Originally published in 1977, Albany: Birth of a Prison - End of an Era attempts to document and analyse some of the changes which happened in the first five and a half years of the prison’s opening and as far as possible account for them. Albany was planned and built as a medium-security establishment but the growth in the prison population meant it ended up, in part, as a maximum-security unit. At the time the prison was notorious, after a stormy series of incidents culminated in an alleged mass escape attempt and a riot, it had become known as the ‘jail of fear’ in which ‘mafia groups’ were said to ‘terrorize’ staff and prisoners alike. Despite the account inevitably being incomplete, it was hoped that lessons could be drawn, both for social research and social policy in regard to prisons.

Originally published in 1976, A Taste of Prison deals with a very sensitive area of concern in the system of trial and imprisonment in Britain at the time. It describes the conditions at Winchester Prison and Winchester Remand Centre for both adults and young persons who were held in custody before trial or who were awaiting sentence. Despite the fact that many of these persons would not subsequently be sent to prison by the courts, the conditions they experienced were in many respects no better and in some respects worse than those for persons sentenced to imprisonment. Moreover, as this study shows, the special provisions for these persons embodied in the Prison Rules and Standing Orders of the Prison Department often meant little in practice – either because they remained unaware of their rights or because they were unable to take them up for various reasons. The authors discuss the function of remands in custody within a changing prison system, analyse recent trends in the numbers of persons received into the prison system on remand, and assess their contribution to the prison population. The implications of the findings are discussed in the context of the prison building programme and the uses to which existing buildings could be put. Finally, the authors make a number of proposals for the improvement of the regime for remand prisoners.

Covers a longer span of time than other books - three decades enabling systematic examination of the policies of four governments: Conservative, New Labour, Coalition and Conservative. It both provides a detailed historic account of the twists and turns of policy and legislation over the 30 year period and combines this with commentary from those intimately involved in decision making and implementation of policy and legislation. There is a range of interviewees, including many from non-political sources. Its unique contribution is the combination of the analysis of legislative and organisational changes with the interviewing of virtually all the most important players in the process - all surviving Home Secretaries and Ministers of Justice since 1990, junior ministers; all Directors of Prisons NOMS/HMPPS and the new National Probation Service; four Chief Inspectors of Prisons and three Chief Inspectors of Probation; the four most recently retired Lord Chief Justices. A unique added value is the interviews with virtually all the politicians and other key players who have been involved over the past 30 years, which provide a unique commentary and insight into how they thought and how they approached their responsibilities. The period of time in question has seen many changes in prison and probation and a detailed analysis of this in one place would be useful but, crucially, to also have the interviews of so many people makes this unprecedented. The authors are highly respected and Professor Roy King has been a leading authority on prisons for several decades.

Originally published in 1971, this title describes a series of studies dealing with the upbringing of children in residential institutions. Most work has been carried out in institutions for children with learning disabilities, although units caring for able but deprived children and children with physical disabilities have also been examined. The investigations have been concerned with the detailed nature of different institutional environments – that is, the routine patterns of daily life in hospital wards, hostels and cottages of children’s homes – rather than with the effects of specific child-rearing practices upon the intellectual, emotional and social development of the children. The more precise delineation of ‘the environment’ is an essential step towards the evaluation of residential services and the interpretation of their effects upon those who use them, yet this is an area which had received little systematic attention from social scientists at the time. This book is a re-issue originally published in 1971. The language used is a reflection of its era and no offence is meant by the Publishers to any reader by this re-publication.

Covers a longer span of time than other books - three decades enabling systematic examination of the policies of four governments: Conservative, New Labour, Coalition and Conservative. It both provides a detailed historic account of the twists and turns of policy and legislation over the 30 year period and combines this with commentary from those intimately involved in decision making and implementation of policy and legislation. There is a range of interviewees, including many from non-political sources. Its unique contribution is the combination of the analysis of legislative and organisational changes with the interviewing of virtually all the most important players in the process - all surviving Home Secretaries and Ministers of Justice since 1990, junior ministers; all Directors of Prisons NOMS/HMPPS and the new National Probation Service; four Chief Inspectors of Prisons and three Chief Inspectors of Probation; the four most recently retired Lord Chief Justices. A unique added value is the interviews with virtually all the politicians and other key players who have been involved over the past 30 years, which provide a unique commentary and insight into how they thought and how they approached their responsibilities. The period of time in question has seen many changes in prison and probation and a detailed analysis of this in one place would be useful but, crucially, to also have the interviews of so many people makes this unprecedented. The authors are highly respected and Professor Roy King has been a leading authority on prisons for several decades.

Prisons occupy a central position in the criminal justice system of all the developed nations. Much is known about prisons, their administration, their effectiveness and their problems. More is known now than at any time in the past about how prisons work and how prisoners view their experiences of incarceration.

However, little attention has been given to comparing and contrasting prison systems in different countries. This collection does just that, bringing together leading prison scholars from Italy, Australia, the US, and the UK to produce a set of essays which offer a broad view of recent developments in imprisonment theory and practice. Topics covered include: privately run prisons; the crisis in prisons in several countries; Russian prisons after Perestroika; human rights and prisons in Europe; women in prisons; and racial disproportion in US prisons.

Contributors: Richard Sparks, Douglas C. McDonald, Massimo Pavarini, Roy D. King, Franklin E. Zimring, Gordon Hawkins, Michael Tonry, Ken Pease, Pat Carlen, Rod Morgan, Malcolm Evans, Mike Maguire