Penology & punishment
What Are Prisons For?
Hindpal Singh Bhui argues that we need to look at who is sent to prison and why to disentangle reality from ideology and myth. Including the voices of prisoners, prison staff and victims, he asks whether prison is an institution for managing marginalized people, or if there is a better way to achieve the socially useful goals of prisons.
Welfare and Punishment
From Thatcherism to Austerity
From Margaret Thatcher’s first government to austerity politics, Ian Cummins traces changing attitudes to imprisonment and the social state. With fresh insights and critical thinking, he demonstrates how increasingly punitive approaches to crime and welfare have shaped the neoliberal economy and created stigma around those living in poverty.
Sound, Order and Survival in Prison
The Rhythms and Routines of HMP Midtown
The soundscape of prison life is that of constant clangs, bangs and jangles. What is the significance of this cacophonous din to those who live and work with it? This book is the story of a year spent with a UK prison community, bringing its social world vividly to life through aural ethnography.
Solitary Confinement
Lived Experiences and Ethical Implications
This book is the first to consider the history of solitary confinement and how it is experienced by the individuals undergoing it. It provides first-hand accounts of the inhumane experience of solitary confinement to provide a better appreciation of the relationship between penal strategy and its effect on human beings.
The Short Guide to Criminal Justice
The Short Guide to Criminal Justice provides a comprehensive, yet concise, introduction to the criminal justice system in the United Kingdom. It includes many student-friendly features such as case study boxes, tables showing key facts and figures and links to data sources and further reading.
Regulating Police Detention
Voices from behind Closed Doors
Custody visitors are volunteers who make unannounced visits to police custody blocks to check on the welfare of detainees. However, there is a fundamental power imbalance between the police and these visitors. This timely book offers detailed proposals for radically reforming custody visiting to make it an effective regulator of police behaviour.
Redemptive Criminology
Challenging concepts and practices of rehabilitation, this text draws on criminology, philosophy and theology to develop a theory of ‘redemptive criminology’ that could revolutionise the rehabilitation system. It offers new insights into punishment and retribution and explores the connections between victims, perpetrators and the community.
Queering Criminology in Theory and Praxis
Reimagining Justice in the Criminal Legal System and Beyond
This ground-breaking book explores the practical applications of queer theory for criminal justice practitioners. It covers theoretical concepts within queer criminology and the experiences of LGBTQ+ individuals as victims, offenders and professionals, and proposes ways in which a real difference can be made to training, policy and practice.
Prisons of the World
This book discusses the failings of the prison system in many countries and offers positive pointers for the future. It shows the way forward will be through initiatives such as Justice Reinvestment and in the Human Development model.
Prisoners' Families, Emotions and Space
This original study of the lives of prisoners’ families adds a feminist perspective on the understanding of carceral geography. She relates the testimonies of families as they navigate new challenges, and measures the impact of imprisonment on their emotions, relationships, identities and experiences of spaces, both inside and outside prison.
Prison Suicide
What Happens Afterwards?
Prison suicides reached a record high in 2016 in England and Wales. Provides the first detailed case study of the investigations that follow prison suicides with findings relevant at a global level.
Pregnancy and New Motherhood in Prison
This timely book addresses an overlooked area of criminal justice by focusing on the reality of pregnancy and new motherhood in prison. Based on the experiences of women in mother and baby units, it passionately argues the case for minimising harm, making key reading for criminology and midwifery students and researchers.