The aim of the study was to see how work groups in the Correctional Service perceived and expressed masculinity norms and how the work group experienced that the phenomenon affected their meetings with clients. To meet the aim two qualitative group interviews were conducted with two and three people respectively in each group. The participants belonged to working groups within the Correctional System Service from two different regions. The results were analysed through theories of hegemonic masculinity and queer theory. The study showed a perception that masculinity norms did affect the client work because of how the client’s expressed masculinity but that the work group lacked expressions of masculinity norms. In the discussion the results are being discussed through previous research and theory. / Syftet med studien var att undersöka hur personal inom Kriminalvårdens frivård uppfattade maskulinitetsnormer i arbetsgruppen samt hur arbetsgrupperna upplevde att fenomenet påverkade klientarbetet. För att besvara syftet genomfördes två kvalitativa gruppintervjuer med två respektive tre informanter i varje grupp. Informanterna tillhörde arbetsgrupper inom Kriminalvårdens frivårdkontor från två olika regioner. Resultatet analyserades genom teori kring hegemonisk maskulinitet samt queerteori. Studien visade en uppfattning om att maskulinitetsnormer kunde påverka klientarbetet beroende på hur klienter uttryckte maskulinitet, men att arbetsgruppen ansåg sig själva sakna uttryck och påverkan av maskulinitetsnormer i klientarbetet. I diskussionen diskuteras förklaringsmodeller till resultatet utifrån tidigare forskning och teori.

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Den första tiden efter frigivning beskrivs som kritisk gällande återfall i brott då det innebär hinder och svårigheter i att anpassa sig till en konform livsstil. När det gäller dessa hinder kan frivilligorganisationer bidra till att minska återfall i brott. Följande studie syftar till att bidra till kunskap om att förebygga återfall i brott efter avslutad fängelseverkställighet. Studien avser att undersöka KRIS (Kriminellas Revansch I Samhället) återfallsförebyggande arbete för individer med en bakgrund av kriminalitet och/eller beroendeproblematik. Vidare att undersöka hur KRIS samarbete med Kriminalvården fungerar och kan utvecklas. Studien har en kvalitativ ansats och baseras på sju semistrukturerade intervjuer, vilka har analyserats tematiskt. Studiens fynd visade på att stöd från likasinnade personer som delar liknande erfarenheter av kriminalitet och/eller beroendeproblematik var en central del i vad som ansågs vara viktigt i KRIS arbete. Vidare ansågs KRIS hjälp med personlig utveckling vara betydelsefull när det kommer till motivation och bibehållande av en konform livsstil. KRIS samarbete med Kriminalvården fungerade väl enligt Förening Två, men Förening Ett hade inte ett pågående samarbete på grund av coronapandemin och en omorganisation. Däremot betonades en efterfrågan kring Kriminalvårdens bemötande av individer som avslutat en fängelseverkställighet och deras behov av socialt och instrumentellt stöd. / The first period after release from prison is described as critical regarding recidivism. There are obstacles and difficulties in returning to a conformist lifestyle. In regard to these obstacles, voluntary organizations can play a part in helping reduce recidivism. The following study aims to contribute to knowledge about preventing recidivism after prison terms have been completed. The study intends to examine KRIS’s relapse prevention work for ex-criminals and/or people who suffer from addiction. Furthermore, to investigate how KRIS’s (Criminal’s Revenge In Society) collaboration with the Swedish Correctional Service functions and can be developed. The study has a qualitative approach and is based on seven semi-structured interviews analyzed through thematic analysis. The study found that support through community with like-minded people who shared similar experiences of crime and/or addiction became a central and recurring point in what was important when a person sought help from KRIS. Furthermore, KRIS’s contribution to personal development was important when it came to motivation and the maintenance of a conventional lifestyle. The associations’ cooperation with the Swedish Correctional Service worked well according to one organization, but the other did not have an ongoing cooperation due to the corona pandemic and a reorganization. However, there was a demand regarding the treatment of individuals and their need for social and instrumental support.

