Thoughts from the criminology team

Follow us on Twitter

Protect international law

April 22, 2022 10:02 / 2 Comments on Protect international law

https://www.flickr.com/photos/galrinho/5410199284

In criminological discourses the term “war crime” is a contested one, not because there are no atrocities committed at war, but because for some of us, war is a crime in its own right.  There is an expectation that even in a war there are rules and therefore the violation of these rules could lead to war crimes.  This very focused view on war is part of a wider critique of the discipline.  Several criminologists including, Ruggiero, DiPietro, McGarry and Walklate, to name a few, have argued that there is less focus on war as a crime, instead war is seen more as part of a metaphor used in response to social situations. 

As far back as the 1960s, US President Johnson in his state of the union address, announced “The administration today here and now declares unconditional war on poverty in America”.  What followed in the 1964 Economic Opportunity Act, was seen as the encapsulation of that proclamation.  In some ways this announcement was ironic considering that the Vietnam war was raging at the time, 4 years before the well documented My Lai massacre.  A war crime that aroused the international community; despite the numbers of soldiers involved in the massacre, only the platoon leader was charged and given a life sentence, later commuted to three and a half years incarceration (after a presidential intervention).  Anyone can draw their own conclusion if the murder of approximately 500 people and the rape of women and children is reflected in this sentence.  The Vietnam war was an ideological war on communism, leaving the literal interpretation for the historians of the future. In a war on ideology the “massacre” was the “collateral damage” of the time.

After all for the administration of the time, the war on poverty was the one that they tried to fight against. Since then, successive politicians have declared additional wars, on issues namely drugs and terror. These wars are representations of struggles but not in a literal sense. In the case of drugs and terrorism criminology focused on trafficking, financing and organised crimes but not on war per se. The use of war as a metaphor is a potent one because it identifies a social foe that needs to be curtailed and the official State wages war against it. It offers a justification in case the State is accused being heavy handed. For those declaring war on issues serves by signalling their resolve but also (unwittingly or deliberately) it glorifies war as an cleansing act. War as a metaphor is both powerful and dangerous because it excuses State violence and human rights violations. What about the reality of war?

As early as 1936, W.A Bonger, recognised war as a scourge of humanity.  This realisation becomes ever more potent considering in years to come the world will be enveloped in another world war.  At the end of the war the international community set up the international criminal court to explore some of the crimes committed during the war, namely the use of concentration camps for the extermination of particular populations.  in 1944 Raphael Lemkin, coined the term genocide to identify the systemic extermination of Jews, Roma, Slavic people, along with political dissidents and sexual deviants, namely homosexuals. 

In the aftermath of the second world war, the Nuremberg trials in Europe and the Tokyo trials in Asia set out to investigate “war crimes”.  This became the first time that aspects of warfare and attitudes to populations were scrutinised.  The creation of the Nuremberg Charter and the outcomes of the trials formulated some of the baseline of human rights principles including the rejection of the usual, up to that point, principle of “I was only following orders”.  It also resulted in the Nuremberg Code that set out clear principles on ethical research and human experimentation.  Whilst all of these are worthwhile ideas and have influenced the original formation of the United Nations charter it did not address the bigger “elephant” in the room; war itself.  It seemed that the trials and consequent legal discourses distanced themselves from the wider criminological ideas that could have theorised the nature of war but most importantly the effects of war onto people, communities, and future relations. War as an indiscriminate destructive force was simply neglected.  

The absence of a focused criminological theory from one end and the legal representation as set in the original tribunals on the other led to a distinct absence of discussions on something that Alfred Einstein posed to Sigmund Freud in early 1930s, “Why war?”.  Whilst the trials set up some interesting ideas, they were criticised as “victor’s justice”.  Originally this claim was dismissed, but to this day, there has been not a single conviction in international courts and tribunals of those who were on the “victors’” side, regardless of their conduct.  So somehow the focus changed, and the international community is now engaged in a conversation about the processes of international courts and justice, without having ever addressed the original criticism.  Since the original international trials there have been some additional ones regarding conflicts in Yugoslavia and Rwanda.  The international community’s choice of countries to investigate and potentially, prosecute has brought additional criticism about the partiality of the process.  In the meantime, international justice is only recognised by some countries whilst others choose not to engage.  War, or rather, war crimes become a call whenever convenient to exert political pressure according to the geo-political relations of the time.  This is not justice, it is an ad hoc arrangement that devalues the very principles that it professes to protect.   

This is where criminology needs to step up.  We have for a long time recognised and conceptually described different criminalities, across the spectrum of human deviance, but war has been left unaccounted for.  In the visions of the 19th and 20th century social scientists, a world without war was conceptualised.  The technological and social advancements permitted people to be optimistic of the role of international institutions sitting in arbitration to address international conflicts.  It sounds unrealistic, but at the time when this is written, we are witness to another war, whilst there are numerous theatres of wars raging, leaving a trail of continuous destruction.  Instead of choosing sides, splitting the good from the bad and trying to justify a just or an unjust war, maybe we should ask, “Why war”?  In relation to youth crime, Rutherford famously pondered if we could let children just grow out of crime.  Maybe, as an international community of people, we should do the same with war.  Grow out of the crime of war.  To do so we would need to stop the heroic drums, the idolisation of the glorious dead and instead, consider the frightened populations and the long stain of a violence which I have blogged about before: The crime of war     

No April Fools

April 8, 2022 10:00 / Leave a comment

The first of April has consisted of a steep 54% rise in what energy company’s can charge customers for using energy, with further rises set to occur in October. This coincides with rises to other bills such as council tax, national insurance and water within a climate of inflation. Previous to this many were struggling to make ends meet…what are these people supposed to do now?

