Cyrus Tata
Biographic Data
| ID | 3465274 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Cyrus Tata |
| GIVEN NAMES | Cyrus |
| FAMILY NAME | Tata |
| SIGNATURE | TATA C |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Strathclyde |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-1033-478X |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 16 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 96 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 15 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1997 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
What does the showing of voluntary participation by the defendant do for criminal justice professionals
How do justice professionals, in their everyday practices, reconcile what they regard as their competing obligations: to allow participation and yet to conclude cases efficiently? This article argues that rather than doing so through individual self‐talk denying the value of participation, or, by overt pressure on the defendant, professionals need to see evidence of apparent participation, often through the work shown to them by other professiona…
Criminal Justice and The Ideal Defendant in the Making of Remorse and Responsibility
This book investigates how defendants are assessed by criminal justice decision-makers, such as judges, lawyers, probation officers, parole board members and those involved in restorative justice. What attitudes and emotions are defendants expected to show? How are these expectations communicated? With contributors from across the world, the book opens new comparative possibilities and research agendas. The book argues that defendants, at various…
Sentencing: A Social Process
Humanising Punishment?: Mitigation and “Case-Cleansing” Prior to Sentencing
The purpose of this article is to stimulate new thinking about the role of the humanisation of the person to be sentenced. By rendering the person’s offending more comprehensible, humanisation is assumed to obstruct harsh penal treatment and mechanical case-disposal. Distinctively, however, this article argues that “humanisation work” also achieves profound latent effects. By resolving the potential threat of a person’s own account appearing to b…
Ritual Individualization: Creative Genius at Sentencing, Mitigation, and Conviction
Judges and lawyers must regard themselves as upholding cherished values, including the presumption of innocence; free defendant choice and participation; and attention to the unique individual. Yet, everyday criminal work also demands compliance with a system of perfunctory, mass case disposal. How is this potential contradiction addressed? Conceiving the criminal‐penal process as a tripartite rite of passage, the article originates the concept o…
Sentencing and Society: International Perspectives
Combining the latest work of leading sentencing and punishment scholars from twelve different countries, this major new international volume answers key questions in the study of sentencing and society. It presents not only a rigorous examination of the latest legal and empirical research from around the world, but also reveals the workings of sentencing within society and as a social practice. Traditionally, work in the field of sentencing has b…
Connecting legal and social justice in the neo-liberal world? The construction, interpretation and use of pre-sentence reports
The legitimacy of state-imposed punishment depends on more than the making of lawful decisions. The sentencing process is legitimated also by looking outwards beyond narrow legal criteria so as to accommodate individualized substantive justice, including some recognition of social disadvantage. Pre-sentence reports1 are the main way in which sentencing brings together these legal and social conceptions of justice. In their advice and assistance t…
A sense of justice: The role of pre-sentence reports in the production (and disruption) of guilt and guilty pleas
The criminal justice process in the lower and intermediate courts depends on defendants admitting guilt and being seen to do so voluntarily. Hitherto, there has been limited academic consideration of how pre-sentence reports and their associated processes interact with the dynamics of guilty pleas. Drawing on recent research following through the production, use, and interpretation of a sample of reports, this article concentrates on the troublin…
Risk, responsibility and reconfiguration: Penal adaptation and misadaptation
This article draws on the findings of an ethnographic study of social enquiry and sentencing in the Scottish courts. It explores the nature of the practice of social enquiry (that is, of social workers preparing reports to assist sentencers) and explores the extent to which this practice is being reconfigured in line with the recent accounts of penal transformation. In so doing, we problematize and explore what we term the ‘governmentality gap’; …
Street‐Level Bureaucracy, Interprofessional Relations, and Coping Mechanisms: A Study of Criminal Justice Social Workers in the Sentencing Process
This article builds on the work of Michael Lipsky and develops an argument about the significance of interprofessional working for street‐level bureaucracy. It presents an ethnographic analysis of criminal justice social workers writing presentence reports for the Scottish courts. Social workers' report writing for judges brought into relief issues of relative professional status. Social workers were uncertain of their place within the legal doma…
