NCJ Number
244695
Date Published
2001
Length
230 pages
Annotation
Based on the "Liverpool Desistance Study," this book compares the stories of ex-convicts currently involved in criminal behavior with the stories of ex-convicts who are desisting from crime and drug use.
Abstract
Based on findings of this study, the author argues that "to desist from crime, ex-offenders need to develop a coherent, prosocial identity for themselves." This involves accounting for and understanding their criminal pasts, i.e., why they did what they did, as well as an understanding of why they are now "not like that anymore." The purpose of this research on ex-offender life narratives was to identify the common, psychosocial structure underlying these self-stories as a means of constructing a phenomenology of desistance from criminal behavior. Chapter 1 reviews what is known about such desistance, followed by a chapter that describes the Liverpool Desistance Study, a recent analysis of the subjective process of desistance from crime based on an analysis of two samples of ex-offenders, one sample that is still actively involved in crime and a sample that has desisted from crime. Part 2 of the book, "Two Views of a Brick Wall" compares the world views of the two samples. The "brick wall" is the common experience of both samples of having a history of long-term offending and being ex-convicts. Chapter 3 portrays the risk factors and structural obstacles apparently underlying the criminal behaviors of both samples. Chapter 4 characterizes the way habitual offenders view and respond to their circumstances, which is labeled a "condemnation script," which involves a sense of being doomed or fated to their life situation. Chapter 5 outlines the prototypical self-story of the desisting ex-offenders, labeled the "redemption script," which the author calls the primary contribution of this study. The chapters of part 3 analyze alternative models of the reformed ex-offender. Exhibits, 400 references, and subject and author indexes