Advancing Corrections Journal - Edition #17 - Designing a Humane Corrections: Possibilities and Challenges (ACJ17-A003)

Article 3: “Humane Corrections”: Forensic Power, Dignity and Identity (ACJ17-A003)

Abstract

Field research in prisons illustrates the importance of “dignity” and “humanity” in the experiences of incarcerated persons, making some prisons more “survivable” than others. Much attention has been paid in that regard to the relations between persons in custody and uniformed prison officers. The relationship between incarcerated persons and forensic experts, however, and the construction of a new “forensic” identity more particularly, are equally important in the former’s experience of personal dignity and identity, as illustrated by two Belgian studies discussed here. These experiences also determine the legitimacy - and consequently eventually the effectiveness - of the forensic work.

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Author

Sonja Snacken

Emeritus Professor, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium

Sonja Snacken (MA Law; PhD Criminology) is Emeritus Professor of Criminology, Penology and Sociology of Law at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium. Her research focuses on (comparative) penality and different forms of (extreme) institutional dependency. She has been involved in over 40 (inter)national research projects, with a special emphasis on the integration of an empirical social scientist and human rights approach.
She was Research Fellow at the Straus Institute for the Advanced Study of Law and Justice, New York University School of Law (2010-2011) and Collaborateur-membre of the Centre International de Criminologie Comparée, Université de Montréal. She was awarded the Belgian Francqui Chair at the Université Catholique de Louvain (2008-2009), the Ernest-John Solvay Prize for Scientific Excellence in the Human and Social Sciences by the National Science Foundation (FWO, 2010) and the 2015 European Criminology Award by the European Society of Criminology.
She was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the Université de Liège (Belgium) in November 2021 and a Honorary Doctorate from the University of Glasgow (UK) in June 2022.
She participates in several international scientific networks, English and French speaking. She was co-founder and president of the European Society of Criminology (2004-2005). She was member (2001-2012) and Chair (2006-2012) of the Council for Penological Cooperation of the Council of Europe, an advisory committee drafting the Council of Europe standards relating to prisons and community sanctions. She was an expert to the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT), monitoring the treatment of prisoners in places of detention within the Council of Europe (1994-2008). She was actively involved in the drafting of the Belgian Prison Act (2005) and the Act on the External Legal Position of Prisoners and Victims’ Rights (2006).
Some of her major international publications include:
Snacken, S. (2005) Forms of Violence and Prison Regimes. Report on a research in Belgian Prisons, in: Liebling, A. & Maruna, S. (eds.) Effects of Imprisonment, Cullompton: Willan Publishing, 306-340
van Zyl Smit, D. & Snacken, S. (2009) Principles of European Prison Law and Policy, Penology and Human Rights, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Translated into Spanish as: van Zyl Smit, D. & Snacken, S. (2013) Principios de Derecho y Política Penitenciaria Europea. Penología y Derechos Humanos, Valencia : Tirant lo Blanch, 677p.
Snacken, S. (2010) Resisting punitiveness in Europe? Theoretical Criminology, 14(3): 273-292
Snacken, S. (2015) Punishment, legitimate policies and values: Penal moderation, dignity and human rights, Punishment & Society, Special Issue: Punishment, Values, and Local Cultures, 17: 397-423
Humblet, D. & Snacken, S. (2016) Human Rights and Imprisonment of Older Adults, in: Weber, L., Fishwick, E. & Marmo, M. (eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Criminology and Human Rights, London, New York: Routledge, 546-555
Snacken, S. (2020) Empirical Prisoners’ Rights – Challenges and Risks of Proceduralisation of Dignity in Prison, in: Drenkhahn, K., Geng, B., Grzyswa-Holten, J., Harrendorf, S., Morgenstern, C., Pruin, I. (eds.) Kriminologie und Kriminalpolitik im Dienste der Menschenwürde - Festschrift fur Frieder Dünkel zum 70.Geburtsdag, Forum Verlag Godesberg, 927-940
Cliquennois, G, Snacken, S., van Zyl Smit, D. (Issue editors) (2021) Special Issue “Human rights, prisons and penal policies", European Journal of Criminology, 18(1): 3-143
Snacken, S. (2021) Human dignity and prisoners’ rights – A European Perspective, Crime and Justice, Vol 50: 301-351.
Dünkel, F. & Snacken, S. (2022) What could we learn from Covid-19? – A “reductionist” and penal moderation approach, in: Dünkel, F., Harrendorf, S., van Zyl Smit (eds) The Impact of the Coronavirus on Prisoners and Penal Policy, London-New York: Routledge, 656-691
Snacken, S, Devynck, C, Uzieblo, K. (2022) Dignity, Social Reintegration of Prisoners and the New Penal Power – European Human Rights, Experiences of Belgian Prisoners and Professional Practices, Int J Off Therapy Comparative Criminology, 66(9): 980–1000

Advancing Corrections Journal - Edition #17 - Designing a Humane Corrections: Possibilities and Challenges (ACJ17-A003)

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