NCJ Number
142170
Journal
International Journal of the Sociology of Law Volume: 20 Issue: 4 Dated: (December 1992) Pages: 321-335
Date Published
1992
Length
15 pages
Annotation
The evolution of the penal lobby in Britain is traced as are debates about progressive policy interventions in the penal systems in Britain and other advanced Western societies in light of new ideas about the nature and role of the state and in terms of the legitimacy, limits, and effectiveness of such interventions.
Abstract
The assumptions of the Radical Alternative to Prison (RAP) differed markedly from the legal emphasis of the Howard League with its positivistic convictions about individual criminal behavior and the potential of the penal system to reform and be reformed. RAP's assumptions had a significant ideological impact. Its refusal to individualize criminal pathology and its claim that criminal justice was located in a wider network of power relationship provided a set of genuinely radical alternatives to the penal lobby. In contrast to the sharp divisions between RAP and the Howard league in the 1970s, the current distinction between the "radical" and "liberal" wings of the lobby seem more subtle. Both need to develop a more adequate conception of the role of the state in a modern, complex social formation. 3 notes and 45 references