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Probation and Risk: The Paradox of ‘Rehabilitating’ Intimately Violent Men

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Constructing Risky Identities in Policy and Practice

Abstract

The language of risk has impacted upon policies and practices in criminal justice in England and Wales. This has cemented the shift away from rehabilitation and a medicalised model of treatment that seeks to diagnose, treat and cure offenders to a discourse of risk and an actuarial model of assessing, managing and reducing the risks of re-offending. The traditional discourse of rehabilitation has sought to reform the offender whereas risk discourse seeks to better manage them and their offending behaviours. This chapter maps out this change in dominant discourse with a specific focus on how the probation service treats intimately violent men. Violent men are the focus because they are predominantly the perpetrators of intimate violence. Intimate violence is used here to mean male violence against female partners and ex-partners. When the term ‘domestic violence’ is used, this refers to literature which has defined it as violence not only in intimate relationships but also among other family members. The chapter argues that the traditional discourse of rehabilitation is a long-term strategy to challenge and change violent men’s repetitive and controlling behaviours, whereas risk discourse is a short-term fix to deal with men’s incident-based, discrete acts of violence. The ramifications of this are discussed because it is risk discourse that is dominant in probation policies and practices.

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Authors
  1. Nicola Ballantyne
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Sunderland, UK

    Jeremy Kearney  & Catherine Donovan  & 

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© 2013 Nicola Ballantyne

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Ballantyne, N. (2013). Probation and Risk: The Paradox of ‘Rehabilitating’ Intimately Violent Men. In: Kearney, J., Donovan, C. (eds) Constructing Risky Identities in Policy and Practice. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137276087_10

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