Shadow Writing and Participant Observation: A Study of Criminal Justice Social Work Around Sentencing
The study of decision‐making by public officials in administrative settings has been a mainstay of law and society scholarship for decades. The methodological challenges posed by this research agenda are well understood: how can socio‐legal researchers get inside the heads of legal decision‐makers in order to understand the uses of official discretion? This article describes an ethnographic technique the authors developed to help them penetrate t…
Assisting and Advising The Sentencing Decision Process: The Pursuit of 'Quality' in Pre-Sentence Reports
Pre-sentence reports are an increasingly prevalent feature of the sentencing process. Yet, although judges have been surveyed about their general views, we know relatively little about how such reports are read and interpreted by judges considering sentence in specific cases, and, in particular, how these judicial interpretations compare with the intentions of the writers of those same reports. This article summarizes some of the main findings of…
Sentencing as Craftwork and the Binary Epistemologies of the Discretionary Decision Process
This article contends that it is time to take a critical look at a series of binary categories which have dominated the scholarly and reform epistemologies of the sentencing decision process. These binaries are: rules versus discretion; reason versus emotion; offence versus offender; normative principles versus incoherence; aggravating versus mitigating factors; and aggregate/tariff consistency versus individualized sentencing. These binaries und…
In the Interests of Clients or Commerce? Legal Aid, Supply, Demand, and 'Ethical Indeterminacy' in Criminal Defence Work
As a professional, a lawyer's first duty is to serve the client's best interests, before simple monetary gain. In criminal defence work, this duty has been questioned in the debate about the causes of growth in legal aid spending: is it driven by lawyers (suppliers) inducing unnecessary demand for their services or are they merely responding to increased demand? Research reported here found clear evidence of a change in the handling of cases in r…
Conceptions and Representations of the Sentencing Decision Process
Conceptions and Representations of the Sentencing Decision Process
This article attempts to reflect on the success of attempts by academic research to understand and explain the sentencing decision process. It identifies conventional themes in the conception and representation of that decision process and argues that there are some important difficulties associated with them and consequently implications for both the findings of sentencing research and for approaches to sentencing reform. The article suggests a …
Risk, responsibility and reconfiguration: Penal adaptation and misadaptation
This article draws on the findings of an ethnographic study of social enquiry and sentencing in the Scottish courts. It explores the nature of the practice of social enquiry (that is, of social workers preparing reports to assist sentencers) and explores the extent to which this practice is being reconfigured in line with the recent accounts of penal transformation. In so doing, we problematize and explore what we term the ‘governmentality gap’; …
Street‐Level Bureaucracy, Interprofessional Relations, and Coping Mechanisms: A Study of Criminal Justice Social Workers in the Sentencing Process
This article builds on the work of Michael Lipsky and develops an argument about the significance of interprofessional working for street‐level bureaucracy. It presents an ethnographic analysis of criminal justice social workers writing presentence reports for the Scottish courts. Social workers' report writing for judges brought into relief issues of relative professional status. Social workers were uncertain of their place within the legal doma…
Sentencing as Craftwork and the Binary Epistemologies of the Discretionary Decision Process
This article contends that it is time to take a critical look at a series of binary categories which have dominated the scholarly and reform epistemologies of the sentencing decision process. These binaries are: rules versus discretion; reason versus emotion; offence versus offender; normative principles versus incoherence; aggravating versus mitigating factors; and aggregate/tariff consistency versus individualized sentencing. These binaries und…
Shadow Writing and Participant Observation: A Study of Criminal Justice Social Work Around Sentencing
The study of decision‐making by public officials in administrative settings has been a mainstay of law and society scholarship for decades. The methodological challenges posed by this research agenda are well understood: how can socio‐legal researchers get inside the heads of legal decision‐makers in order to understand the uses of official discretion? This article describes an ethnographic technique the authors developed to help them penetrate t…
In the Interests of Clients or Commerce? Legal Aid, Supply, Demand, and 'Ethical Indeterminacy' in Criminal Defence Work
As a professional, a lawyer's first duty is to serve the client's best interests, before simple monetary gain. In criminal defence work, this duty has been questioned in the debate about the causes of growth in legal aid spending: is it driven by lawyers (suppliers) inducing unnecessary demand for their services or are they merely responding to increased demand? Research reported here found clear evidence of a change in the handling of cases in r…
