Reexamining Evidence-Based Practice in Community Corrections: Beyond “A-Confined View” of What Works

• Author: Shadd Maruna,Steve Farrall,Fergus McNeill,Claire Lightowler
• Published date: 01 June 2012
• Date: 01 June 2012
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.3818/JRP.14.1.2012.35
• Subject Matter: Special Issue on Evidence-Based Policy and Practice

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ReexaminingEvidence-BasedPracticeinCommunity

 Corrections:Beyond“AConfInedView”ofWhatWorks

Fergus McNeill

University of Glasgow

Steve Farrall

University of Sheff‌ield

Claire Lightowler

Institute for Research and Innovation in Social Services

Shadd Maruna

Queen’s University Belfast

* Abstract

This article aims to reexamine the development and scope of evidence-based practice

(EBP) in community corrections by exploring three sets of issues. Firstly, we examine

the relationships between the contested purposes of community supervision and their

relationships to questions of evidence. Secondly, we explore the range of forms of

evidence that might inform the pursuit of one purpose of supervision—the rehabilitation

of offenders—making the case for a fuller engagement with “desistance” research

in supporting this process. Thirdly, we examine who can and should be involved in

conversations about EBP, arguing that both ex/offenders’ and practitioners’ voices need

to be respected and heard in this debate.

JUSTICE RESEARCH AND POLICY, Vol. 14, No. 1, 2012

© 2012 Justice Research and Statistics Association

Sp e c i a l iS S u e o n ev i d e n c e -Ba S e d po l i c y a n d pr a c t i c e

P

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Questions about the role of evidence in criminal justice policy and practice have

been around for a long time. One of the founding fathers of classical criminology,

Cesare Beccaria, writing in 1775, put it this way:

Would you prevent crimes? Let liberty be attended with knowledge. As

knowledge extends, the disadvantages which attend it diminish, and the

advantages increase...

. Knowledge facilitates the comparison of objects,

by showing them in different points of view. When the clouds of igno-

rance are dispelled by the radiance of knowledge, authority trembles, but

the force of the law remains immovable (as cited in Priestley & Vanstone,

2010, p. 11).

Alongside his early endorsement of the role of science in promoting public

safety, Beccaria demanded clarity in the law, due process in its administration, and

certainty and regularity in its delivery of punishments, limited by the principles of

parsimony and proportionality. So, for him, as for many that have come after him,

delivering criminal justice must be about both evidence and principle; both science

and law; both the empirical and the normative.

It is with this central set of relationships in mind that we begin this discussion

of “evidence-based practice” (EBP) in the f‌ield of community corrections.1 More

specif‌ically, we aim to look at EBP from three different points of view. Firstly,

we seek to examine the relationships between the purposes of community cor-

rections and the ways in which we might assess its effectiveness; we argue that

these purposes are multiple and contested and that the types of evidence in play

are therefore varied and diffuse. Relying on any one measure will fail to capture

the complexities of the task. Secondly, even in focusing on one purpose (reducing

reoffending so as to better protect the public), we suggest that “what works” evi-

dence drawn from evaluation studies has serious limitations, and that it must be

supplemented with evidence from explanatory studies that explore how and why

people desist from crime. Finally, we argue that evidence from research is not the

only evidence that matters in advancing practice; both ex/offender and practitio-

ner voices need to be taken much more seriously if we are to develop systems and

practices that f‌it the realities of people’s lives. In our concluding discussion, we

discuss a transatlantic “knowledge exchange” project, Discovering Desistance,

through which we are currently trying to open up debates and developments

around evidence-based corrections.

1 We use the U.S. term “community corrections” in this paper to refer to all forms of of-

fender supervision in the community, whether on probation or parole. We also use the term

evidence-based practice (EBP) throughout given its familiarity. However, we prefer the more

modest term evidence-informed practice, partly in recognition of the role of other forms of

evidence (i.e., beyond research evidence) in service and practice development.