Russia’s atrocities and Covid-19 have been blamed for the steep price increases and inflation. I suspect that employers will be using this as a reason to not increase the persistent low rises in wages that workers are receiving, all whilst their bosses are becoming richer and richer. Of course, both Russia and Covid will have a significant impact on the economy, however, it does not take a genius to be aware that people have been struggling to survive well before this, hence terms like, food poverty, period poverty and fuel poverty predate these issues. Also, so do the persistent low rises in wages for workers.  

Apparently, MPs are due a £2,200 pay rise which whilst it seems low (2.7%) compared to inflation, a few MPs themselves (such as Zarah Sultana) have stated that they do not need this pay rise as they already receive a high paying wage.

Oh, and let us not forget that the increasing energy prices will ensure that privatised fuel companies such as Shell and BP continue to profit, with a predicted profit of £40 BILLION for this year.

Meanwhile benefits for those who are not formally employed and spend a higher proportion of money on household bills and rent are set to increase by 3.1% – a rise which will not cover these price increases.

How is it that employers and the State cannot afford to pay people more – but can ensure high wages for the already rich, privileged and powerful?

It is not surprising that the government’s measures to deal with the problem, such as one-off payments and energy loans, have been heavily criticised as inadequate and significantly failing to support the lowest income homes. The government employs a group of elites and many are completely out of touch with reality. Apparently the man presiding over these measures, millionaire Rishi Sunak and his billionaire wife, often donate to charitable causes, such as donating £100,000 to Rishi’s former elitist private school. Because a private school in need is a pressing cause…yeah right!

Image from Hollie McNish Cherry Pie 2014

The opposition parties have rightly criticised the Conservatives take on this but listening to Keir Starmer’s bumbling take on what Labour would do to solve these issues is also worrying. During an interview he stated that windfall tax could be a solution ‘for right now’ with no feasible long term plan. My usual vote for Labour in May will be damage control against more Tory time in power.

A long term TAX on THE RICH to use this money to support those that need it is not even that simple, given that the government accepts donations from the super-rich it is unlikely that decisions would be made to genuinely reduce inequality between the rich and poor. The world will never be a better place if those in power continue to focus on their own interests and huge profits in place of looking after people. The rise in energy prices on the first of this month was no April Fools’ joke…I really wish that it was.

They think it’s all over…….

April 6, 2022 10:00 / Leave a comment

https://www.northampton.ac.uk/news/covid-blog-they-think-its-all-over/

Probably the most famous quote in the history of English football was that made by Kenneth Wolstenholme at the end of the 1966 World Cup final where he stated as Geoff Hurst broke clear of the West German defence to score the 4th goal that “Some people are on the pitch…. they think it’s all over…….it is now”. I have been reminded of this quote as we reach April 1st, 2022 when all Coronavirus restrictions in England essentially come to an end. We are moving from a period of pandemic restrictions to one of “living with Covid”. Whilst the prevailing narrative has focussed on “it’s over” the national data sets would suggest it is most definitely not. We are currently experiencing another wave of infections driven by the Omicron BA-2 variant. Cases of Covid infection have been rising steadily over the past couple of weeks and we are now seeing hospital admissions and deaths rise too. This has led to an interesting tension between current politically driven and public health driven advice.

The overriding question then is why remove all restrictions now if infection rates are so high. The answer sits with science and the success of the vaccination programme, and the protection it affords, which to date has seen 86% of the eligible population have two jabs and 68% boosted with a third. Furthermore, we are now at the start of the Spring booster programme for the over 75s and the most vulnerable. The introduction of the vaccine has seen a dramatic fall in serious illness associated with infection and the UK government now believe that this is a virus we can live with and we should get on with our lives in a sensible and cautious way without the need for mandated restrictions. The advances gained in both the vaccination programme, anti-viral therapies and treatments have been enormous and underpin completely the current and future situation. So, the narrative shifts to one that emphasises learning to live with the virus and to that end the Government has provided us with guidance. The UK Government’s “Living with Covid Plan” COVID-19 Response – Living with COVID-19.docx (publishing.service.gov.uk) has four key principles at its heart:

  • Removing domestic restrictions while encouraging safer behaviours through public health advice, in common with longstanding ways of managing most other respiratory illnesses;
  • Protecting people most vulnerable to COVID-19: vaccination guided by Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advice, and deploying targeted testing;
  • Maintaining resilience: ongoing surveillance, contingency planning and the ability to reintroduce key capabilities such as mass vaccination and testing in an emergency; and
  • Securing innovations and opportunities from the COVID-19 response, including investment in life sciences.

So, in addition to the restrictions already removed from 1 April, the Government will:

  • Remove the current guidance on voluntary COVID-status certification in domestic settings and no longer recommend that certain venues use the NHS COVID Pass.
  • Update guidance setting out the ongoing steps that people with COVID-19 should take to minimise contact with other people. This will align with the changes to testing.
  • No longer provide free universal symptomatic and asymptomatic testing for the general public in England.
  • Consolidate guidance to the public and businesses, in line with public health advice.
  • Remove the health and safety requirement for every employer to explicitly consider COVID-19 in their risk assessments.
  • Replace the existing set of ‘Working Safely’ guidance with new public health guidance

My major concern with these changes is the massive scaling back of infection testing. In doing so we run the risk of creating a data vacuum. Being able to test and undertake scientific surveillance of the virus’s future development would help us identify any future threats from new variants; particularly those classified as being “of concern”. What we should have learned from the past two years is that the ability to understand the virus and rapidly scale up our response is critical.