Kriminalvården är en myndighet som på senare tid fått mycket uppmärksamhet i media. Myndigheten står inför stora utmaningar avseende plats- och resursbrist och behöver anställa 4 000 personer till år 2025. Det har genomförts flertalet studier kring vårdande och rättsliga myndigheter hur de agerar och verkar under press. Rättsvårdande myndigheter som Kriminalvården har inte studerats i samma omfattning. Myndigheten har en central funktion med ett samhällsviktigt uppdrag och kunskap inom området är högst relevant. Därför avser denna studie fylla en kunskapslucka som råder, genom att öka förståelse för den profession som arbetar klientnära inom en av rättsväsendets myndigheter. Syftet med studien var att undersöka vilka värden och handlingsmönster som framträder hos kriminalvårdare när de står inför utmaningar. Studien är genomförd via kvalitativ metod och Utförd inom några utav Kriminalvårdens häkten och anstalter, med fokus på kriminalvårdare som utför klientnära arbete. Studiens ansats är induktiv som innebär att utefter kriminalvårdarnas upplevelser har olika teman identifierats och analyserats. Som referensram användes Lipskys (2010) teori om närbyråkraten och etisk stress via Bengtsell, Thoursie och Åstrand Freidlitz (2021). Studien visar att säkerheten är ett överordnat värde inom Kriminalvården samt vikten av att inneha en humanistisk människosyn för klient påverkan. Det mest framträdande handlingsmönstret är sammanhållningen mellan kriminalvårdare för att hantera utmaningarna som de möter i sin vardag. Detta visar att kriminalvårdare innehar egenskaper både som närbyråkrat och byråkrat. En unik yrkesroll som inte förekommer inom andra närliggande områden. / The Correctional Service is an authority that has recently received a lot of attention in the media. The authority is facing major challenges regarding lack of space and resources and needs to employ 4,000 people by the year 2025. Several studies have been carried out about care and judicial authorities and how they act and operate under pressure. Law enforcement agencies such as the Correctional Service have not been studied to the same extent. The authority has a central function with an important mission in society, knowledge in the area is highly relevant. Therefore, this study intends to fill a gap of knowledge that exists, by increasing understanding of the profession that works close to clients within one of the judicial authorities. The purpose of the study was to investigate which values and action patterns that appears in the role of correctional officers when they are faced with challenges. The study was carried out via a qualitative method and carried out within some of the Correctional Service's prisons and institutions, with a focus on correctional officers who perform clientrelated work. The study's approach is inductive, which means that based on the experiences of the correctional officers, various themes have been identified and analyzed. Lipsky's (2010) theory of the street-level bureaucrat and ethical stress via Bengtsell, Thoursie and Åstrand Freidlitz (2021) was used as a frame of reference. The study shows that safety is an overriding value within the Correctional Service, as well as the importance of having a humanistic view of people when influencing clients. The most prominent pattern of action is the cohesion between correctional officers to deal with the challenges they face in their everyday lives. This shows that correctional officers possess characteristics both as street-level bureaucrat and bureaucrat. A unique professional role that does not occur in other related fields.

The thesis examine the process of rehabilitation offered by the Department of Correctional Service as from the time the offender is admitted (sentenced) until such time he is released back into society. Rehabilitation in the departmental context is based on four key delivery areas, which must be in place to ensure that offenders are rehabilitated. Faced with several challenges, e.g. demilitarization, structural defects of the facilities that are not conducive for rehabilitation or build for Unit management principles, career path developed for officials, and the transformation of the old penitentiary system to the new generation prison system, the department failed to achieve their objectives. The thesis will examine the current process of rehabilitation in the Department of Correctional Service, and identify areas of under performance to seek best practices to improve service delivery. The study will also focus on the readiness of offenders to be release as rehabilitated offenders and the After Care the Department provide to offenders upon their release. / Corrections Management / MA (Correctional Management)

This was a retrospective study of a community-based methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) program in Toronto. Participants (N = 170) were federally sentenced adult male offenders admitted to this voluntary program between 1997 and 2009 while subject to community supervision following incarceration. The primary investigation examined correlates of treatment responsivity, with principal outcome measures including MMT clients’ rates of: (i) illicit drug use; and (ii) completion of conditional (parole) or statutory release (SR). For a subset (n = 74), recidivism rates were examined after a 9-year interval. Findings included strong convergent evidence from logistic regression and ROC analyses that an empirically and theoretically derived set of five variables was a stable and highly significant (p <.001) predictor of release outcome. Using five factors related to risk (work/school status, security level of releasing institution, total PCL-R score, history of institutional drug use, and days at risk), release outcome was predicted with an overall classification accuracy of 88%, with high specificity (86%) and sensitivity (89%). The logistic regression model generated an R2 of .55 and the accompanying AUC was .89, both substantial. Work/school status had an extremely large positive association with successful completion of community supervision, accounting for > half of the total variance explained by the five-factor model and increasing the estimated odds of successful release outcome by > 15-fold. Also, when in the MMT program, clients' risk taking behaviour was significantly moderated, with low overall base rates of illicit drug use, yet the rate of parole/SR revocation (71%) was high. The 9-year follow-up showed a high mortality rate (15%) overall. Revocation of release while in the MMT program was associated with a significantly higher rate and more violent recidivism at follow-up. Results are discussed within the context of: (a) Andrews' and Bonta's psychology of criminal conduct; (b) the incompatibility of a harm reduction treatment model with an abstinence-based parole decision-making model; (c) changing drug use profiles among MMT clients; (d) a strength-based approach to correctional intervention focusing on educational and vocational retraining initiatives; and (e) creation of a user friendly case-based screening algorithm for prediction of release outcome for new releases.

