Social Work with Sex Offenders. Cowburn, Malcolm
The ‘risk analysis professional’ (Douglas, 1992) plays a significant part in sociological analyses; s/he operates within specialist sub-disciplines that develop their own technical language (ie inaccessible to the general public). Bauman (1993, pp 200–8) highlights how risk discourses, through technologised approaches to knowledge, create a self-perpetuating, highly technical form of knowledge as the only valid way to approach, understand, assess and manage risk. This has the effect of prioritising certain forms of intellectual activity (calculative and mathematical) and certain subjects for inquiry:
Technology’s miraculous powers are intimately related to the stratagem of close focusing: a ‘problem’ to become a ‘task’, is first cut out from the tangle of its multiple connections with other realities, while the realities with which it is connected are left out of account and melt into the indifferent ‘backdrop’ of action. (Bauman, 1993, p 194)
In reflecting on this analysis in seeking to understand sex crime, we can see how the activities of forensic disciplines contribute to the construction of risk. Much of the psychological literature on risk and risk assessment is expressed in esoteric and inaccessible (to the lay reader) language. The terminologies are derived from medical, psychological and statistical vocabularies, and together create a discourse that embodies what may be considered to be ‘expert’ knowledge. The names of some of the instruments of assessment imply an abstracted technical world, with processes and procedures only to be understood by technical ‘experts’ (eg Static-99, Static-2002 and Risk Matrix-2002, cited in Bengtson and Långström, 2007, p 138). This technical endeavour may be located in a context of knowledge, derived from meta-analysis, which indicates that:
most sexual offenders do not re-offend sexually, that first-time sexual offenders are significantly less likely to sexually re-offend than those with previous sexual convictions, and that offenders over the age of 50 are less likely to re-offend than younger offenders. In addition, it was found that the longer offenders remained offence-free in the community the less likely they are to re-offend sexually. (Harris and Hanson, 2004, p ii)
Sociological perspectives on the nature of risk and risk assessment draw attention to the limitations of the activity. Silver and Miller (2002, p 138) suggest that the main concern of an actuarial approach is the efficient management of resources, and that by focusing on aggregate populations identified on the basis of data from criminal justice systems, it contributes to further stigmatising populations that are already marginalised. The purely actuarial task potentially ignores both the socio-political context of risk assessment (eg remember Davis’s [1981] comments, cited in Chapter One, on the sentencing and execution of black men) and the significant population of people who perpetrate sexual harms that do not come into contact with the criminal justice system (see the discussion of attrition later in this chapter). The implications of this analysis of risk for social work have been highlighted by Pollack (2010), who sees the calculation of risk as a part of the neoliberal agenda designed to control socially marginal populations. Pollack (2010, p 1276) notes that Ferguson and Lavalette (2006) call for a ‘social work of resistance’ to neoliberal agendas: ‘Integral to developing such a framework is challenging standardized technologies of “managing risky behaviours”, since “a ‘what works’ agenda that does not address issues of process, relationship and structural oppression often simply does not work”’ (Ferguson and Lavalette, 2006, p 313). Sociological perspectives allow for a wider consideration of the socio-political implications of activities that are commonplace and rarely examined.
Understanding desistance
Much psychological research explores those issues that may prompt sex offenders to reoffend. An alternative way of looking at things is to consider what helps sex offenders to avoid reoffending – what helps them to ‘desist’ from offending. Willis, Levenson and Ward (2010, p 545, emphasis in original) note: ‘The process of ceasing sexual and general offending and becoming a productive member of society is called desistance’. In recent years, there has developed a considerable body of criminological research in relation to general desistance from crime. The available research indicates that if sex offenders released from prison are provided with the resources to access stable housing, establish pro-social support networks and create intimate relationships, and are presented with opportunities for employment, then they are less likely to reoffend (Willis et al, 2010, p 545). However, Farrall (1995, p 56) notes ‘that very few people actually desist as a result of intervention on the part of the criminal justice system or its representatives’. Ward and Maruna (2007, p 14) comment that it ‘makes considerable sense to develop models of rehabilitation on the basis of what is known about how reintegration works in the “natural” environment outside of the criminal justice system’. Research clearly indicates that desistance is not an introverted psychological process, but a social activity; again, Willis et al (2010, p 548) locate the importance of social and psychological strengths in achieving aspirations: ‘All human beings require help from other people to acquire and utilize the psychological capabilities and social resources necessary to realize their aspirations whether this involves completing job training, participating in social activities, or remaining crime free’.
McNeill (2012) identifies three separate perspectives on desistance that are increasingly becoming integrated in desistance theory: (1) the significance of age and maturation; (2) life transitions and social bonds; and (3) personal and social identity. Key for the sex offender in making this transition away from offending is community support because, as Willis et al (2010, p 548) note, the move from a treatment environment into the community is difficult. Desistance-based research has informed the development of the Good Lives Model of rehabilitation that is discussed elsewhere in this book (see Chapter Six).
Theological understandings
In the ‘West’, the (Christian) Church defined and dealt with sex crimes until the 19th century (Thomas, 2011, pp 39–59). Kirby (2013) describes the relevant biblical law (Leviticus, ch 20, verses 13–16) concerning sexual behaviour. A prime concern of 19th-century legislators in the UK was ‘vice’ and ‘social purity’ (Thomas, 2011); concerns with obscene publications (Act of 1857) and prostitution (campaigns of the Social Purity Movement) featured prominently. The language of the Bible and Christian morality defined and framed the laws relating to sex crimes in the 19th and 20th centuries; sex offences were seen as acts that contravened the dominant moral code. Acts were criminal because they contravened biblical stipulations about family relations (incest) or other men’s ‘property’ (rape), or because they contravened heteronormative standards of ‘decency’ (indecent assault and gross indecency). Perhaps, partly, because of the harsh sanctions stipulated against victims in Leviticus chapter 20, there was no victim perspective involved in the framing of this legislation. In England and Wales, ‘indecent assault’ and ‘gross indecency’ remained sex crimes until the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (SOA). In many ways, such nomenclature implies that ‘decency’ is the main victim of the crime – decency has been offended – and that the people who were sexually harmed by these acts (the real victims) were an incidental element in the offence. In England and Wales, the SOA revised the terminology and gave victims an active presence in the proceedings.
The law
This section refers to the law as it applies to England and Wales; it does not pretend to provide an exhaustive account (for such an account, see Stevenson et al, 2004; Gerry et al, 2014). Furthermore, legal penalties prescribed by law are discussed in Chapter Three. The SOA announced itself as a ‘comprehensive review of sexual offences’, with three aims: (1) to modernise the catalogue of sexual offences; (2) to render them appropriate for the 20th century; and (3) to protect individuals from sexual crime. The focus of the Act is very clearly on behaviours, offenders and victims. Offences are not described in terms of breaches of moral codes or of decency (with the exception of ss 45–46); consideration is given to the relationship between the victim and the offender (eg familial, breach of trust), and there is a greater awareness of how trafficking links to prostitution, and how both are serious offences against vulnerable victims. The range and nature of crimes identified by the SOA are listed in Table 2.1.
Table 2.1: Sexual Offences Act 2003 (England and Wales), offences