Reconceptualising ‘risk’: Towards a humanistic paradigm of sexual offending

Within Western criminal justice traditions, the ‘risk’ paradigm has become the defining logic of contemporary laws and policies on sex offender management. This article critically examines the limitations of current technocratic and algorithmic approaches to risk in relation to sexual offending and how they might be addressed. Drawing on nearly two decades of theoretical and empirical research conducted by the author, it applies the learning on sex offender reintegration and desistance to advance a ‘humanistic’ paradigm of sexual offending. The paper attempts to counter some of the dangers of algorithmic justice and shift risk-based discourse away from its predominantly ‘scientific’ origins. It argues that such a move towards a more expansive and progressive version of risk within criminal justice discourses would better capture the realities of sexual offending behaviour and its real-world governance.

Thinking about offender social reintegration: A case study of one NGO programme in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa

Successful social reintegration is critical if we are to reduce recidivism and crime in general. This voice of people article presents a background case for why effective offender reintegration services are key in South Africa, and the Eastern Cape in particular, through an example of the Offender Reintegration programme rendered by the National Institute of Crime Prevention and Reintegration of Offenders (NICRO). Apart from the paucity of literature on offender reintegration, very few voices from people working directly with these former offenders are ever heard. Therefore, this article seeks to address this gap by contributing to the body of knowledge on offender social reintegration.

Vertigo in the City: Urban Crime, Consumerism and the Theopolitical Act

This article explores some theological points of contact and development arising from an understanding of the city not yet receiving sustained attention in urban theologies—crime and punishment. It gives an account of the expressive criminality of late modern cities and the attendant sociology of vindictiveness that shapes practices of punishment. It demurs from an influential but highly pessimistic vision of the persistence of consumerist desire, the only escape from which comes in a largely unsustainable politics of renunciation (Steve Hall drawing on Slavoj Žižek). It begins to develop an account of non-consumerist desire and political subjectivity though a critical dialogue with Žižek’s exposition of Romans 7. It suggests that the fragmentary urban practices of Christian mercy (offender reintegration, education programmes, anti-gang social projects, youth work) enact a form of asceticism which more satisfactorily parallels the covenantal and participatory thrust of Romans 5–8.

Ngwana phosa dira ga a bolawe: The value of restorative justice to the reintegration of offenders

Does restorative justice have anything to offer the field of offender reintegration? Restorative justice is defined, and distinctions are drawn, between a restorative justice worldview and processes and programmes that are restorative. Restorative justice processes focus on relationships and create opportunities for individual, family and community restoration and reconciliation. In doing so they open up new social spaces for offenders and nurture social inclusion. They also help offenders accept responsibility and help all parties manage the process of release from prison.