ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the views of probation practitioners about the aims and purposes of supervision and their own practice. Drawing on an empirical study, it argues that this sample of practitioners sees supervision as being about individual change facilitated by a professional relationship based on rapport, empathy and professional discretion and that they try to practise based on these principles. This relationship is seen as holding most hope for positive change in offenders’ behaviour and understood as involving far more than a simple management function. I conclude that the everyday practice of probation supervision (at least as represented by this group of practitioners) has not moved as far away from its origins as has sometimes been assumed. While this chapter covers practitioner behaviour in England and Wales, it has implications for the wider corrections debate in terms of the possibility of a gap between government policy and intentions and ‘real practice’ carried out by practitioners regarding themselves as professionals in the human services. This in turn throws light upon macro level theories of the new penality (for example Feeley and Simon 1992) which see such correctional services practice moving from rehabilitation and reform to one that has largely given up on transformative ambitions to concentrate on offender management and control.
