Psychologists as ‘the quiet ones with the power’: understanding indeterminate sentenced prisoners’ experiences of psychological risk assessment in the United Kingdom

ABSTRACT

Prisoners serving indeterminate sentences in the United Kingdom do not know when or if they will be released from prison. Release and progression decisions are determined by the risk the ISP presents of reoffending. This makes the assessment of risk a high stakes business for ISPs. Whilst there is a large body of literature focused on prisoners’ general experiences of prison, there is an absence of specific empirical exploration of prisoners’ experiences of risk assessment. This paper aims to address this gap by reporting the results of a qualitative exploration of ISPs’ experiences of psychological risk assessment. Interviews with 10 ISPs were conducted and analysed using Grounded Theory methods. Analysis indicated that prisoners experienced the prison environment as characterised by violence, volatility and suffering. Psychological risk assessment is embedded within this emotionally and physically challenging context but also contributes to the experience of suffering. Within this context, prisoners felt stuck, powerless and out of control in relation to risk assessment, and experienced psychologists as untrustworthy yet powerful. Understanding prisoners’ experiences is the first step in resolving some of the long-reported difficulties in working relationships between psychologists and prisoners as well as making the process more procedurally just.     

Migrant Workers or Working Women? Comparing Labour Supply Policies in Post-War Europe

ABSTRACT

Why did some European countries choose migrant labour to expand their labour force in the decades that followed World War II, while others opted for measures to expand female employment via welfare expansion? The paper argues that gender norms and the political strength of the left were important structuring factors in these choices. Female employment required a substantial expansion of state intervention (e.g. childcare; paid maternity leave). Meanwhile, migrant recruitment required minimal public investments, at least in the short term, and preserved traditional gender roles. Using the contrasting cases of Sweden and Switzerland, the article argues that the combination of a weak left (labour unions and social democratic parties) and conservative gender norms fostered the massive expansion of foreign labour and a late development of female labour force participation in Switzerland. In contrast, more progressive gender norms and a strong labour movement put an early end to guest worker programmes in Sweden, and paved the way for policies to promote female labour force participation.     

中国特色社会主义理论向实践转化的评估体系的构建

构建中国特色社会主义理论向实践转化的评估体系,是有针对性地推进马克思主义中国化时代化大众化的现实需要,也是保证和提升马克思主义中国化时代化大众化的实践路径与制度创新研究的客观需要。     

法的现代性：一个虚构的理论神话

在当代中国，法的现代性理论虽然已成为一个引入注目的学术板块，但是，有两个方面的问题需要再审视。一方面，从现代性本身来看，它其实是一个虚构、虚拟的概念，而且已经异化成为一个符号化的图腾。另一方面，从现代性与中国法律、中国法治的关系来看，在历史上，法律移植虽然持续不断，但百年中国的法律移植与现代性无关；20世纪80年代以来，现代性虽然有力地塑造了中国的法学理论，但它对当代中国法治实践的塑造能力相当微弱，真实生活中的法律与法治只能按照实践本身的逻辑来演进，现代性不足以牵引中国法治实践的方向。这两个方面表明，虽然现代性这个词的价值与意义不容全部抹杀，法的现代性理论依然只是一个虚构的理论神话。     

实质公平视角下劳方利益倾斜性保护之法律思考

劳资利益的公平分配需要劳资双方相互制衡.劳动力的不可独立性、不可存储性、个体弱势性等特征,使其在与资方谈判中存在先天的弱势性,需要国家给予倾斜性制度保障.但当前我国存在现有制度难以保障劳动者生存需求的矛盾、劳方与资方抗衡的组织需求矛盾、集体谈判制衡性权利缺失矛盾等法律困境.因此,我国需要从劳方生存保障制度之补足、保障劳动者组织的独立性、赋予劳动者组织的制衡性权利等方面给劳方提供倾斜性制度保护,方能实现企业利益中劳资利益分配的实质公平.     

Negotiating peace in Kosovo

We systematically analyze and forecast key developments before and during the Kosovo Crisis. Prior to the air campaign, we anticipated the breakdown of negotiations at Rambouillet and the subsequent initiation of hostilities. Without Russia as a mediator, we predicted that Milosevic would engage in military activity and strengthen his domestic control. As the war was being waged, we took a second look at settlement opportunities. Russia was identified as the key mediator needed to reach a settlement We show that a European‐led settlement offered promising prospects for peace. Finally, we demonstrate that the settlement achieved after the air war was not much different than the settlement that could have been achieved at Rambouillet The settlement on Kosovo offers only short‐term stability. To gain long‐term stability, the Serbians must either agree to the existing ethnic makeup in Kosovo or allow it to be partitioned. Otherwise, conflict in this region will likely revive.     

Land grabbing in Latin America and the Caribbean

Land grabbing has gained momentum in Latin America and the Caribbean during the past decade. The phenomenon has taken different forms and character as compared to processes that occur in other regions of the world, especially Africa. It puts into question some of the assumptions in the emerging literature on land grabbing, suggesting these are too food-centered/too food crisis-centered, too land-centred, too centred on new global food regime players – China, South Korea, Gulf States and India – and too centred on Africa. There are four key mechanisms through which land grabbing in Latin American and the Caribbean has been carried out: food security initiatives, energy/fuel security ventures, other climate change mitigation strategies, and recent demands for resources from newer hubs of global capital. The hallmark of land grabbing in the region is its intra-regional character: the key investors are (Trans-)Latin American companies, often in alliance with international capital and the central state. Initial evidence suggests that recent land investments have consolidated the earlier trend away from (re)distributive land policies in most countries in the region, and are likely to result in widespread reconcentration of land and capital.     

党内民主与中国共产党理论创新的有效实现

党内民主是不仅是促进党的理论创新及其有效实现的根本前提,也内在地奠定了中国共产党理论创新的实现机制。在新的历史条件下要进一步发挥党内民主对党的理论创新的积极作用,就必须坚持以先进的理论指导党内民主建设,以完善的制度保障党内民主建设,以科学的方法推进党内民主建设。     

我国党文化世俗化的理论建构

我国党文化世俗化是党文化揭开其神秘面纱,日益走向公民社会、世俗社会之中的过程,其在主体构成上通常包括党的思想文化、政治文化、组织文化、领导文化、执政文化的世俗化等基本内容。推进我国党文化世俗化有助于巩固党的领导地位、检验党文化的优劣性、完整展示党的性质、宗旨和任务。为推进党文化世俗化,在策略路向上要坚持做到:着力推进中国化、时代化的马克思主义之大众化进程,将党文化融合到建构完善实践社会主义核心价值体系之中,发挥党文化对社会文化的影响示范效应,以建设学习型政党,促进学习型社会建设。     

Coming to Grips with Realism

Retrieving Realism renders the joint philosophical goals of Hubert Dreyfus and Charles Taylor into what is probably their final and most concise form. It has two main objectives: first, it aims to deconstruct the mediationalism that undergirds Western philosophy, and second, it endorses contact theory, or embodied/embedded coping, as an alternative. In this essay, I present the book’s most salient themes and reveal areas that are ripe for further philosophical consideration. I also direct the reader to the work’s genuine ontological challenge: how to come to grips with contact theory beyond the borders of epistemology.