What Works in Therapeutic Prisons (PDF)

Jennifer Brown is Visiting Professor and Co-Director of the Mannheim Centre for Criminology at the London School of Economics, UK and is a chartered forensic and occupational psychologist.

Sarah Miller is a Chartered Psychologist and registered Forensic Psychologist. She is currently living and working in Australia and has recently commenced a PhD at Bond University in Queensland.

Sara Northey is a Chartered Psychologist, currently working for Sussex Partnerships Secure and Forensic services at the Hellingly Centre medium secure unit, UK.

Darragh O'Neill is currently undertaking audit research into the National Health Service and is based in the School of Life and Medical Sciences at University College London, UK.

'This book gives terrific practical attention to the details of describing the project, remembering its history and context, exploring its methods, and raising issues on an increasingly complex level as the book evolves. It will be welcomed by its readership.'

- Russ Immarigeon, Editor, Offender Programs Report, USA

"In this unique book an account of the vision, preparation, then trials and tribulations involved in establishing the UK's first therapeutic community prison in decades forms the background to a very readable narrative of the accompanying research programme from inception to outcome. Rising to the many challenges the researchers persevered with an innovative, multimethod, longitudinal and process- (as well as outcome-) oriented strategy. What has emerged is a richly detailed, "warts and all" portrayal of decisions, reality and ultimate vindication, with clear lessons and implications for future policy, practice and research in this field. This volume should be required reading for those with an interest in penal policy, therapeutic communities, personality disorder, processes of personal change and research in institutional contexts." - Adrian Needs, University of Portsmouth, UK

'The idea of a therapeutic community is a complex one, even more so in a prison environment. Evaluating its work and its effects is a challenging process. This book describes, in a highly engaging way, how such a community operated - and endeavoured to meet the needs of its members while also addressing its task of returning them to society less likely to offend than before. The book reports a searching evaluation of many facets of this. It is a genuine "demonstration project" showing how to combine a variety of research methods: the exploration of individual-level change is particularly welcome. Most important of all, the people at the centre of the story show vividly through. Their struggles to relate to others in new ways, to leave behind damaged