Reducing prison sentencing through pre-sentence reports? Why the quasi-market logic of 'selling alternatives to custody' fails
Tata, Cyrus (2018) Reducing prison sentencing through pre-sentence reports? Why the quasi-market logic of 'selling alternatives to custody' fails. The Howard Journal of Crime and Justice (formerly The Howard Journal of Criminal Justice), 57 (4). pp. 472-494. ISSN 1468-2311 (https://doi.org/10.1111/hojo.12276)
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Abstract
A central aim of successive generations of penal reformers and governments has been to reduce the use of imprisonment in relatively less serious cases. In their various guises, pre-sentence reports (PSRs) have been a key vehicle to promote non-custodial ‘alternatives’ to the judicial sentencer. Yet, after decades of pursuing this strategy, a significant reduction in prison sentencing remains elusive. This article suggests that the failure of this policy strategy is, at least in part, rooted in its quasi-market logic. It tends to construct the judicial sentencer as a metaphorical consumer in a penal marketplace, to whom the report writer must convincingly ‘sell alternatives’ to custody. Applying and developing theories of consumption as a cultural practice, it is proposed that, by its very nature, a consumerist model is bound to fail to deliver penal reduction.
ORCID iDs
Tata, Cyrus ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1033-478X;-
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Item type: Article ID code: 65526 Dates: DateEvent31 December 2018Published20 August 2018Published Online22 May 2018AcceptedSubjects: Law
Social Sciences > Social pathology. Social and public welfare > Criminal justice administrationDepartment: Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences (HaSS) > Strathclyde Law School > Law Depositing user: Pure Administrator Date deposited: 25 Sep 2018 10:43 Last modified: 02 Nov 2024 01:48 URI: https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/id/eprint/65526