Examining Compliance, Criminalization, & Carcerality in Legal Systems

Interest in reforming criminal justice has been growing in academic, political, and societal circles. Community supervision programs were developed as reform options intended to provide more constructive treatment of the individuals involved in comparison to carceral alternatives. These programs include probation, parole, pretrial electronic monitoring, and alternatives-to-detention programs. However, as the researchers established through a pilot project, in the effort to ensure compliance with supervision requirements, community supervision programs can have unforeseen consequences for supervised individuals. This research adds to scientific understanding by identifying the specific elements of community supervision that create these consequences for supervised individuals. The research also explores how the effects on individuals’ behaviors and relationships reflect trends in broader social systems. The knowledge gained can contribute to the development of more effective community supervision policies and programs and also to the overarching effort to reform the criminal justice system. Focused on the consequences of community supervision, this research investigates three key questions: 1) How do the state and state actors conceptualize and enforce individuals’ compliance with the requirements of community supervision programs? 2) How do supervised individuals and their families experience and perform compliance with supervision requirements? 3) How do compliance dynamics contribute to variation in the experience of supervision? The answers are pursued through a multi-method approach that includes courtroom observations, interviews, and photo-voice narratives. The comparative analysis enables the researchers to highlight parallels and contrasts and thus to contribute to emerging scientific and policy attention to these empirical domains. Findings from this research augment scientific understanding of how policies and institutional practices can contribute to variation in supervision outcomes. This understanding provides a basis for future reform initiatives that use scientific evidence to inform new approaches to criminal justice reform. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.