What is also now abundantly clear from the current data is that this is far from over and it is going to take some time for us to adapt as a society. The ongoing consequences for the most vulnerable sections of our society are still incredibly challenging. It will not be a surprise to any health professional that the pandemic was keenest felt in communities already negatively impacted by health inequalities. This has been the case ever since the publication of the “Black Report” (DHSS 1980), which showed in detail the extent to which ill-health and death are unequally distributed among the population of the UK.  Indeed, there is evidence that these inequalities have been widening rather than diminishing since the establishment of the National Health Service in 1948. It is generally accepted that those with underlying health issues and therefore most at risk will be disproportionately located in socially deprived communities. Consequently, there is a genuine concern that the most vulnerable to the virus could be left behind in isolation as the rest of society moves on. However, we are now at a new critical moment which most will celebrate. Regardless of whether you believe the rolling back of restrictions is right or not, this moment in time allows us an opportunity to reflect on the past two years and indeed look forward to what has changed and what could happen in terms of both Coronavirus and any other future pandemic.

Looking back, I have no doubt that the last two years have changed life considerably in several  positive and negative ways. Of course, we tend to migrate to the negative first and the overall cost of life, levels of infection and the long-term consequences have been immense. The longer-term implications of Covid (Long Covid) is still something we need to take seriously and fully understand. What is not in doubt is the toll this has had on individuals, families, communities and the future burden it places on our NHS. The psychological impact of social isolation and restrictions has been enormous and especially so for our children, young people, the vulnerable and the elderly. The social and educational development of school children is of particular concern. The wider economic implications of the pandemic will take some time to recover. Yet, whilst the negative implications cause us grave concern many features of our lives have improved. Many have identified that this pandemic has helped them re-asses what is important in life, how important key workers are in ensuring society continues to operate smoothly and the critical role health and social services must play in times of health crisis. Changing perspectives on work, work life balance and alternative ways of conducting business have been embraced and many argue that the world of work will never be the same again.

On that final note it’s important that as a society we have learned from what I have previously described as the greatest public health crisis in my lifetime. Pandemic planning was shown to be woefully inadequate and we must get this better because there is no doubt there will be another pandemic of this magnitude at some point in the future. Proper support for health and social services are critical and the state of the NHS at the start of all this was telling. Yes, it rose to the challenge as it always does but health and social care systems were badly let down in the early stages of this pandemic with disastrous consequences. Proper investment in science and research is paramount, for let’s be honest it was science that came to our rescue and did so in record time. There will inevitably be a large public enquiry into all aspects of the pandemic, its management and outcomes. We can only hope that lessons have been learned and we are better prepared for both the ongoing management of this pandemic and inevitably the next one.

Dr Stephen O’Brien

FHES

Originally posted here

Meet the Team: Helen Trinder, Associate Lecturer in Criminology

April 4, 2022 10:00 / Leave a comment

My Academic Journey

Two weeks ago, I attended a university reunion. My cohort are now in our late 40s or early 50s but it is remarkable how little we had all changed. Being back in the place where we all studied together put me in reflective mood and that (combined with some timely prompting from Paula) inspired me to share my academic journey.

I was one of those annoying kids who did well at school and knew exactly what they wanted to do. As a small child, I wanted to be a nurse but I later developed an aversion to bodily fluids which made that career choice untenable. I briefly flirted with the idea of being an English teacher, but both of my parents were in education and strenuously tried to dissuade me. So, at the age of about 14, I decided that I wanted to be a prison psychologist. I was in a careers lesson at school, and we had a big green plastic box filled with cards on which were written descriptions of different jobs. I announced that I wanted to be a psychiatrist (I think I was just being provocative) but I couldn’t find “psychiatrist” in the box, so I picked the closest one that I could find: “psychologist”. I read the card and it sounded really interesting, so I decided to find out more about psychology. The more I read, the more interesting I found it, and when I looked into the sorts of settings where I could work as a psychologist, prisons called out to me.

I was very lucky to secure a place to read Experimental Psychology at University College, Oxford in 1990. People have an image of ancient universities as being elitist, but what struck me was the huge diversity of people who were there. They were all clever and had studied hard to achieve their places, but beyond that they came from an enormous range of backgrounds – a far greater variety than I had encountered in my Shropshire comprehensive school. Our tutors worked us extremely hard. We had weekly tutorials, either in pairs or one-to-one, in two modules every term and we had to prepare an essay for each tutorial (two essays a week). In tutorials, we read out, discussed and analysed our essays and the reading on which they were based. There were lectures and practical classes on top of that and we had exams at the beginning of each term to make sure that we hadn’t forgotten anything over the vacations! That’s why I’m sometimes not very sympathetic to students who struggle to read one paper in preparation for a seminar!

At the end of my undergraduate studies, I still wanted to work in prisons but I knew very little about them. My degree had given me an excellent grounding in psychology but I knew little about the study of crime. So I applied to do an M.Phil. at the Institute of Criminology in Cambridge. This gave me an extra year as a full-time student and I thoroughly enjoyed it! I was privileged to be taught by such eminent criminologists as Loraine Gelsthorpe, Alison Liebling and David Farrington. I particularly enjoyed the penology seminars with Nigel West, which I attended just out of interest – I wasn’t taking the assessment in that module! The assessments were all coursework (extended essays and a dissertation) and had to be submitted at the start of each term, so I studied hard in the vacations, and I attended my seminars in term time, but there was also plenty of time for sport and socialising and making the most of my last year as a student!

