not designed for cases as complex as theirs. So, in the case of unpaid work, which is the most frequently imposed measure, each probation officer looks into which entities could be best for them according to their time availability, their needs and responsibilities and that is difficult, very difficult. Sometimes the ratio of cases or whatever does not allow you time for this and then they have to adapt to any place, but of course, then the community sentence loses its content. And sometimes what happens is that they feel uncomfortable with so many men and we can't do anything from here either. So, you know what do we do? We seek to link them to an outside resource that will serve them well while they are serving their sentence. We would need resources, tools. It is really up to us to offer them emotional support, listening, understanding and flexibility, but within the limits of regulation and available resources.’
The few resources designed on the basis of women's needs and the high ratio of cases are factors that significantly hinder more gender-sensitive monitoring, since this does not depend solely on probation officers. However, it should be noted that supervision by Catalan probation officers is in the form of interviews, so they manage the implementation of sanctions, but treatment and educational programms are offered by other professionals, giving the probation professionals more management tasks, which fits with the managerial model of community sanctions (Robinson and McNeill, 2016). These interviews could contribute to better quality supervisory relationships and then contribute to better compliance and to a process of desistance in the long term (Dominey, 2018), but this often depends on the number of interviews and their content. In fact, a study in our country (Blay, 2019) shows that these professionals tend to use strong relationship skills, however, their use of cognitive restructuring skills is less marked. In the words of the professionals themselves, perhaps this is due to the configuration of the role of probation officers as ‘case managers’ (Tidmarsh, 2020) who coordinate the other professionals involved in enforcement and inform the judge, which means that they increasingly have to manage more cases and the interviews lose the rehabilitative content they might have. Fortunately, when they can afford to do so, they show understanding, flexibility and active listening, which are elements identified in the extensive research as good practises with women who offend (Gelsthorpe et al., 2007). It appears professionals are reluctant to lose the “quality of the intervention” even if this means swimming against the tide.
On the other hand, this research, in the words of the same probation officers: ‘I’ll be honest with you, the other day we were talking to some of our colleagues and we said that these interviews have really made us think about things that we had never thought about before and you realise that we all agree, that yes, there are few women but that doesn't mean that they have to be forgotten, that we have to do something.’
According to the practitioners interviewed, the interviews challenged them as they discussed and reflected on issues about women that had never been raised before - often because of the small number of women users - and this was viewed in positive terms by the interviewees. It was a way of problematising gender and making practitioners aware of its importance during the process of supervising and implementing community sentences.
Conclusions and reflections
The findings of this study follow trends found in research conducted in other jurisdictions (for example: Malloch and McIvor, 2013; Sheehan et al., 2007; 2011) and show that the probation officers interviewed agree that gender differences regarding personal and penal characteristics exist.
Firstly, although the female user population represents only 7% to 10% of the total population of the Catalan probation system (Vasilescu, 2020), women who serve community sentences have a wide range of problems, needs and responsibilities compared to men such as: high levels of physical, psychological and sexual victimisation in childhood and as an adult by men close to them, lack of social and familial support, mental and physical health issues (mostly anxiety and depression), financial problems, problems related to substance misuse, precarious employment situations, and childcare difficulties because women are the main caregivers and are often left alone to care for children and other dependents, among others.
In addition, women differ from men because, according to the professionals interviewed, they are a much more heterogeneous group. Young mothers, transexual, immigrant and Roma women are especially faced with overwhelming structural obstacles and have multifaceted needs. Given that women with intersectional needs are disproportionately over-represented within the Catalan probation population (mostly immigrant women), it is necessary to know and recognize the effects of community sentences on women with intersectional identities. In this sense, it is interesting to note Boppre's work (2019) calling for an intersectionally-responsive approach within correctional supervision and treatment for women.
Secondly, according to the professionals interviewed, women are first time offenders to a greater extent than men and there are differences in the crimes committed by women and men users and in the reasons that motivate them. In this regard, and before going any further, it should be noted that the professionals are correct in their opinion about the criminal career differences between men and women who serve community sentences (Vasilescu, 2020). Men commit (more) violent crimes compared to women. Furthermore, men and women do not enter the criminal justice system in the same situation or with the same needs. The needs and/or problems and the lack of other alternatives are the main cause for crimes committed by women. Men, on the other hand, often act more impulsively and are less reflective, so the reasons behind their crimes are often more cognitive-behavioural. Therefore, they believe that while men respond better to interventions that focus on their offending behaviour, women tend to need more emotional support and a holistic response to a wide range of underlying issues (Gelsthorpe, 2020; Gelsthorpe et al., 2007).