Conceptions and Representations of the Sentencing Decision Process
This article attempts to reflect on the success of attempts by academic research to understand and explain the sentencing decision process. It identifies conventional themes in the conception and representation of that decision process and argues that there are some important difficulties associated with them and consequently implications for both the findings of sentencing research and for approaches to sentencing reform. The article suggests a …
Assisting and Advising The Sentencing Decision Process: The Pursuit of 'Quality' in Pre-Sentence Reports
Pre-sentence reports are an increasingly prevalent feature of the sentencing process. Yet, although judges have been surveyed about their general views, we know relatively little about how such reports are read and interpreted by judges considering sentence in specific cases, and, in particular, how these judicial interpretations compare with the intentions of the writers of those same reports. This article summarizes some of the main findings of…
Connecting legal and social justice in the neo-liberal world? The construction, interpretation and use of pre-sentence reports
The legitimacy of state-imposed punishment depends on more than the making of lawful decisions. The sentencing process is legitimated also by looking outwards beyond narrow legal criteria so as to accommodate individualized substantive justice, including some recognition of social disadvantage. Pre-sentence reports1 are the main way in which sentencing brings together these legal and social conceptions of justice. In their advice and assistance t…
A sense of justice: The role of pre-sentence reports in the production (and disruption) of guilt and guilty pleas
The criminal justice process in the lower and intermediate courts depends on defendants admitting guilt and being seen to do so voluntarily. Hitherto, there has been limited academic consideration of how pre-sentence reports and their associated processes interact with the dynamics of guilty pleas. Drawing on recent research following through the production, use, and interpretation of a sample of reports, this article concentrates on the troublin…
Ritual Individualization: Creative Genius at Sentencing, Mitigation, and Conviction
Judges and lawyers must regard themselves as upholding cherished values, including the presumption of innocence; free defendant choice and participation; and attention to the unique individual. Yet, everyday criminal work also demands compliance with a system of perfunctory, mass case disposal. How is this potential contradiction addressed? Conceiving the criminal‐penal process as a tripartite rite of passage, the article originates the concept o…
Conceptions and Representations of the Sentencing Decision Process
Conceptions and Representations of the Sentencing Decision Process
This article attempts to reflect on the success of attempts by academic research to understand and explain the sentencing decision process. It identifies conventional themes in the conception and representation of that decision process and argues that there are some important difficulties associated with them and consequently implications for both the findings of sentencing research and for approaches to sentencing reform. The article suggests a …
Sentencing as Craftwork and the Binary Epistemologies of the Discretionary Decision Process
This article contends that it is time to take a critical look at a series of binary categories which have dominated the scholarly and reform epistemologies of the sentencing decision process. These binaries are: rules versus discretion; reason versus emotion; offence versus offender; normative principles versus incoherence; aggravating versus mitigating factors; and aggregate/tariff consistency versus individualized sentencing. These binaries und…
In the Interests of Clients or Commerce? Legal Aid, Supply, Demand, and 'Ethical Indeterminacy' in Criminal Defence Work
As a professional, a lawyer's first duty is to serve the client's best interests, before simple monetary gain. In criminal defence work, this duty has been questioned in the debate about the causes of growth in legal aid spending: is it driven by lawyers (suppliers) inducing unnecessary demand for their services or are they merely responding to increased demand? Research reported here found clear evidence of a change in the handling of cases in r…
Shadow Writing and Participant Observation: A Study of Criminal Justice Social Work Around Sentencing
The study of decision‐making by public officials in administrative settings has been a mainstay of law and society scholarship for decades. The methodological challenges posed by this research agenda are well understood: how can socio‐legal researchers get inside the heads of legal decision‐makers in order to understand the uses of official discretion? This article describes an ethnographic technique the authors developed to help them penetrate t…
Assisting and Advising The Sentencing Decision Process: The Pursuit of 'Quality' in Pre-Sentence Reports
