When Policy Comes to Town

Discourses and Dilemmas of Implementation of a Statewide Reentry Policy in Kansas

Bibliographic Data

ID9680652
AuthorsAndres F Rengifo (0000-0003-3345-5055, School of Criminal Justice Rutgers University—Newark, corresponding author), DON STEMEN (Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology Loyola University Chicago), Ethan Amidon (Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice Missouri State University)
Year2017
Volume55
Issue3
Pages603-630
Publication date2017-08-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueCriminology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0011-1384 • E-ISSN: 1745-9125
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/1745-9125.12146
OpenAlexW2627992703
LanguageEN
Citations received16
References cited35

In this case study, we document challenges to reform implementation posed by line staff, supervisors, and managers during a large‐scale realignment of the Kansas Department of Corrections (KDOC) in which they sought to replace a traditional approach of “risk containment” focused on surveillance and incarceration with a new model of “risk reduction” focused on service delivery and reintegration. We draw on interviews, observations, and archival research to document the staff's discursive challenges to the rollout of the new policy. More specifically, we describe how varying challenges to the reforms—“denial,” “dismissal,” and “defiance”—reflect actors’ positions within the organization, the local contexts in which they operate, and more general frames of interpretation of the long‐term orientation of the KDOC. We integrate these perspectives to contribute to the ongoing expansion of conventional models of penal change that highlight the role of actors and local social and institutional context as moderators of the gap between “law on the books” and “law in action.”

Context (archaeology · Criminology · Denial · Dismissal · Interpretation (philosophy · Political science · Public relations · Sociology · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis · Law · Policing Practices and Perceptions · Psychology · Public Administration · Regulation and Compliance Studies

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