Thirdly, probation officers agree that supervising female and male users is different in some aspects. Women appear to be more committed to comply with the community sentence because they are usually first offenders and are more concerned about how their sentence may affect them and the people around them. Nevertheless, the underlying issues of women make supervision more complicated a because the attendance of women is more irregular. Behind women's lack of attendance (mostly justified) is the difficulty to reconcile compliance with their responsibilities, burdens and problems. In this regard, childcare responsibilities are the greatest challenge for both supervised women and supervisors. The central relationships for women who offend are those with their children, and it seems that the Catalan probation system is not prepared to respond adequately to a responsibility that, unfortunately, is still predominantly maternal in our society (Navarro, 2018).
Therefore, on the one hand, there are practical consequences such as not being able to leave the children alone due to lack of support and assistance, and on the other hand, emotional consequences, among which the frustration and helplessness of female users stand out. When asked about the need for child-care provision for women who require it, the answers from professionals were not very encouraging. While some believe that this would make it easier for women to comply, others believe that it is too complicated for the probation service to provide this type of practical support or that it would not be the responsibility of the system to do so. In many cases, this is because although women's cases are very complicated, women are a minority and it would not be in their best interests to provide this resource. What remains, then, is for the women themselves to look for ways to achieve this or for professionals, when they have the time, to look for entities that are more flexible and where women can go to serve their sentences with their children.
So, resources designed on the basis of women's needs (both within and outside the system) are scarce and often unknown to professionals. Given the lack of a gender-responsive approach within the system, in the face of women's frustration and their increased demand for emotional support, practitioners believe that it is in their hands to offer greater flexibility, understanding and active listening to women who offend. In fact, according to the probation officers interviewed, the more tolerable, flexible and understanding probation officer works particularly well with women and to a greater extent than with men. Supervision and intervention must focus on these factors if they are to be relevant to women who offend, which could be achieved, of course, by giving the professionals less management tasks and more freedom for individual quality supervision through interviews (Blay, 2019; Morash, 2010).
In any case, the final reflection provided by the professionals interviewed is interesting. For them it was the first time they were given a space to reflect on women users and this helped them to realise that they were clear about many things that they had never stopped to think about together, such as despite the fact that women represent a minority within the system, they present very complex problems and needs and they require more resources and tools to understand their criminal paths, their needs, more knowledge about resources available in the community and above all community penalties designed with the needs of women and their responsibilities in mind. In turn, the interviews served to highlight the lack of a gender and intersectional responsive vision within the probation system. Another point to add is that generally, there were not any difference in interviewee responses between genders.
However, despite all mentioned limitations, it is undeniable that the needs of criminalised women are best met within the community and paying more attention to women and the introduction of a gender-responsive approach would further minimise the impact of the sentences on women's lives and would enable successful compliance with the community sentences (Phoenix, 2018). It is hoped that the results of this research will encourage reflection on the need to change a system already designed largely on the basis of the needs and criminal pathways of the men who offend. The professionals who perform the central role in the implementation of community sentences in Catalonia already provide important indications of what works with women who offend and what therefore needs to be retained and what could be improved and therefore needs to be reformulated.
Firstly, the disproportionate impact that gender roles have on women offenders (as the primary caregiver) and the ways in which class and ethnicity often interact in the relationship between gender and crime must be recognised. Secondly, women will need more emotional and psychological support given their previous and/or current traumas. Thirdly, a therapeutic community sentence will be better than an unpaid work sentence. Fourthly, referring female service users to educational programmes or unpaid work placements designed for male users should be avoided. Fifth, the problems suffered as a result of changes in gender identity should be known and recognised, and, in sixth place, service provision for women in the community also needs to be intersectionally-responsive.
There is no doubt that the professionals interviewed who work with community-based women are aware of these factors and the implications they have on the implementation of community sentences; however, they need gender training that provides them with tools and resources to supervise women offenders as optimally as possible (Phoenix, 2018). In any case, these changes are likely to be inaccessible without wider political and public commitment and socio-economic change because as Malloch and McIvor (2013: 207) stated “a crucial factor in the experiences of women who come to the attention of criminal justice systems internationally is the social, political and economic factors that determine processes of criminalisation and mechanisms of social control”.
Footnotes
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by the University of Girona Grant Programme for Researchers in Training (grant number IFUDG 2017-2020).
