Through some sort of gravitational force, the phrase ‘criminal justice’ evokes ideas about justness in the administration of deviance. The police handle people suspected of infractions according to the gravity of their deeds and the rule book. In their book, ‘Tough Choices’, Seddon, Williams and Ralphs argue that contemporary drug policy, instead, should be understood as a risk-filtering ‘machine’. Here, offenders suspected of being drug addicts are herded into rehabilitation by a blend of carrot and stick. They base this claim on an impressive bulk of data. The authors carried out 220 interviews and analysed more than 150 documents and almost 80 hours of observations.
Seddon, Williams and Ralphs set out to explain the common observations of drug workers at police stations and courts. What are they doing there, and how did they get there? What used to be arenas for policing and judgement have become work areas for social/drug workers. Seddon and his team refer to this shift in drug policy as a ‘criminal justice turn’. This turn is quickly identified as a political strategy with the name, ‘Tough Choices’ (TC). Also as the title of the book, it indicates that this is a study about TCs more specifically seen as a political strategy. TC has four or five core elements: (1) Tests for drug use on arrest for certain offences. (2) Assessments of those testing positive. (3) Restrictions on bail for those found to be in the target group. (4) Community sentences with rehabilitation programmes in court. In addition, a set of rehabilitative measures are available inside prisons, but this is not part of the study by Seddon and his team. The authors identify this strategy as neoliberal in its emphasis on choice and responsibility. The rationale is to confront the culprit with situations in which he or she must make a decision. Within the funnel of the criminal justice system, this programme has inserted doors opening out of the drug lifestyle, i.e. through treatment programmes and community sentencing. The rehabilitation options are less unpleasant than the alternative, and as a result, those arrested for certain offences are supposed to ‘choose a life’, that is, a life without crime. Drawing on Foucault and his heirs and their analysis of contemporary politics, Seddon, Williams and Ralphs characterize the TC strategy as a form of neo-liberal government.
When the authors conclude that drug policy, and TC in particular, is a risk filtering machine, they take one more step along the criminological trajectory. Several authors have developed the concept of governmentality into an analysis of contemporary penal policy as a measure of risk management. Writers such as Garland (Citation2001), Simon (Citation2007) and Ericson (Citation2006) have provided benchmark analyses in this tradition.
Seddon and his team do a good job both in framing their study in the risk-tradition; and in doing this, they introduce these writers and their tradition in a comprehensive manner. This book, then, may also serve as an introduction to this body of literature for researchers and practitioners within the fields of penal and drug policies, respectively, who may not already be acquainted with it.
TC is described as a risk-filtering machine in three chapters. In this study, we are introduced to the practical implementations of TC at the police station and in the courts. These chapters constitute less than half of the book (70 of 180 pages). A critical reader may find these chapters a little wanting in depth. We are not presented with empirical material as such; we are left with indirect references to their interviews, experiences and interpretations. The interpretations made by the authors leave the reader in the dark. Is it really possible that three years of collecting data did not result in any uncertainties about the fruitfulness of labeling TC as a risk-filtering machine? Given the space for historical framing and the amount of theoretical groundwork in the introduction to this study, one may ask if the conclusion is sufficiently underpinned. Furthermore, the balancing of ‘big theory’ and small scale scrutiny begs questions such as ‘what is theory and what is data?’ and ‘what is presupposed and what is it that is really found?’ At least, we could have been given a reference to other publications, where the data were presented more elaborately.
TC, the book, is published in the Clarendon Studies in Criminology series. Historically, this series is a guarantor for quality, defining benchmarks for top notch studies within different subfields in criminology. Thus, the expectations are high, and they are fulfilled.
Social science at its best integrates theory and data. What we find here is a theoretically informed text, which lifts the quality of the data and throws light on the authors’ findings. And vice versa; the data illuminate theory. The two concluding chapters bring the findings into a fruitful dialogue with the most important authors in the field. This is not a book that includes theory and data; In this study these elements are successfully integrated.
This study excels in scientific precision. The pages are used to lay bare the theoretical premises, both in leaving the study open to criticism (which of course, is a fundamental academic virtue) and in pointing to their exact empirical targets. The book brims with intimate knowledge of the justice apparatus and drug policies. Departing from the literature on criminal justice as a way of administering risk has obviously enabled these researchers to design their study accurately in the otherwise complex myriad of institutional contexts that together constitute the justice system.
This book comes across as a convincing study, theoretically informed, empirically precise and thorough. Notwithstanding the question marks, the authors put forward a weighty argument for their claim that TC, the programme, fits in with the developments within the framework of big-picture trends in criminal justice.
Thus, this is not just another report on criminal justice and drugs. This book is setting a standard for future research in drug policy and criminology alike. This is one for the book shelf.
Nicolay B. Johansen
Department of Criminology and Sociology of Law
University of Oslo
Oslo, Norway
E-mail: [email protected]
References
- Ericson RV. Crime in an insecure world. Polity Press, Cambridge, MA 2006
- Garland D. The culture of control: Crime and social order in contemporary society. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL 2001
- Simon J. Governing through crime: How the war on crime transformed American democracy and created a culture of fear. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2007