At that time, HM Prison Service recruited new psychologists once a year through a national assessment centre. I applied in 1994, just after I had submitted my M.Phil. dissertation but I was unsuccessful. I got a job instead at the University of Wales, Swansea, as a research assistant in the Department of Social Policy and Applied Social Studies. I was involved in an evaluation of drug and alcohol treatment centres, funded by the Welsh Office, which employed both quantitative measures and participant observation. When that contract ended, I obtained another contract with Swansea City Council to compile a community profile of a “problem” estate. This required knocking on doors to interview residents, and participant observation in community settings such as the youth club, old people’s bingo sessions and the local pub. It was considered a rather intimidating environment to drop a well-educated 24-year-old English girl into, but I found the residents to be remarkably warm and welcoming and it was a highly rewarding piece of work.

By the time I finished the community profile, I had re-applied to the Prison Service and passed the assessment centre – the interpersonal skills I had developed through my action research had served me well. I had, however, joined the Prison Service at an unfortunate time. There was a recruitment ban in force which meant that although I had passed the psychologist assessment centre, I couldn’t actually secure a job. I was eventually given a temporary contract to collect data at HMP Littlehey for a large-scale research project analysing effective prison regimes.  After 10 months of doing this, the recruitment ban was lifted and I was taken on as a prison psychologist, sharing my time between HMP Littlehey and HMP Wellingborough. The Prison Service used to fund a part-time M.Sc. at Birkbeck University, which all newly recruited psychologists undertook. Obtaining a suitably accredited M.Sc., along with completing a satisfactory period of supervised practice, is an essential requirement of becoming a fully qualified “Chartered” psychologist. In another piece of unfortunate timing, the Birkbeck M.Sc. ceased to run just as I joined the service. At first, there was nothing to take its place. However, other universities soon noticed the gap in the market. I, and others in my prison psychology cohort, were relieved when the University of Leicester set up an M.Sc. in Forensic and Legal Psychology by Distance Learning. The Prison Service agreed to pay my fees and my manager allowed a small amount of study leave when assignments were due. Completing a post-graduate degree while working full-time in a demanding job was hard work and I vowed I would never do it again!

I moved to HMP Woodhill in 1998, completed my M.Sc. in 1999 and became a Chartered Psychologist in 2001. At some point after that, I remember receiving a phone call at work from someone called “@manosdaskalou” at, what was then, University College Northampton! I don’t know where he got my number from, but he wanted someone to talk to his third year Forensic Psychology students about the work that psychologists do in prisons. My parents had not completely succeeded in knocking a desire to teach out of me (in fact I probably inherited my urge to educate from them), and my Dad had taught at Northampton when it was Nene College, so I was keen to fulfil the request. The talk became a regular fixture and, after a few years (by which time I was Head of Psychology at HMP Woodhill), we extended it from a single guest lecture to a series of four, to allow me to cover topics such as risk assessment and offending behaviour interventions in more detail.

My son was born in 2008 and I took 12 months maternity leave from the Prison Service. At the end of that time, I didn’t feel ready to go back, so I negotiated a further 12 months career break. I wasn’t ready to return to the full intensity of managing a team in a high security prison, but I did want to keep my brain active. I asked Manos if there were any opportunities to expand my teaching commitments. The University was in the process of setting up a foundation degree in Offender Management, which was aimed primarily at custodial officers at HMP Rye Hill but was also delivered to a small cohort of full-time students. They were short of lecturers to deliver the modules and my offer to help out was eagerly accepted. The terms of my career break meant that I couldn’t earn money from another employer, but a couple of hours a week teaching suited me very well, so I gave my services for free and taught a module on Professional Practice alongside a lecturer with a background in probation, from another university, called Keith Davies.

After a year of this arrangement, HMP Woodhill were unwilling to have me back part-time, so I resigned from the Prison Service and joined the Parole Board as a part-time psychologist member. This allowed me to work much more flexibly and, with a toddler in the family, it suited me well. It also meant that I could have a proper contract with the University of Northampton and I became an associate lecturer in September 2010. Keith had moved to a different job but I continued to teach Professional Practice on the Offender Management degree. There was also a module in Offender Management on “The Psychology of Crime and Criminal Behaviour”. The person who taught this left after a couple of years and I took it over. Returning to basic psychology and teaching it every week was daunting at first, but I really enjoyed going back to what I had learned as an undergraduate and re-discovering how relevant it was to real-life criminal justice.

The arrangement with HMP Rye Hill had never really taken off and the Offender Management degree only ever attracted small numbers of full-time students, so in 2014 the course closed. Manos was keen, however, to incorporate more psychology into the B.A. Criminology course, so we adapted “The Psychology of Crime and Criminal Behaviour” into a first-year criminology module and I’ve been teaching it ever since! I’ve also taught a module on violence and I’ve covered maternity leave and sickness absence in other modules too. My students will have heard me banging on about forensic psychologists being “scientist-practitioners” and I feel that teaching at the University of Northampton has allowed me to fulfil this role. As a practitioner, I have lots of interesting real-life examples to use to illustrate points to my students, but teaching also keeps me up-to-date with research and theory which I can use to inform my practice.

My academic journey continues to take me to new places. My position on the Parole Board was a public appointment with a fixed tenure that came to an end in September 2020. I decided at that point to start a part-time Ph.D. with the University of Birmingham. I had not wanted to go into research straight from my M.Phil. because I felt that, in order to understand people who committed offences, I really needed some direct experience of working with them, but after 24 years as a practitioner, the time seemed right. I am now 18 months into a 6-year part-time degree. I am exploring the role of empathy deficits in violent and sexual offending. Trying to undertake research (which ideally requires access to prisoners) has not been easy during a pandemic and I have faced a number of obstacles but nothing insurmountable yet.

