Promoting professionalPrison Practice.
17th & 18th October 2023- Helsinki, Finland
Dr. Victoria Knight, De Montfort University, UK
EuroPris’ capacity and energy to get practitioners and experts together is unprecedented. Their ICT Expert Group is active and committed to knowledge exchange and growth. They do this work on top of their day jobs. The landscape of digitising our prisons is a complex one. Not necessarily because of the technology but because human interactions, needs and circumstances engage in a curious dance with all things digital.
This two-day meeting saw little focus on the tech per se but on people and what they need. The location of the roundtable brought this into sharp focus. With 10 ICT Expert Group members and 10 guest experts from academia and other EuroPris member countries, EuroPris’ Justina Dzienko and our hosts the Finnish Prison and Probation service (Rikosseuraamuslaitos), scheduled engaging presentations and a visit to Hämeenlinna women’s prison- fondly named the “Smart Prison”.
Finland’s response to digitising their prisons provided expert members, invited practitioners, and academics the right conditions to see how far our prisons can mature their digital offer for the rehabilitative benefit of prisoners and supporting staff. The context therefore provided stimulating and provocative material to expand our knowledge and re-think. Whilst conversations with key practitioners and key updates from research, social media, and reports are available, there is nothing more valuable than standing within the context I felt I knew quite a bit about. I realised I did not know enough. Witnessing Finland’s digital offer in person and first-hand was invaluable.
Seeing how it all hangs together helped me to see how there is such a thing as digital rehabilitation. And how on and offline modes of rehabilitation intersect and complement each other. Not only an important treatment programme or access to online learning but those bits in between, that we take for granted- calling our family, organising our calendars, finding out something we need to know, staying informed, managing our money, planning our meals, planning our futures- just human everyday stuff. Together and in sum THIS is digital rehabilitation- it is options, choices, autonomy, guidance, support, comfort and learning. Further to this, my original thinking about smart solutions to our prisons has forced a rethink.
In this short reflection, I will highlight the key themes that emerged from our engagement and offer my view on what are the emergent issues and needs. And perhaps topics of focus for further meetings.
There is a need to establish standards in digitisation to drive quality experiences, outcomes, and of course meaningful data. Establishing standards of quality across different jurisdictions is complicated but focused conversations about driving quality are now becoming critical. Quality is shorthand for secure ethical practice. And we are witnessing the beginning of an ‘ethical turn’ in this space. Moreover, quality assurances need to be transparent and may require independent evaluation and assessment. External scrutiny through monitoring could be a sound commitment to make in this space. Who to invite to become part of this dialogue is also important. Widening insights from those who are experts by experience could be of deep value. Moreover, independence is also important.
Questions about the cost of developing AND maintaining digital systems in prisons and the need to ensure the quality of services is a reality for services in this space. Sophisticated management systems and processes are in regular need of refreshing, maintenance, and security measures. With many public services across Europe and of course, beyond under increasing financial pressure, budgets become increasingly more restricted. Which shifts priorities, hampers growth, and slows down reform-driven innovation. Partnerships with external agencies like NGOs seem to help but don’t resolve this. Projects can stand still, stall, or even get stuck in planning phases. Essential rather than desirable may be something it all comes to. The scalability of the digital portfolio can be restricted and denied.
The demand for evidence-based AND exploratory research on digital prisons is needed. The advent of AI-based methods in prisons is catalysing this need. Sound decision-making informed by rigorous evidence bases is a challenge to the sector. Suggestions included advocating for partnerships between different jurisdictions to build cross-national projects that could work. Partnerships with researchers can help. Commissioned and coordinated research requires investment. However, networks across experts and dedicated scholars may see future developments to establish a healthier and buoyant research culture alongside practice developments. They are two sides of the same coin. Research demands resources and access to funding in this space is problematic.
Effective leadership is deemed necessary to guide people through the process of implementing digital systems and making necessary changes. Is leadership of digital prisons different from other parts of the prison, or should it be?
User involvement is key. Those with lived experience, including staff and prisoner families are crucial for meaningful and ethical digitisation. The importance of creating user-friendly systems is paramount for engagement to lead people to a rehabilitative pathway. If systems and services are not useful or are not engaging, people just won’t use them. Pia Puolakka’s presentation on the Finnish smart prison concept highlighted how feedback and engagement with users can provide illuminating insights into their service provision. More recently, their insights from feedback into rights-based agendas and the role of ICT, outline important evidence for the need to design opportunities for procedural justice, transparency, and equal on/offline opportunities.
There is always much debate about devices, and offering the choice of laptops as devices, rather than tablets contributes to normalisation. But of course, there are opposing views to this. Drivers of cost, replacement, and efficiency are included in this. Jurisdictions may benefit from project-specific administrators, as well as the need for services to offer guidance and training for all stakeholders, particularly staff. There is good evidence elsewhere where different approaches to user engagement can be utilised by services. Co-creating and co-producing have had great results. This can help address aspects of workplace change and technological resistance, particularly amongst staff. In sum, meeting needs- the need to flourish and recover.
The integration of different systems and data management challenges, including data privacy and security, are part of this discussion. Switching off one solution and turning on another is not straightforward. The development of Offender Management Systems is a nice example of this. A presentation from our Finnish hosts explained how their ROTI system brought about significant challenges for data migration and resistance from staff.
The use of Virtual Reality (VR) in rehabilitation programmes was wonderfully highlighted by significant efforts in Spain’s Catalan region, led by, Nicolas Barnes Mendez. As a digitally supportive rehabilitative tool to address those who are perpetrators of gender-based violence to experience empathy is an example of the potential for expanding and supporting service provision. Not replacing it.
