Professional Legitimacy, Identity, and Practice
Towards a Sociology of Professionalism in Probation
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8400499 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Matt Tidmarsh (0000-0002-6063-9805, University of Hertfordshire, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2022 |
| Volume | 62 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 165-183 |
| Publication date | 2022-01-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The British Journal of Criminology (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0007-0955 • E-ISSN: 1464-3529 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/bjc/azab045 |
| OpenAlex | W3164689305 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 7 |
| References cited | 37 |
This paper draws from Foucauldian understandings of the sociology of the professions to explore legitimacy, identity, and practice in probation after the Transforming Rehabilitation (TR) reforms to services in England and Wales. A discourse of ‘professionalism’ was crucial to the Coalition Government’s mobilization of TR; however, the contested nature of the term is rarely acknowledged in a probation context. Based on an ethnographic study of a privately-owned Community Rehabilitation Company, the paper demonstrates how professionalism in probation has been reshaped by punitive, managerial, and rehabilitative ‘adaptations’. It argues that professionalism has been detached from its ideal-typical groundings, becoming a malleable practice of (self-)government which is integral to how probation professionals demonstrate their legitimacy to multiple (and competing) actors in a network of accountability – the state, the public, offenders, adjacent organizations, and, additionally, private providers. Accordingly, appeals to a discourse of professionalism are a source of meaning for staff and a disciplinary mechanism that governs their conduct ‘at a distance’
Accountability · Context (archaeology) · Discipline · Ethnography · Government (linguistics) · Identity (music) · Legitimacy · Meaning (existential) · Political science · Politics · Public relations · Punitive damages · Social science · Sociology · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis · Homelessness and Social Issues · Law · Psychology · Public Administration · Social Work Education and Practice
Professional Registration of Probation Practitioners in a Devolved Welsh Probation Service
‘So, your words weren’t twisted were they?’
‘I would work with a client, but I have to fill out papers’
A necessary but painful journey
Making, unmaking, remaking
Legacies of Change
The Governmentalization of the Professional Gay Self
The System of Professions
The Culture of Control
The Interpretation of Cultures
Probation renationalised
Professionalism, Payment by Results and the Probation Service
Legitimacy and Compliance in Criminal Justice
Doing Probation Work
The Mission Transformed
The Mission to the English Police Courts 1876–1936
Investing in ‘Toughness’
Transforming Rehabilitation
Probation migration(s)
A legitimate business? Representations of privatised probation in England and Wales
Late-modern rehabilitation
Risk analysis and the new practitioner
Privatization and coercion
Some Reflections on the Relationship between Citizenship, Access to Justice, and the Reform of Legal Aid
Moving Away from Social Work and Half Way Back Again
Technicality and Indeterminacy in Probation Practice
Constructing the Durable Penal Agent
Criminal Justice Identities in Transition
Publics, Politics and Power
The Appeal to 'Professionalism' as a Disciplinary Mechanism
Undoing the Demos
When Welfare Professionals Encounter Restructuring and Privatization
Professionalism
Governing economic life
| Unique citing works | 7 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1,75 |
| Citation span | 2022 - 2025 (4) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 7 |