Abstract
Although the topic of attitudes towards sexual offenders has received substantial descriptive attention, it is only in recent times that this area has been studied within established conceptual frameworks. In doing so, it is possible to understand how such views form, the methods by which they can be influenced, and the conditions under which they are expressed in different ways. This chapter sets out to achieve three aims. First, to identify the various ways in which attitudes towards sexual offenders can be conceptualised and measured. Second, to set out how attitudes towards sexual offenders play a pivotal role at different levels of the criminal justice system, namely, the legislative level, the rehabilitative level, and the reintegrative level. Third, the chapter closes with some suggestions as to how we might develop more productive conversations about sexual crime in order to reduce the adverse effects of negative attitudes on the desistance process.
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Harper, C.A. (2019). Public Attitudes and Penal Policy in the Desistance Process for Sexual Offenders. In: Blagden, N., Winder, B., Hocken, K., Lievesley, R., Banyard, P., Elliott, H. (eds) Sexual Crime and the Experience of Imprisonment. Sexual Crime. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-04930-0_8
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