Lessons Learned About Offender Change: Implications for Criminal Justice Policy (From How Offenders Transform Their Lives, 188-203, 2009, Bonita M. Veysey, Johnna Christian, et al. eds., - See NCJ-229365)

• NCJ Number: 229376
• Author(s): Russ Immarigeon
• Date Published: 2009
• Length: 16 pages
• Sale Source: Willan Publishing
• Publication Format: Book Chapter
• Publication Type: Literature Review
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This chapter reviews the articles collected in this volume and then considers the findings in a broader policy framework of criminal justice interventions, and whether they are called restorative justice or rehabilitative programming.

Abstract

Current approaches to policy and practice in the area of offender rehabilitation programs and prisoner reentry emphasize the need to deliver services that offenders will use upon release from prison. However, the contributors to this volume emphasize the connection between offender-centered mechanisms and their individual experiences with innovative change efforts. This combination of factors presents a fuller picture of the identity transformation process. This chapter reports some of the empirical findings, theoretical insights, and program implications or policy recommendations suggested by the contributors, and argues that criminologists and criminal justice researchers are too often to narrowly focused in the scope of their recommendations. Specifically, the chapter has three purposes: 1) to briefly report some of the collective findings and perspectives of the essays and studies contained in the chapters of this volume; 2) to stress particular emphasis on the policy and practice implications of these contributors; and 3) to place these findings and implications within a larger policy context and in the process, suggest some recommendations that can be derived from the results of the reported research. References