This was a retrospective study of a community-based methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) program in Toronto. Participants (N = 170) were federally sentenced adult male offenders admitted to this voluntary program between 1997 and 2009 while subject to community supervision following incarceration. The primary investigation examined correlates of treatment responsivity, with principal outcome measures including MMT clients’ rates of: (i) illicit drug use; and (ii) completion of conditional (parole) or statutory release (SR). For a subset (n = 74), recidivism rates were examined after a 9-year interval. Findings included strong convergent evidence from logistic regression and ROC analyses that an empirically and theoretically derived set of five variables was a stable and highly significant (p <.001) predictor of release outcome. Using five factors related to risk (work/school status, security level of releasing institution, total PCL-R score, history of institutional drug use, and days at risk), release outcome was predicted with an overall classification accuracy of 88%, with high specificity (86%) and sensitivity (89%). The logistic regression model generated an R2 of .55 and the accompanying AUC was .89, both substantial. Work/school status had an extremely large positive association with successful completion of community supervision, accounting for > half of the total variance explained by the five-factor model and increasing the estimated odds of successful release outcome by > 15-fold. Also, when in the MMT program, clients' risk taking behaviour was significantly moderated, with low overall base rates of illicit drug use, yet the rate of parole/SR revocation (71%) was high. The 9-year follow-up showed a high mortality rate (15%) overall. Revocation of release while in the MMT program was associated with a significantly higher rate and more violent recidivism at follow-up. Results are discussed within the context of: (a) Andrews' and Bonta's psychology of criminal conduct; (b) the incompatibility of a harm reduction treatment model with an abstinence-based parole decision-making model; (c) changing drug use profiles among MMT clients; (d) a strength-based approach to correctional intervention focusing on educational and vocational retraining initiatives; and (e) creation of a user friendly case-based screening algorithm for prediction of release outcome for new releases.

When conducting research on crime, scholars are generally inclined to focus on the aetiology, hence our comprehension of biological and/or environmental factors as antecedents of crime. In this study, however, acknowledgement was given to ex-offenders who, once released from prison showed positive signs of disengagement from crime and posed the following questions: what are the lived experiences of ex-offenders who desist from crime and what are the reasons influencing their decisions to stop offending? Four adult male ex-offenders of African descent between the ages of 30 and 42 participated in the study. The researcher, inspired by his insider position as an ex-offender aimed to explore and describe the lived experiences of other ex-offenders who had stopped offending, or who were in the process of disengaging from crime. An interpretive phenomenological approach including three theories of criminal desistance were used to ground the study. Data were collected via semi-structured interviews and analysed thematically. Results showed that the processes of criminal desistance are unique and contextual, particular rather than universal, and that change can be attributed to intra-individual factors facilitated by strong quality social bonds / Psychology / M.A. (Psychology)

The thesis examine the process of rehabilitation offered by the Department of Correctional Service as from the time the offender is admitted (sentenced) until such time he is released back into society. Rehabilitation in the departmental context is based on four key delivery areas, which must be in place to ensure that offenders are rehabilitated. Faced with several challenges, e.g. demilitarization, structural defects of the facilities that are not conducive for rehabilitation or build for Unit management principles, career path developed for officials, and the transformation of the old penitentiary system to the new generation prison system, the department failed to achieve their objectives. The thesis will examine the current process of rehabilitation in the Department of Correctional Service, and identify areas of under performance to seek best practices to improve service delivery. The study will also focus on the readiness of offenders to be release as rehabilitated offenders and the After Care the Department provide to offenders upon their release. / Corrections Management / M.A. (Correctional Management)

A need to correct the behaviour and deeds of people who have been incarcerated has been in the plans of the South African Government for a number of years now. Shifting from being punishment to rehabilitation centres, the correctional places have the aim to rehabilitate and prepare inmates to be included in and accepted by the society beyond their incarceration period. Qualitative and quantitative approaches were adopted. The case study design was employed to provide the researcher with the flexibility to gather data after an in-depth study of the LIS in Leeuwkop and Johannesburg correctional centres. The targeted population was the Department of Correctional Services (DCS) officials in charge of the LIS, Gauteng Department of Arts and Culture (DAC), City of Johannesburg (CoJ) municipality LIS Department and offenders from the Leeuwkop and Johannesburg correctional services. The purposive sampling technique was used to select the sample for the study. Interviews were held with six Leeuwkop and Johannesburg DCS officials, one official from the City of Johannesburg LIS Department responsible for project management, and two officials from the Department of Arts and Culture. Questionnaires were administered to Leeuwkop and Johannesburg offenders. Triangulation was used to provide different views and opinions during the data analysis. The qualitative data was analysed thematically while the quantitative data was analysed numerically with tables and graphs. Ethical considerations were taken into account by acknowledging authors and providing consent forms to the participants. The study established that there was a provisional policy for correctional services libraries in Gauteng. However, most libraries did not utilise it as they rather used other policies. This is due to the fact that libraries are not autonomous but are under the formal authority of the Department of Education and Sport, Recreation, Arts and Culture (SRAC). Most inmates knew about the LIS facilities in their centres. However, the study found out that the materials stored in the libraries were out-dated and limited. Additionally, most centres did not have programmes to rehabilitate offenders while they are within the correctional facilities and to reintegrate them back into the society after their release. The study recommends that another study be done pertaining to the mandate and development of policies for the DCS libraries. / Information Science / M. Inf.