I am still keen to maintain a scientist-practitioner balance, and I need to pay my university fees and make a contribution to the family income, so in February of last year I started working as a Forensic Psychologist at St Andrew’s hospital. I am primarily based on a medium-secure ward for men with learning disabilities. Forensic mental health is a new area of practice for me and, although I have plenty of transferable skills from my previous roles, I have had to adapt to a different approach to the people we work with and a completely new set of jargon.

Reflecting on my academic journey, it is the people that stand out. I think that the most profound learning has taken place when I have been able to engage with experts who have shared their enthusiasm. In this respect, my undergraduate tutorials and M.Phil. seminars contrast with my distance learning M.Sc., which was a means of obtaining a qualification rather than an immersive learning experience. I hope that, as a practitioner who also teaches, I have been able to share some of my enthusiasm for forensic psychology with my own students. In order to benefit from this, however, students need to take up the opportunity to engage fully with teaching and not just see their university experience as a means to a qualification. Of course, COVID has not helped this, and the university’s penchant for remote learning placed it in a good position to maintain teaching when the pandemic struck. But it is very difficult to engage students when they are just names on a screen. I hope that, as we return to more face-to-face teaching, I can once again inspire my students, not just to pass their exams but to develop a life-long fascination for understanding criminal behaviour and the people that perpetrate it.

Helen Trinder, M.A., M.Phil., M.Sc., C.Psychol.

Forensic Psychologist and Associate Lecturer

Meet the Team: Paul Famosaya, Lecturer in Criminology

April 1, 2022 10:00 / Leave a comment

Hi all! My name is Dr Paul Famosaya and I have just joined UoN as a Lecturer in criminology. Prior to joining UoN, I have taught as a Lecturer in criminology and policing at the University of Cumbria – where I contributed to the development and running of modules at both Undergraduate and Masters level. In addition, I have taught criminology at Middlesex University, London as an HP Lecturer (during my PhD days). So, over the years really, I have developed and taught a variety of modules around the theories of crime, the crimes of the powerful, global dimensions of crime, policing, new ideas in criminology, crimes & deviance, social exclusion, criminological frameworks etc. I also serve as a reviewer of a few international reputable journals.

In terms of my academic background, I completed my undergraduate degree in Nigeria, 2010 and then went straight on to complete my Masters in Criminology at Middlesex University, London. I then dived straight in to my PhD, which I completed also at Middlesex in 2019 – with my thesis focusing on police experiences, actions and practices.

I came into the world of Criminology simply for my interest in understanding the logic of corruption and the network of greed. I realised that these two components are largely the foundational problems of my home country Nigeria, and many other countries. So, the plight to unravel these dynamics from both institutional and personal level triggered my interest in the discipline. To a large extent, this interest has continued to strengthen my area of specialisation which concentrates largely on the areas of Critical and Theoretical criminology, Police culture, Social harms and Injustice. Criminology is something I’ve really enjoyed doing and while I have taught it for many years, I still consider myself to be a student of Criminology really.

I am currently completing another article on pandemics and criminology – so it’ll be cool to chat with colleagues looking at similar area(s). Looking forward to meeting everyone soon!

The strikes and me: never going back!

March 25, 2022 09:18 / 1 Comment on The strikes and me: never going back!

I woke up this morning, at 4am to be precise, with a jumble of thoughts going through my mind.  In my bleary eyed, docile state I wondered whether the cats’ body clocks had gone awry, and they thought it was breakfast time (I don’t need an alarm clock) or whether it was an age thing and I shouldn’t have had that cup of tea at 10 o’clock last night (I hate getting old), but no, it’s strike day again and it weighs heavy on my mind.  

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not wavering, far from it, but I do reflect on the impact, and it bothers me, and I know it bothers my colleagues. It bothers me that the students are caught up in this and I have been at pains to explain to my classes why we are on strike and to try to mitigate some of the impact, but I know I cannot mitigate all of it.  The business we are in is education and that education relies on lecturers, surprisingly enough, take away the lecturers and there is no education.  I know that every day I’m on strike, there are topics that I’m not covering in class and there is no one else to cover them; no I’m not irreplaceable but I do add real value.

I struggle with the concept of ASOS and once again I am not alone. ASOS has meant that things are just not getting done, even though I’m still working at least a couple of hours a week over my contracted hours.  Not strictly ASOS I know, but it’s difficult to stick to the rules when doing so would cause everything to grind to a halt. I still have to do my teaching and marking and second marking and look at draft dissertations and have meetings with dissertation students and spend what seems like an interminable amount of time on emails (which by diktat have to be answered in two days).  I still have to prepare for my classes as I’m not a performing seal and do have to think about it before hand.  I still have to communicate with my colleagues and with the less experienced provide a guiding hand and I’m sure there are a myriad of other things I do that I haven’t mentioned. 

But I have not wavered and nor will I.  When I hear management talking about the cost of fuel going up, the state of the sector’s finances, the value of student fees compared to a few years ago, woe is me, when I see how management can treat their workers (P&O Ferries comes to mind alongside some of the other horror stories affecting both higher and further education), it simply reminds me of two things; they are out of touch and they don’t care. Insulated from the real world, their response to our very real concerns about workloads and our ever-diminishing pay, is that they’ll look into it.  Looking into it isn’t doing anything about it. Looking into it doesn’t fix my workload and, in the meantime, I’m still dealing with the aftermath of new IT systems that don’t work properly and cause significant extra work (maybe someone should have looked into that before foisting it upon the unsuspecting student and lecturer body).  I knew there was something I’d left out in the above paragraph.

