Abstract
Having recently moved on from working in the probation service after 13 years, I found the timing and content of this well-written and easily accessible book immensely useful in my personal reflections on my ‘probation journey’ during that time. The book seeks to: . . . capture the middle ground between ideological abstraction, political and theoretical contexts for contemporary rehabilitative endeavour and the more painstaking and necessarily detailed analysis of the bureaucratic, administrative and policy frameworks within which correctional services ply their trade. (p. 174)
It mostly covers a period co-terminus with the length of my probation career following a couple of wider introductory and contextualising chapters. However, this is not a book just written for the employee or ex-employee reflecting and seeking to make sense of the seismic changes to probation in recent history like myself. This is a book that through well-researched discourse guides the reader through the more fundamental, political and practical implications of the decision making of those at the top of the rehabilitative tree – the policy and decision makers.
The scope and depth of knowledge underpinning the text is unsurprising given the qualifications of its authors to commentate on the topic. Both authors have a practitioner’s background in probation. Lol Burke is able to add his academic knowledge as a researcher, senior lecturer and Editor of the Probation Journal. Steve Collet is able to bring a complimentary, academically considered perspective as a recently retired Chief Probation Officer. One of the highlights of this book for me was the personal narrative of the authors present in the content, which is reflective of their own deeply held commitment to the rehabilitative notion when working with “troubled and troublesome people” (p. 174).
The eight chapters of the book guide the reader in a quite logical progression, building on the concept of rehabilitation by looking at its governance, provision and marketization. Chapters Six and Seven then provide a particularly fascinating analysis of social assumptions of the Transforming Rehabilitation agenda, examining subjects such as partnership, localism, civil society, citizenship, exclusion and the state. In making sense of my own journey, these two chapters were particularly persuasive of the importance of keeping genuine partnership, structural factors of inequality and comradeship with the people with whom we work at the heart of practice, as I move forward with my own social venture. This is summarised neatly in the following quote: ‘Notions of a Big Society are ultimately meaningless to those who are disenfranchised, marginalised and unable to exercise the levers of choice assumed in a consumerist policy-based framework’ (p. 142). The power of this statement is only heightened by the statistics quoted by the authors highlighting the irony of the ‘levers of choice’ asserted by the political paymasters through the disproportionate political percentage of boardroom interest in the companies gaining from Transforming Rehabilitation in comparison to other European countries. It is this level of political analysis and insight, along with easily memorable phrases such as ‘the penal arms race’, which really give this book standout value for readers. This very personal insight would be illuminating for any student or academic considering the plethora of control and change forced upon the probation service since the New Labour victory in 1997. For practitioners approaching the text, it will provide a well-reasoned and expressive narrative to their recent experiences. This could deliver value in helping practitioners to have an anchor of academic critique at a challenging time, whilst refocusing them on the importance of the work they do at a time of immense potential dislocation or mores. I will let the authors summarise this purpose in their own words: . . . as we have argued throughout this book, effective supervision is ultimately a moral activity – one that engages the values, outlook, personal strengths and capacities of the individual offender and which should aim to bring citizens together in a greater understanding of their interdependency and mutual interests rather than as a means of separating and further alienating those who offend from the so-called law-abiding majority. (p. 120)