Speakers
Christopher Stacey
Parallel Workshops
What does it really take to build a meaningful partnership between academic research and frontline practice in the corrections space—and what can others learn from it?
This plenary session offers a candid, behind-the-scenes look at a collaboration between Prisoners Abroad and the University of Cambridge exploring life after imprisonment overseas. Focusing on people navigating complex resettlement journeys, the research brings together academic expertise and lived, practice-based insight to better understand desistance, reintegration, and long-term support needs.
Rather than presenting findings alone, this session will unpack how the partnership itself worked in practice. Speakers will share the key decisions, tensions, and turning points that shaped the project—from negotiating research design and managing ethical challenges, to adapting approaches in response to participant needs and emerging insights. Along the way, the session will highlight how trust, flexibility, and shared purpose enabled the collaboration to move beyond traditional research models.
The session will also explore how the partnership has extended into creative outputs and public engagement, helping to amplify voices that are often overlooked in mainstream corrections discourse.
Bringing together academic and third sector perspectives, this session offers practical, transferable lessons for anyone seeking to develop impactful, evidence-informed partnerships. It will be particularly relevant for practitioners, researchers, and policymakers looking to strengthen collaboration and build more responsive, humane approaches to complex correctional challenges.
Christophers Stacey is Chief Executive of Prsioners Abroad, based in the United Kingdom. Prisoners Abroad is a UK-registered human rights and welfare charity which supports British citizens who are imprisoned overseas. Christopher has 20 years’ experience of charities and NGO’s. He has been Chief Executive since May 2023 and is responsible leading the organization, the governance of the charity and ensuring it is achieving its strategic goals.
Together with Leslie Alcock (Irish Counsel for Prisoners Overseas) and Marco Brok (International Bureau Dutch Probation) Christopher participates in the CEP & EuroPris expert group Foreign Nationals in Prison and Probation (FNPP).