One thing ASOS has taught me, there is too much to do nearly every week. I look at the things that are not done and I lament when I see that it has impacted on students.  My PDR means nothing if I haven’t the time to achieve the objectives, the mandatory training (so important that’s it’s done by eLearning; that’s another story), sits waiting to be done when I have time; and I’m constantly playing catchup.  I work in a system that thrives on making me feel guilty for not achieving. My reality though is so far removed from the workload plan that the plan has no meaning, other than to serve as a tool to beat me up with.

I am angry.  I am angry that I have been forced to go on strike. I am angry about the way that I have been treated in the past and I am angry that there has been little progress made.  I am angry about the impact that all of this is having on my students.  ASOS though has taught me one thing, there is such a thing as work/life balance and when the strikes are over, I am never going back to working the way I did before.  I have a contract and I’m sticking to it. None of this is my fault, I didn’t invent this system and I’m not the one out of touch with reality. I’m not wavering in my resolve, regardless of any future ballot, the principles of ASOS are here to stay.

UCU Strike 21-25 March 2022

March 21, 2022 08:00 / Leave a comment

https://www.ucu.org.uk/media/10409/Four-fights-one-voice-HE-ballot-leaflet/pdf/ucu_fourfights_heleaflet.pdf

More information around the University and College University [UCU] and the Four Fights Dispute can be found here.

Information about the Northampton branch of UCU can be found here and here.

You can also find out why striking is a criminological issue here: https://thoughtsfromthecriminologyteam.blog/2021/12/10/striking-is-a-criminological-matter/ and here: https://thoughtsfromthecriminologyteam.blog/2022/02/18/united-nations-un-world-day-of-social-justice/

If you want to know why the Criminology Team is prepared to stand outside in the cold and rain please read here: https://thoughtsfromthecriminologyteam.blog/2022/03/02/higher-education-the-strikes-and-me/ and here: https://thoughtsfromthecriminologyteam.blog/2022/03/09/higher-education-students-the-strikes-and-me/

Days to mark on our calendar!

March 18, 2022 10:00 / Leave a comment

https://unsplash.com/photos/ebvCsRypmxM

It is common practice to have a day in the year to commemorate something.  In fact, we have months that seemed to be themed with specific events.  I look at the diary at the days/months which are full of causes, some incredibly important, others commemorating and then there are those more trivial.  Days in a year to make a mark to remind us of things.  An anniversary of events that brings something back to a collective consciousness.  Once the day/month is over, we busily prepare for the next event, month and somehow between the months and days, I cannot help but wonder; what is left after the day/month? 

When International Women’s Day was originally established, at the beginning of the 20th century, socialism was a driving political movement and women’s suffrage was one of the main social issues; since then other issues have been added whilst the main issue of equality remains on the cards.  Has women’s movement advanced through the commemoration of International Women’s Day?  Debatable if it had an impact.  Originally the day was a call for strikes and the mobilisation of women workers. Today it is a day in the calendar that allows politicians to utter platitudes about how important the day is, and of course how much we respect and love women these days!  It is hardly a representation of what it was or set out to be.  Like so many, numerous other events are marked on our calendar, but wehave lost sight of what they were originally set out to be. 

Consider the importance of a day to commemorate the Nazi Holocaust.  Never again!  The promise that such a mass crime should never happen; the recognition that genocide has no place in our respective societies.  Since that genocide, numerous others have taken place, not to mention the mass murder, violent relocations, and the massacres and ethnic cleanings that have happened since.  Somehow the “never again”, to people in Biafra, East Timor, Rwanda, Darfur, former Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, and many other places simply sounds ironic!  We commemorate the day, but we do not honour the spirit of that day. 

In this mixture of days and months we also have days for mothers, fathers, lovers, friends, hugs, happiness, and many other national and international events.  To commemorate or to offer a moment of reflection.  Somehow the reflection is lost and for some of these days, millions of people are required to purchase something to demonstrate that they care or worst still, to make something!  How many mothers worldwide have had to admire badly made pottery or badly drawn cards from kids who wanted to say “I love you” on one specific day.  Leaves me to wonder what they would want to say on all other days! 

So, is it better to forget them? Get rid of these days and if anyone suggests the creation of another, we feed them to crocodiles?  It would have been easy from one point to end them all.  Social issues are never easily resolved so we can recognise that a day or a month does not resolve them!  It raises awareness but it’s not the solution.  In the old days when the Olympics started there was a call for truce.  They did not allow for the games to take place whilst a war was happening.  Tokenism? Perhaps, but also the recognition that for events to have any credibility they need to go beyond words; they must have actions associated with them.  What if those actions go further than the day/month of the commemoration?  Imagine if we respect and honour women, not only on IWD but every day, imagine if we treat people with the respect, they deserve beyond BHM, LGBTQ+ months?  Maybe it is difficult but if we recognise it to be right, we ought to try.  We know that the Holocaust was a bad thing so lets not just remember it…lets avoid it from happening …Never again! 

International Women’s Day should be a protest

March 14, 2022 09:00 / Leave a comment

Don’t know, might delete this later!

As to not be a mansplainer, this blog entry will not explain ‘women’s issues’ (unlike a certain institution enjoys doing), more highlight some of the discontent I feel with commemoratory days, weeks and months for people who colour outside lines set by the state. Institutional equality statements will say ‘underrepresented groups’ when we have actually have been consciously excluded by patriarchy, white supremacy and other intersectional matrixes of oppression. While I have titled this blog “International Women’s Day should be a protest”, I admit this was for ‘clickbait’ effect. The title also acts as symbolic for other tokenistic occassions where institutions “celebrate” their marginalised employees while also resuming white supremacist, patriarchal, cisheteronormative violence. Just business as usual, isn’t it?

