Abstract
Based on ethnographic fieldwork, this chapter explores how individuals experience the complex socio-legal position of ‘the parolee’ and navigate parole regulation. It traces a seeming paradox wherein individuals frequently violated rules and sometimes committed crimes, yet perceived themselves as ‘doing parole the right way’ and as embodying virtuous citizenship. This reflects the ways in which individuals challenged the logics of parole, in particular, the construction of the paroled subject as dangerous and incapable of ethical self-governance. Individuals rejected these assumptions and called for—and exercised—autonomy vis-à-vis parole, even if this meant subverting formal rules. While reflecting resistance to penality, this dynamic was at the same time undergirded by the productivity of penal and social power writ large.
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Notes
- 1.
See Turner (1967) for a discussion of liminal positions that are on a threshold, where one’s social positionality is unclear or transitioning. Such states, for Turner, often entail a state of ambiguity and/or disorientation.
- 2.
As will be expanded upon, although for some this entailed the goal of “going straight” – of desisting from all criminal activity – this was not the case for everyone. Rather, straightening oneself out is oriented towards bettering one’s life by avoiding ‘legal trouble’, not necessarily by avoiding all offending.
- 3.
I use the terms interlocutor and participant to refer to the individuals subject to parole supervision with whom I conducted interviews and fieldwork.
- 4.
The parole agency assigns a supervision level that mandates a minimum number of contacts that must occur between parolees and agents each quarter. During fieldwork, the supervision levels were “High Risk Sex Offender”, “Second Striker”, “High Control”, “High Service”, “Low Control”, and “Minimum”. Although it varies across individuals, on average participants had to meet with their agent twice a month.
- 5.
Currently, as a result of ‘correctional realignment’, individuals whose parole is revoked are incarcerated in county jails, for a maximum period of 180 days. During the period of fieldwork, however, individuals who were revoked were returned to State prison facilities for up to one year.
- 6.
Opsal (2012) observes that for individuals on parole employment represents a way to address financial needs and, also, an avenue for conceiving of oneself as pro-social.
- 7.
Notably, fieldwork for this project took place following the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation’s “recommitment” to rehabilitation in 2005, which entailed the goal of increasing rehabilitative assistance to offenders. The data here do not allow for an empirical examination of the impact of this recommitment, or for a detailed examination of the reentry and rehabilitative support that was available to individuals on parole. For our purposes, however, it is important that individuals perceived that parole failed to provide meaningful or adequate support.
- 8.
While this finding resonates with existing scholarship, it is analytically, as well as politically, problematic to view individuals on parole as self-sufficient entities. As Leverentz (2014: 182) notes, ‘as long as we maintain the illusion of returning prisoners’ unilateral control over their own fate, we can continue to absolve ourselves of responsibility.’
- 9.
See Farrall et al. (2014) for a similar finding among individuals on probation. However, these authors also found that in retrospect some former probationers did attribute some credit to probation authorities in aiding them change their lives. It is worth noting that some of the participants in the current study likewise acknowledged that penal authorities or the experience of punishment had a positive effect on them. Yet, regardless of this, they felt that parole as a system did not provide adequate support and that meaningful changes were achieved primarily through their own efforts.
- 10.
- 11.
This resonates with scholarship on desistance noting the ways in which individuals’ sense of autonomy can be imperiled by penal governance.
- 12.
While these accounts occurred in both men and women, it is noteworthy how they were more common among women, raising the potential of gendered differences in how individuals understand and make sense of their past and, possibly, future. For a good account of how parole governance is gendered, see Turnbull and Hannah-Moffatt (2009). And see Opsal (2015) on ways in which women experience parole governance.
- 13.
See Farrall et al. (2014) for a similar finding in probation.
- 14.
This is akin to McBarnett’s (2003: 229) concept of ‘creative compliance’ among tax payers, wherein actors were more oriented towards the spirit than the letter of the law.
- 15.
Upon completion of the parole sentence, individuals are no longer subject to penal custody and regulation. Thus, in the institutional logic of parole, individuals on parole are becoming but not yet capable of ethical self-management. Yet, it should be noted that given the rise of punitive, incapacitative and retributivist logics within punishment (e.g., Beckett & Sasson, 2004; Cohen, 1985; Garland, 2001), it is possible that penal subjects are often construed as not yet and probably not ever capable of ethical, law-abiding citizenship.
- 16.
See Armstrong (this volume) on how violating parole rules can trigger responsive treatment.
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Acknowledgements
I want to express my gratitude to the individuals who, while on parole, graciously shared their time, energy and experiences with me. I also want to thank Ruth Armstrong and Ioan Durnescu for making this book possible and for their invaluable feedback on this chapter. Thank you to Cathy Hu for her assistance with this research and for her insightful ideas and comments. And thank you to Randy Myers, Andrea Ballestero, Travis Linnemann, Judah Schept, Tara Opsal, John Halushka and Jasmine Lin for reading and/or discussing this article and providing sharp, productive feedback.
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Werth, R. (2016). Breaking the Rules the Right Way: Resisting Parole Logics and Asserting Autonomy in the USA. In: Armstrong, R., Durnescu, I. (eds) Parole and Beyond. Palgrave Studies in Prisons and Penology. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95118-5_6
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