ABSTRACT
Since the 1980s, the electronic monitoring (EM) of offenders has been successfully introduced in over 30 countries worldwide, having originated in the United States. As both a means of enforcing compliance with curfews and home confinement, and (less so) of monitoring the general whereabouts of offenders in the community, it has become established in Western Europe, and in some countries it has already moved beyond experimental status and has become a mainstream, if not a dominant, penal measure. The practical application of EM has not only been extended on a considerable scale, the measure itself has already been transformed, technologically and penally, in a number of different ways. A wide range of decision-makers have become involved in its administration, e.g. prosecutors, judges, administrative bodies, prison governors, parole boards or sentence implementation courts. In most countries, commercial organizations are involved as technology suppliers or as full-service supervisors, and in some countries private sector employees are even involved in ‘breach’ decisions. Finally, EM has created a new category of penal subject, offenders who have experienced supervision in the community in ways that are distinctively different from probation and community service. While it is indeed important to recognize that EM has not been as penally transformative as some of its champions hoped and some of its opponents feared when it first arose, it is by no means insignificant, and this book is premised on the idea that – for policy-makers, practitioners and academics – there is much more to be said about it than has been said before. Neither ‘the sociology of punishment’ nor ‘surveillance studies’ – the two intellectual fields which can contribute most to understanding EM – have had much to say so far. The resources of both could be used to much better effect to appraise the meaning and significance of this penal innovation.