To slightly rephrase a quote by Malcolm X,

‘The oppressor will keep on granting tokenism; a few of the oppressed may get big jobs, but the marginalised majority will catch hell as long as they stay in the his house.’

Whether we are talking about International Women’s Day / Women’s History Month, Pride Month, LGBT+ History Month, Autism Acceptance Week and others, the fact remains institutions use tokenism and co-opt these occassions to present the image of ‘diversity as marketing’ (Ahmed and Swann, 2006).

Pride started as a protest in response to police harrassment of gay and lesbian people. Margaret Thatcher’s government further introduced Section 28 prohibiting “the promotion of homosexuality” by local authorities which had a devestating impact on education. Institutions will use their LGBT+ staff members as diversity bunting, but will not use these times of year to talk about how eugenics for example, is a big talking point in contemporary autistic advocacy circles – pertinently with Applied Behavourial Analysis [ABA] which is heavily contested by autistic activists as eugenics in the twenty-first century. Black History Month is also frequently centred around Black excellence, which ultimately centres whiteness and capitalist takes on what success looks like (Kinouani, 2021: 162). The politics of existing and expressing yourself authentically even while institutions say “they want diversity” (but not that sort of diversity), has been gutted in many institutional responses in favour of a shiny diversity agenda.

Photo by Ehimetalor Akhere Unuabona on Unsplash

Guy DeBord’s book Society of the Spectacle may be one vessel for which to discuss how institutions celebrate marginalised people without discussing how that marginalisation occurs. Though even in this regard, I would tread carefully as Marxism does often centre the Male Gaze. His book was written in the aftermath of WW2 and is centred in the 1960s’ fever of antiestablishment Paris. It is a critique of a society that cares more about images and appearances than reality, truth, and experience. It resonates today with the contemporary world’s addiction to social media and TikTok trends, but it came out of a Europe gripped by consumerism following 1945: “In societies dominated by modern conditions of production, life is presented as an immense accumulation of spectacles” (DeBord, [2021] 1967: 1). Yet, that society’s aim was to curate a passive population of watchers rather than participatory actors (very very familiar).

In our present-day if we consider protest as art, we might think how numerous activist movements to the everyday-eye, are looked at as devoid from their historical, political, or any economic contexts many sprouted from – but rather just “nice things” to look at, watch, or listen to. The euphoria of the Black Lives Matter protests two summers ago is an example of something that was treated by institutions as just about one man – George Floyd – but not about the anti-Blackness that pervades worldwide – via white people “doing racism” and some Black and non-Black people of colour who have internalised it. In many cases we have been conditioned to hate ourselves and both these things go back centuries. Yet, following performative statements done by numerous institutions this International Women’s Day (including Northamptonshire Police), I am reminded of the hypocrisy of how institutions rarely do what they say!

The neoliberal university is a testament to this where they present themselves in marketing as beacons of Diversity and Inclusion, and then discriminate against their students and staff. This sounds like any institution. However, the added bonus of so-called commitments to ‘decolonising the curriculum’ adds insult to injury where diversity and decolonisation are often conflated. As Gurminder Bhambra and colleagues (2018) write:

“Taking colonialism as a global project as the starting point, it becomes difficult to turn away from the Western university as a key site through which colonialism – and colonial knowledge in particular – is produced, consecrated, institutionalised and naturalised. It was in the university that colonial intellectuals developed theories of racism, popularised discourses that bolstered support for colonial endeavours and provided ethical and intellectual grounds for the dispossession, oppression and domination of colonised subjects. In the colonial metropolis, universities provided would-be colonial administrators with knowledge of the peoples they would rule over, as well as lessons in techniques of domination and exploitation. The foundation of European higher education institutions in colonised territories itself became an infrastructure of empire, an institution and actor through which the totalising logic of domination could be extended; European forms of knowledge were spread, local indigenous knowledge suppressed, and native informants trained. In both colony and metropole, universities were founded and financed through the spoils of colonial plunder, enslavement and dispossession” (p3).

From: ‘Decolonising the University’ (2018)

International Women’s Day should be a protest (what protest looks like is up for debate). Universities still hide behind the Athena Swan gender equality charter which we know centres white privileged women (Bhopal and Henderson, 2019). All while Black and Biracial writers have long discussed intersectionality before Kimberlé Crenshaw (1989) conceptualised it (Anon,1808; Prince,1831; Truth,1851; Jacobs,1861; Hurston,1926; Hansberry,1968; Angelou,1969; Giovanni,1970; Emecheta,1979; hooks,1981; Walker,1982; Davis,1983; Lorde,1984; Hill Collins,1986). Yet, to the exclusion of Black and Brown women, (white) feminism still presents itself as universal. Today, many people fail to realise if there is no equality for ethnic minorities, there is no equality. There is a long history of white women and racism (Ware, 1992), when white feminism is simply ‘white supremacy in heels.’ In more recent times influencers like The Guilty Feminist have made attempts to use their white privilege to platform systemically excluded voices, those voices that sit on the fault lines considered ‘too radical’ or ‘too difficult’ for mainstream discourse.

When you see the plethora of issues that exist across intersectional lines, ‘girlboss representation politics’ is not robust enough. Of course celebrate, but exclusively celebrating under institutional definitions of success also ties ‘worth’ to capital and this toxic productivity culture we live in. The fact that women and people in general exist should be enough, and the need to contribute to the economy should be by the by. Diversity and Inclusion ultimately centres captialism because these institutions do not care about people as people, just what bodies can do for the organisation. As Nirmal Puwar (2004) further writes:

“In policy terms, diversity has overwhelmingly come to mean the inclusion of different bodies. It is assumed that, once we have more women and racialised minorities, or other groups, represented in the hierarchies of organisations … especially in the élite positions … then we shall have diversity” (p1).

