Client Rehabilitation or Sanitisation of the Penal Language? Analysis of Correctional Reforms in Jamaica

• Author: Marlyn J. Jones
• Pages: 323-347

323

CLIENT REHABILITATION OR SANITISATION OF THE PENAL LANGUAGE?

INTRODUCTION

To date, there has been limited academic

research on Jamaica’s criminal justice system

and even less focus is placed on the

‘correctional’ component of the system. The

result is a paucity of information on

‘corrections.’ This study attempts to fill this

gap by examining post-1975 reforms within

the Department of Correctional Services of

Jamaica (DCSJ) which changed its mandate

to reflect rehabilitation. The paper, by

juxtaposing official discourse of correctional

services with the counter discourse of

inmates, questions whether the mandate to

rehabilitate inmates is being achieved.

DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONAL

SERVICES, JAMAICA (DCSJ)

DCSJ, a department of the Ministry of

National Security, is one of three

components of Jamaica’s criminal justice

system. The three core functional areas of

DCSJ are: custodial services (adults and

juveniles), rehabilitation and Human

Resources Management, and Community

Services. Within these three core areas, the

department provides facilities for admission,

incarceration and welfare of inmates and

wards; administers the probation, parole and

hostel services operating in the community,

and provides the necessary reports that will

assist the courts to make informed decisions

in selected cases. DCSJ is also mandated to

provide rehabilitation programmes for

inmates, offenders and wards including

Client

Rehabilitation

or Sanitisation

of the Penal

Language?

Analysis of

Correctional

Reforms in

Jamaica

Marlyn J. Jones

Fifteen

324

CRIME, DELINQUENCY AND JUSTICE

educational programmes, individual group counselling, spiritual/religious

instruction and other treatment programmes. The department is also required to

develop, implement and evaluate procedures to ensure fiscal responsibility (http:/

/dcsj.net/p/dcsj2.htm).

The Department operates seven adult correctional centres, one adult remand

centre and four juvenile centres. Seventeen community service offices (probation

offices) are also located across the island (http://dcsj.net/p/dcsj2.htm). Citing ‘an

inefficient system plagued with inconsistencies and duplication’ in 1975,

components of ‘Corrections’ were reorganised to form the Department of

Correctional Services, Jamaica (http://dcsj.net/p/background.htm). Prior to its

reorganisation, the Jamaican prison system emphasised punishment. Post-1975

reforms used updated correctional philosophy to focus on rehabilitation, adoption

of rehabilitation as a mandate, and implementation or amendment of several

legislation such as The Criminal Justice Reform Act (CJRA) and The Parole Act, and

Criminal Records (Rehabilitation of Offenders) Act.

Reflecting the new philosophy of offender management, CJRA made provisions

for new alternatives to incarceration while the Correctional Institution (Declaration)

Adult Correctional Centres, Order 1991 renamed prisons as adult correctional centres.

Similarly, ‘prisoners’ became ‘inmates;’ and ‘prison officers’ became ‘correctional

officers.’ To ‘guide the Department of Correctional Services in managing

rehabilitation as a core strategic function’ (Rehabilitation http://www.dcsj.net/dcsj/

rehabilitation.htm) in 2000, the department’s ‘philosophical and conceptual

functions were revisited and restructured to reflect a twenty-first century approach

to the correctional process’ http://dcsj.net/p/background.htm.

OFFICIAL DISCOURSE

The following describing the department’s current philosophy states:

The Department of Correctional Services is determined to move strategically into

enhanced client supervision and public safety, thus enabling the successful

achievement of its vision of a “therapeutic environment” for its clients and a

“more peaceful, caring and productive society” (http://www.dcsj.net/p/background.htm).

Reflecting the changed philosophy, the vision and mission statements also

echo the need to serve and empower clients. Reproduced below are the

organisation’s mission and vision statements (http://www.dcsj.net/p/vision.htm):

VISION

We are serving the needs of all our clients by creating and facilitating

opportunities for their empowerment and rehabilitation, resulting in a more

peaceful, caring and productive society.