An Appreciative Inquiry into the response to diversity in three Yorkshire Prisons

应对监狱环境中的多样性是一个复杂和具有挑战性的过程，英国监狱管理局仍在制定和完善其国家政策框架，以确保履行《种族关系(修正案)法》(2000年)、《残疾歧视法》(1995年)和新的《平等法》(2010年)规定的责任。在这一更广泛的框架内，每一所监狱都必须制定自己的地方政策框架，以促进平等，减少与以下七个“受保护特征”相关的歧视：年龄、残疾、性别调整、种族、宗教或信仰、性取向、婚姻和民事伙伴关系以及怀孕和孕产(卫生部，2011年)。本研究建立在研究人员以前由ESRC资助的一个试点项目的基础上，该项目旨在开发和测试一种方法，以探索监狱中对多样性的反应。它的目的是在监狱管理局内更广泛地采用这一方法，以约克郡地区的三所监狱为个案研究，发展关于应对多样性的知识体系。地点的选择受到记录囚犯和监狱工作人员在一系列不同安全类别和类型监狱的经历的需要的影响，包括：HMP Wakefield，一个最高安全级别的监狱，收容被判犯有非常严重罪行的成年男性囚犯，长期服刑，并可能继续对其他人构成威胁(包括监狱工作人员、其他囚犯，如果他们要逃跑，也包括普通公众)；HMP Leeds，一座‘当地/Remand’监狱，收容等待出庭的成年男性囚犯、等待分配到其他监狱的囚犯和正在服刑的囚犯；HMP Lindholme是一所收容21岁以上囚犯的C类监狱，分配的安全级别相对较低。这一群体包括可能在其他地方服刑很长时间的正在服刑的无期徒刑囚犯和服刑较短的囚犯。这项为期三年的研究项目将说明：o不同少数族裔群体的囚犯如何体验每个机构实施的多样化政策和程序；o少数群体群体认为每个监狱的政策、程序和做法的哪些方面有助于增进尊重和福祉；o监狱工作人员如何体验指导他们对待不同少数群体囚犯的政策和程序；o如何改进每个监狱的多样性政策、程序和做法，以促进少数群体更多地感受尊重和福祉；o还将探索和发展交叉理论，以此作为了解人们如何体验监狱生活的一种方式。通常，种族、宗教和性等人格方面被认为是决定压迫的政治、社会和经济动态的不同方面的经验。交叉性理论认识到这些方面通常相互重叠，创造了几个方面可能相遇的复杂交叉点。它们可以讨论政策和政策执行者的行动如何共同运作，以制造歧视和剥夺权力，并提供一种手段，说明各种形式的歧视如何构成不同少数群体的相对地位。这些目标将结合数据收集的四个阶段来实现：对官方多样性政策和程序与工作人员的知识和做法之间的关系进行评价的民族志；约谈来自每所监狱各个分支的不同少数群体的囚犯代表；对每所监狱的所有囚犯进行调查；每所监狱住宅区和其他部门的工作人员组成的重点小组。

Responding to diversity within the prisons setting is a complex and challenging process and HM Prison Service is still developing and refining its national policy framework to ensure that its responsibilities under the Race Relations (Amendment) Act (2000), the Disability Discrimination Act (1995) and the new Equalities Act (2010) are met. Within this wider framework each individual prison is required to develop their own local policy framework to promote equality and reduce discrimination in relation to seven 'protected characteristics' of diversity; age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnerhip and pregnancy and maternity (MOJ, 2011). The present research builds on a previous ESRC funded pilot project undertaken by the researchers which aimed to develop and test a methodology for exploring the response to diversity in prisons. It aims to employ the methodology more widely within the Prison Service to develop a body of knowledge about the response to diversity using three prisons from the Yorkshire region as case studies. The choice of sites is influenced by the need to capture the experiences of prisoners and prison staff across a range of different security categories and types of prison and includes; HMP Wakefield, a maximum-security prison accommodating adult male prisoners convicted of very serious offences, serving long sentences and who may continue to pose a risk to others (including prison staff, other prisoners and, if they were to escape, the general public); HMP Leeds, a 'Local/Remand' prison accommodating adult male prisoners awaiting court appearances, prisoners awaiting allocation to other prisons and prisoners serving short sentences; and HMP Lindholme, a Category C prison accommodating prisoners, over the age of 21,allocated a relatively low security category. The population includes prisoners serving life sentences who may have served a substantial period of their sentence elsewhere and prisoners serving shorter sentences. The three year research project will illustrate:o how prisoners in diverse minority groupings experience the diversity policies and procedures in place at each establishment,o which aspects of policies, procedures and practices in each prison are perceived by minority groups to promote feelings of respect and well-being,o how prison staff experience the policies and procedures that guide their practice with prisoners from diverse minority groupings, and,o ways in which diversity policies, procedures and practices in each prison could be improved to promote a greater feeling of respect and well-being in minority groups.It will also explore and develop theories of intersectionality as a way of understanding how people experience prison life. Commonly, aspects of personhood such as ethnicity, religion, and sexuality are deemed to be distinct aspects of experience which determine the political, social and economic dynamics of oppression. Theories of intersectionality recognise these aspects as commonly overlaying one another, creating complex intersections at which several aspects may meet. They can address the ways in which policies and the actions of those implementing policies can operate together to create discrimination and disempowerment, and offer a means of accounting for the ways in which forms of discrimination structure the relative positions of people of diverse minorities. These aims will be met combining four stages of data collection: an appreciative ethnography of the relationship between official diversity policies and procedures and the knowledge and practices of staff, interviews with prisoners' representative of diverse minority groupings from all wings of each prison, a survey of all prisoners in each prison, focus groups with staff from the residential wings and other departments across each prison.