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This book explores probation staff understandings of professionalism in the aftermath of the Transforming Rehabilitation (TR) reforms to services in England and Wales. Drawing on the sociology of the professions, this book offers an original and timely contribution to the criminal justice literature, examining the ways in which professionalism in probation has been reshaped and renegotiated in response to the market logic that has dominated public services in recent decades.
The case of the TR reforms offers a useful platform for exploring broader shifts in understandings of professionalism. This book demonstrates the ways in which professionalism in probation can be understood as a discourse through which professionals are expected to be receptive to the demands of multiple stakeholders - offenders, taxpayers, the state, and, additionally, the market. It situates TR in a marketising continuum, the logical endpoint of a period of reform that has sought to discipline staff and reshape their understandings of professionalism.
Written in a clear and direct style, this book is essential reading for researchers engaged in probation, rehabilitation, criminal justice, and organizational and professional studies.
List of contents
1.Probation: A Profession in Transition 2.Probation’s professional project 3.Transforming Rehabilitation: The micro-physics of (market) power 4.‘Well, what are you?’ Professionalism, identity, and culture in probation 5.Probation practice, architecture, and an art of distributions 6.Payment by Results, ‘penal accountancy’, and the regulation of autonomous conduct 7.‘The right kind of person for the job?' Professionalism, probation values, and emotional labour 8.Beyond marketisation? The future of professionalism in probation
About the author
Matt Tidmarsh is a lecturer in Criminal Justice at the School of Law, University of Leeds. He completed his PhD on staff experiences of the Transforming Rehabilitation reforms to probation services in England and Wales, at the School of Law, University of Leeds, in November 2019. His research interests are interdisciplinary, drawing from criminology, sociology, and penology – with a particular focus identity, culture, and practice in probation.
Summary
This book explores probation staff understandings of professionalism in the aftermath of the Transforming Rehabilitation (TR) reforms to services in England and Wales.
