The Promise and Challenge of Local Initiatives That Support Reentry and Reintegration

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00027162221115380
• Published date: 01 May 2022
• Date: 01 May 2022
• Subject Matter: Promoting Social Integration: Health, Housing, and Community

ANNALS, AAPSS, 701, May 2022 191

DOI: 10.1177/00027162221115380

The Promise

and Challenge

of Local

Initiatives That

Support

Reentry and

Reintegration

By

JOHNNA CHRISTIAN

1115380ANN THE ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMYLOCAL INITIATIVES SUPPORTING REENTRY AND REINTEGRATION

research-article2022

Scholars and policy-makers are increasingly recogniz-

ing the limitations of bureaucracies to deliver the ser-

vices and interventions that are most needed by people

who have been impacted by the justice system. We are

also seeing the ways in which supervision practices can

exacerbate the challenges that formerly incarcerated

people face in terms of meaningful reintegration with

family and community after imprisonment. Local reen-

try initiatives are showing potential as a mechanism to

advance the individual and collective well-being of

justice-involved people. This article examines the strat-

egies and initiatives of community-directed organiza-

tions that provide for people who have been incarcerated

and considers lessons for future practice. Among our

key findings are that services need to include people

with histories of justice involvement in leadership at all

levels of their organizations and that the outcome

measures for success in service provision should not be

limited to recidivism.

Keywords: reentry initiatives; reintegration; advo-

cacy; community-based programs

Introduction

As the reach of the correctional system, includ-

ing community supervision, has expanded,

scholars and policy-makers have recognized the

limitations of bureaucracies and formal systems

of control to meet the multilayered needs of

those under penal control (Flores 2018; Mellow

and Barnes-Ceeney 2017; Payne, Brown, and

Wright 2019). Incarceration has long-lasting

effects on the physical and psychological well-

being of people who have been confined, and

Johnna Christian is an associate professor at the School

of Criminal Justice at Rutgers University–Newark. Her

work has examined the familial ties of incarcerated and

formerly incarcerated men and reentry and reintegra-

tion after incarceration. She is coeditor of Beyond

Recidivism: New Approaches to Research on Prisoner

Reentry and Reintegration (New York University Press

2020).

Correspondence: johnnac@scj.rutgers.edu