Begging for Crime? The Effect of State Laws Restricting Access to Temporary Assistance for Needy Families on Unsuccessful Completion of Parole

Transitioning from prison to the community can pose significant hardships as returning individuals seek to support themselves while searching for work and housing. Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) is one potential service that can help ease this transition, however, in numerous states TANF is not available to many former offenders. We conduct a fixed effects analysis on laws banning TANF assistance and state rates of unsuccessful parole completion between 1994 and 2016. We find that states that imposed restrictions on TANF saw an increase in state rates of unsuccessful parole completion. Furthermore, we find no significant difference between full bans and partial bans of TANF, indicating that even partial bans may undermine efforts to successfully reintegrate former offenders.

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.

‘What to do when the grills open?’ Entrepreneurial motivations and individual beliefs of former convicts

Study Objective: To investigate the entrepreneurial motivations and individual beliefs of former convicts from prison in Ceará regarding opening their own business, according to the theory of planned behavior (TPB). Methodology/Approach: A qualitative research was carried out with eleven former convicts from the Ceará prison system. The data collected through semi-structured interviews were analyzed by Atlas-ti software, using the content analysis pattern matching technique. Results: The former convicts expressed their intention to open their own business based on three motivations: by necessity, by opportunity, and by personal achievement. The interviewees' entrepreneurial intention was influenced by three types of salient belief: behavioral, normative, and perceived control. Theoretical/Methodological contributions: This research promotes and expands the discussion on entrepreneurship after a period of deprivation of liberty, using the TPB to identify the beliefs that precede the entrepreneurial intention. Relevance/Originality: Findings oppose the dichotomous classification of entrepreneurial motivation described by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor. The study endorses the important influence of social referents in the construction of normative beliefs, which were perceived as facilitators of behavioral intention, being confused with beliefs of perceived control. Social contributions: Recognizing the low employability of former convicts as a management problem can be the beginning of a debate on strategies that seek to minimize the negative impacts of their low employability. This study is an invitation to discuss joint efforts between public authorities, the population, and academia, to mitigate prejudices that imprison former offenders and society.

The Transformative Power of Education as a Means of Enabling Former Offenders to Live Meaningful and Productive Lives

Kaur (2012) raises the question, how can education be more inclusive and representative when catering to diverse groups and students? Does our entitlement to human kindness cease once incarcerated, and are we to be forever banished to the outskirts of society? The majority of offender education research assesses success or failure through mechanistic, objective and calculated criteria. Statistically, offenders repeatedly underachieve in primary and secondary education; offenders who partake in some form of adult and post-release learning continue this pattern, and face other non-learning barriers that impact on participation and accreditation outcomes (Prison Education Trust, 2018). Departing from conventional modes and methods of teaching, this article examines the transformative journeys of former offenders, and considers the role of education in supporting them to lead more productive and meaningful lives.

Public opinion and the politics of collateral consequence policies

We analyze data from a national sample of the U.S. population to assess public support for policies that deny former offenders’ access to job training programs, food stamps, and public housing. We find that Americans generally oppose benefit restrictions, though support for these policies is higher among Republicans and people with higher levels of racial resentment. We also find that a legislator’s criminal justice reform positions generally do not significantly affect voters’ evaluation of him or her, and even voters with more punitive attitudes toward collateral consequence policies support legislators who advance particular kinds of reform proposals. These findings provide little evidence that any group of Americans would be mobilized to vote against a legislator who works to reform collateral consequence policies. We discuss the implications of these findings for American and comparative studies of the politics of punishment.

What Matters to Formerly Incarcerated Men? Looking Beyond Recidivism as a Measure of Successful Reintegration

This study explored how men recently released from prison conceptualized successful reentry. Qualitative analysis of 12 in-depth life history interviews with formerly incarcerated men revealed that they defined success beyond the literature’s typical focus on criminal behavior avoidance and future criminal justice system contact. The study found several interconnected definitions of success. Central to participants’ conceptions were connection to legitimate employment, ownership, or entrepreneurship, using past experiences to assist other former offenders or recovering addicts with their problems, and the achievement of heteronormative masculine expectations. The implications of these findings for future research and practice are discussed.

Exploring County Lines: Criminal Drug Distribution Practices in Scotland

The concept of ‘County Lines’ denotes an exploitative type of illegal drug distribution and dealing criminal enterprise that is indicative of the development of new strategies to underpin criminal markets in Britain. It is a growing phenomenon characterizing the evolution and working of drug distribution networks in contemporary Britain which often establish ‘nests’ in the homes of vulnerable persons domiciled within drug traffic hubs. This article draws upon qualitative data generated from interviews with active and former offenders and members of intervention agencies in order to understand more about the denizens of this embryonic criminal world.

Reentry Processes in the United States

Reentry is the process of ending a period of incarceration, leaving jail or prison, and returning to society. Not to be confused with reintegration or recidivism, reentry is not a measure of success or failure. Instead, reentry is a journey, and no two reentries are analogous. The reentry process is individualized and highly dependent on a number of factors including a reentering individual’s sentence structure, incarceration experience, and postrelease resources. Depending on these factors, a reentering individual may find his or her return to the free world a relatively smooth transition or a task riddled with seemingly insurmountable obstacles. To navigate such obstacles, most reentering individuals need assistance. Traditionally, reentry assistance was provided by the state, through correctional programming in prison or by parole authorities tasked with monitoring a reentering individual postrelease. In recent years, nonprofit and faith-based organizations have increasingly been a part of innovative reentry initiatives. There has also been a recent expansion of Internet-based reentry resources, such as reentry.net and exoffenders.net, which allow those experiencing reentry to obtain reentry resources online. Reentry initiatives typically take two forms: deficit-based and strengths-based. Deficit-based reentry models use actuarial assessments to identify a reentering individual’s criminogenic risks and needs. In theory, deficit-based models then address those risks and needs through measured, tailored responses. Critics of deficit-based models argue that by focusing only on risks and needs, such approaches overlook reentering individuals’ talents and skills. Acknowledging these criticisms, many reentry initiatives have shifted away from the traditional deficits-centered model of reentry and toward a strengths-based approach. Rather than focusing on the risks and needs of a reentering individual, strengths-based approaches highlight the attributes of reentering individuals and draw on the experiences of former offenders who have successfully navigated their own reentry and best understand the pitfalls of the process. Recent, albeit limited empirical and experiential evidence supports the strength-based approach to reentry, suggesting that the concerns and insights of those who have been directly impacted by the criminal justice system make the transition from incarceration to freedom a smoother one.

The stigma of a criminal record in the labour market in Spain: An experimental study

The aim of this research is to determine whether the stigma of a criminal record should be considered in understanding the precarious conditions of individuals with convictions in the Spanish labour market. Previous studies have been unable to separate this effect from other explanations such as low levels of education or the breakdown of networks resulting from the conviction. Following Pager (2007), this study adopts the experimental methodology of the audit tests, in which matched fictitious curricula vitae, differing only in the mention of a conviction, are sent to real job offers, to verify whether there is a difference in the number of responses to each CV. The results show that skilled former offenders are discriminated in the Spanish labour market as a result of the stigma of a criminal record.