Pre-sentence reports are an increasingly prevalent feature of the sentencing process. Yet, although judges have been surveyed about their general views, we know relatively little about how such reports are read and interpreted by judges considering sentence in specific cases, and, in particular, how these judicial interpretations compare with the intentions of the writers of those same reports. This article summarizes some of the main findings of…
Risk, responsibility and reconfiguration: Penal adaptation and misadaptation
This article draws on the findings of an ethnographic study of social enquiry and sentencing in the Scottish courts. It explores the nature of the practice of social enquiry (that is, of social workers preparing reports to assist sentencers) and explores the extent to which this practice is being reconfigured in line with the recent accounts of penal transformation. In so doing, we problematize and explore what we term the ‘governmentality gap’; …
Street‐Level Bureaucracy, Interprofessional Relations, and Coping Mechanisms: A Study of Criminal Justice Social Workers in the Sentencing Process
This article builds on the work of Michael Lipsky and develops an argument about the significance of interprofessional working for street‐level bureaucracy. It presents an ethnographic analysis of criminal justice social workers writing presentence reports for the Scottish courts. Social workers' report writing for judges brought into relief issues of relative professional status. Social workers were uncertain of their place within the legal doma…
Connecting legal and social justice in the neo-liberal world? The construction, interpretation and use of pre-sentence reports
The legitimacy of state-imposed punishment depends on more than the making of lawful decisions. The sentencing process is legitimated also by looking outwards beyond narrow legal criteria so as to accommodate individualized substantive justice, including some recognition of social disadvantage. Pre-sentence reports1 are the main way in which sentencing brings together these legal and social conceptions of justice. In their advice and assistance t…
A sense of justice: The role of pre-sentence reports in the production (and disruption) of guilt and guilty pleas
The criminal justice process in the lower and intermediate courts depends on defendants admitting guilt and being seen to do so voluntarily. Hitherto, there has been limited academic consideration of how pre-sentence reports and their associated processes interact with the dynamics of guilty pleas. Drawing on recent research following through the production, use, and interpretation of a sample of reports, this article concentrates on the troublin…
Sentencing and Society: International Perspectives
Combining the latest work of leading sentencing and punishment scholars from twelve different countries, this major new international volume answers key questions in the study of sentencing and society. It presents not only a rigorous examination of the latest legal and empirical research from around the world, but also reveals the workings of sentencing within society and as a social practice. Traditionally, work in the field of sentencing has b…
Humanising Punishment?: Mitigation and “Case-Cleansing” Prior to Sentencing
The purpose of this article is to stimulate new thinking about the role of the humanisation of the person to be sentenced. By rendering the person’s offending more comprehensible, humanisation is assumed to obstruct harsh penal treatment and mechanical case-disposal. Distinctively, however, this article argues that “humanisation work” also achieves profound latent effects. By resolving the potential threat of a person’s own account appearing to b…
Ritual Individualization: Creative Genius at Sentencing, Mitigation, and Conviction
Judges and lawyers must regard themselves as upholding cherished values, including the presumption of innocence; free defendant choice and participation; and attention to the unique individual. Yet, everyday criminal work also demands compliance with a system of perfunctory, mass case disposal. How is this potential contradiction addressed? Conceiving the criminal‐penal process as a tripartite rite of passage, the article originates the concept o…
Sentencing: A Social Process
Criminal Justice and The Ideal Defendant in the Making of Remorse and Responsibility
This book investigates how defendants are assessed by criminal justice decision-makers, such as judges, lawyers, probation officers, parole board members and those involved in restorative justice. What attitudes and emotions are defendants expected to show? How are these expectations communicated? With contributors from across the world, the book opens new comparative possibilities and research agendas. The book argues that defendants, at various…
What does the showing of voluntary participation by the defendant do for criminal justice professionals
How do justice professionals, in their everyday practices, reconcile what they regard as their competing obligations: to allow participation and yet to conclude cases efficiently? This article argues that rather than doing so through individual self‐talk denying the value of participation, or, by overt pressure on the defendant, professionals need to see evidence of apparent participation, often through the work shown to them by other professiona…
Political science (15 works) · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis (13 works) · Law (13 works) · Criminology (12 works) · Sociology (12 works) · Psychology (11 works) · Law (9 works) · Criminal justice (7 works) · Social Psychology (7 works) · Computer Science (6 works)