From ‘space invaders’ by nirmal puwar

The ongoing UCU strikes are testament to that, where universities appear to care more about bodies as capital rather than the human rights of their employees. Former PM-Margaret Thatcher said there is no such thing as society but “there are individual men and women and there are families.” This was the start of what we now call neoliberalism or more commonly – neoliberal capitalism where this political ideology says that connections between people are purely economic more than anything else (i.e more than social, cultural, political etc etc). The term liberal was meant not in the modern sense, but in the context of the 18th and 19th century amid classical liberalism of promoting economic liberty – to do what you want with your money including the trafficking and subjugation of human beings under the British Empire!

Neoliberalism claims that our very existence in relation to one another is driven on self-interest and how each individual seeks to gain economically from each interaction (or simply human relationships as transactional). This sentiment is underpinned by what bell hooks called ‘imperialist white supremacist heteropatriarchy’ where whiteness in particularly is tied to property and ownership (Harris, 1993).

Photo by Jen Theodore on Unsplash

For Britain’s institutions, these acts of tokenism are like property. They think they own the people doing DIE* work and thus the institutions thinks they own The Work too – LGBT History Month, Pride Month, BHM, Autism Awareness Week, IWD, Women’s History Month, Disability Awareness Month.

Ownership is at the basis of whiteness, and people who speak out are turned into problems. Imagine neoliberal institutions thinking they can put limits on social justice advocacy structures … i.e anti-racism, femnism etc etc; imagine them thinking they can own activist struggles by slapping them on their marketing. In concept International Women’s Day makes sense (and I’m here for it), but in reality institutions that benefit from ‘imperialist white supremacist heteropatriarchy’ are not going to help smash those systems of domination. Especially in the perfect storms of Black Lives Matter, COVID-19, and the reinterest in discourses into violence against women (after the murders of Sarah Everard, Sabina Nessa, Bibba Henry, Nicole Smallman and others) – where to performative institutions “it is cool to be an activist.”

International Women’s Day should be a protest and call to action. By all means celebrate women for their achievements, but those achievements need not centre capitalism. And for God’s sake, let’s stop glorifying billionaires … they are part of the problem and somebody is always being exploited. Always.

*Diversity, Inclusion, Equality (or DIE)

Watch Out: Inspirational Women Coming Through

March 11, 2022 10:00 / Leave a comment

In my blog post about My favourite Things I mentioned that Jane Eyre was somebody who inspires me. Upon reflection, she is somebody who inspired me a lot when I was younger, and still today, but not with the same force. Over the past 9 years there have been 4 women who at various points over these years have inspired me in one way or another and remain inspirational to this very day. These four wise, wonderful women have had a humongous impact on my life and in my character development. This blog post is a sort of thank you letter to these fabulous women, as well as an outline of how and why they inspire me. They will remain unnamed to protect myself against certain death!

The first woman I have known the longest, and whilst I would class them as a close friend now, we did not start out as such. Neither did we dislike each other (I HOPE)! This person has had a direct impact on my identity as a criminologist but also as a feminist: something I will always be grateful for. They inspire me daily to be more understanding, empathetic and kind to myself. To challenge the status quo and to think critically at all times! For me they represent whom I want to be in the future. They are hard-working, generous, morally impeccable and a fan of Toy Story (massive plus points in my book). They have overcome a number of academic obstacles and inspire me to persevere with academia and its frustrations on the toughest of days. If I turn out to be half the woman they are; I feel like I will have succeeded in life.

The second woman is one of my closest friends. They are the perfect combination of weird and wonderful. We have had similar journeys in academia, but arguably they went first, and seeing them succeed inspired me to do similar! This woman has the patience of an actual real-life saint (although it has been tested on occasion-possibly by myself)! They inspire me to let the little things go and to recognise and check my own privilege. When I feel myself wobble, I think to this person and know that we can do this together! They might not know this: but I am continuously looking up to them.

The third woman has had a very recent inspirational impact on my life. I’ve known them for a number of years, but the last few years has changed the dynamic of our relationship to a beautiful friendship: one where they kick my backside at the Switch, but share my love for cheeseboards! This woman, other than keeping me sane, has inspired me to stand up for my own self-worth and to generate a backbone (metaphorically speaking). Our challenging discussions around race and gender, her open-mindedness and critical thinking all encourage me to follow suit. Life has thrown a number of obstacles her way, and whilst she may get a little knocked, she brushes it off and continues to smash her goals! All of this leaves me in awe: not to mention their stamina when it comes to shopping!

The final, and by no means least, woman is the most recent addition to the inspirational gang of fabulous women, who bless my life and keep me grounded. They keep me motivated in things I am passionate about outside of academia, are always there as a sounding board for me to air out my frustrations, and totally gets my need for doughnuts! They balance a ridiculous work-life balance as a single parent, and do so with flare, generosity and hard-work! Her non-traditional route into academia serves as inspiration to all, that if you are passionate about something; pursue it!

All four of these women manage ridiculous work/life/study loads, are empathetic, caring and always make time for me. All of them inspire me to be a better academic, friend and human being. They have had an impact on me as a student (Undergraduate and Postgraduate) as an academic (Associate Lecturer and Lecturer) and most importantly as a person. I cannot thank them enough. But if they are reading this, which they should be as I’ll be sharing it on social media; THANK YOU WISE, WONDERFUL WOMEN!

Post navigation

← Older posts Newer posts →

Categories