How prisons help criminals return to society

In recent times, people have looked at penalties with a rational eye, and penalties have gradually become more moderate. Contemporary concepts of punishment are more rational and humane, focusing on the education and rehabilitation of offenders so that they can return to society. For offenders who are deprived of their freedom, most of them are only in prison for a period of time, and regardless of the length of their sentences, they will always return to society, and one of the purposes of our penalties is to enable the offenders to reintegrate into society after they have been punished? and not to jeopardize society again, and even to contribute to society. How to ensure that offenders are not disconnected from society and unable to integrate when they return to society is the subject of the resocialization of offenders. I. The dilemma of modern prisons: the contradiction between "prisonization" and socialization Prisons are closed or semi-closed environments, and offenders, after entering such an environment from an open society, first have to adapt to such an environment, which is devoid of freedom, where the law reigns supreme, and which is relatively closed. We can call this process "prisonization". In such an environment, offenders are unable to learn the correct outlook on life and values from the people around them, but may instead learn more criminal techniques. Secondly, prison is very different from society, where there are extremely strict norms and very limited sources of information, and the conditions or factors needed for the re-socialization of offenders are missing in prison. The contradiction between prisonization and socialization is due to the limitations of the single function of prison itself. The positive functions that prison execution is expected to perform are limited by various internal and external factors, and the contradictions inherent in prisons themselves, such as the contradiction between the prisonization and the resocialization of offenders, and the contradiction between closed prisons and open societies, show that liberal sentences and their traditional prisons have great drawbacks in reforming offenders. Even so, prison continues its function of punishing and reforming criminals amidst controversy. It is undeniable that under the present historical conditions, prison remains the most effective and indispensable means of punishment. In order to ease this contradiction, countries have adopted corresponding reform programs in the area of crime correction. Secondly, the practical experience of resocialization of offenders in foreign countries The focus of resocialization of offenders is to overcome the pathologies in the process of socialization and, with the help of certain forms, to gradually guide offenders to re-adapt to the norms of society and the process of social life. In this regard, Western countries have adopted measures such as deinstitutionalization, decriminalization and decriminalization, shortening institutional treatment, increasing open treatment and making extensive use of case management, which are all useful attempts. First, the rights of offenders are safeguarded. Criminals are deprived of their freedom and many other rights are lost with them, but this does not mean that criminals have no rights to speak of. After World War II, the United Nations adopted a series of international conventions dealing with the rights of criminals. In addition, many Western countries have also enacted legislation to safeguard the rights of criminals, such as the Spanish Prison Organization Act, which stipulates that convicts can also exercise civil, political, economic and cultural rights, the right to hygienic living (the right to food and drink, the right to life and housing), and so on, and there are also labour rights. In the process of participating in labor, criminals enjoy the right to labor protection, the right to labor insurance, the right to rest, and so on. Protecting the rights of criminals can reduce their sense of deprivation and minimize the degradation of their personality brought about by incarceration. Second, the expansion of the application of open treatment. In order to avoid the shortcomings of imprisonment as much as possible and to better realize the purpose of resocialization of criminals, open treatment has gradually developed into a new form of penal treatment. In Western countries, non-custodial sentences are imposed on some offenders and replaced by probation, conditional release, public service work, driving bans and reconciliation between the offender and the offended. Thirdly, a case management approach is applied. Classified management of criminals, focusing on psychological correction, the criminals from the psychological relief, counseling, the use of social forces *** with the participation of criminals re-socialization, so that criminals can come into contact with society and so on. Third, the conception of China's criminal re-socialization initiatives At present, under the background of building a harmonious society, in the rule of law in the construction of socialist rule of law in the environment, China's reform of criminals in the relevant research should be strengthened in the re-socialization of criminals on the issue of the appropriate reference to the successful experience of the western countries, and to further promote the re-socialization of China's criminals to further improve the development of the measures and improve. First of all, the rights of offenders should be more effectively safeguarded in legislation, and special attention should be paid to the protection of offenders' personality rights. Around us there is no lack of such a number of ex-prisoners, they return to society, abide by the law, did not re-offend, but the spirit of numbness, extremely low self-esteem, although they will not jeopardize the community, but the independence of the personality has suffered a great deal of damage, it is difficult to integrate into society. The protection of the rights of criminals is first and foremost reflected in respect for their personalities. In terms of prison facilities, the number of humiliating facilities should be minimized, and under the premise of ensuring safety, the places where prisoners eat, drink and live should have as few traces of incarceration as possible, so that offenders can live in a more relaxed environment. The main purpose of this is to establish an interpersonal relationship of mutual trust and closer psychological distance. This contributes to the re-socialization process of the offender. Secondly, a case management model has been drawn on and gradually introduced. Case management is based on the categorization of offenders. It should be recognized that a one-size-fits-all model of rehabilitation may not be suitable for every offender. In particular, when it comes to the psychological treatment of offenders, attention should be paid to the differences between individuals and to the application of the right medication in order to achieve good results. The idea of "people-centeredness" and the theory of individual differences are two of the most important theoretical foundations for the case-by-case correctional model adopted by the correctional system. The greatest benefit of case management is the analysis of specific cases, with different correctional programs being proposed for each individual according to his or her different circumstances. For example, in Australia, when a person enters a correctional center, the correctional officer first conducts a case investigation. The investigation includes recording fingerprints, conducting body searches, taking photographs, finding out about the educational background and the reasons for committing the crime, and asking a doctor to check whether the person is physically and mentally healthy (including mentally, physically and spiritually), and so on. The Correctional Officer then submits to the Senior Correctional Officer his/her opinion on case management and educational measures and programs. After the Senior Correctional Officer decides on the specific measures and programmes based on his/her opinion, the Correctional Officer organizes their implementation. Depending on each case, the program will be implemented by incarceration, community corrections or both. Of course, our national conditions are so different that it is impossible to copy the Western countries' approach. However, it is worthwhile for us to learn from their useful practical experience, and we should explore the establishment of a case management model that suits our national conditions. China's case management model should be based on the classification of offenders; on the basis of the original separation of offenders according to gender, age, type of sentence and length of sentence, they should be further categorized on the basis of the nature of the crime committed, so as to prevent mutual "contagion" among inmates, and to create the conditions for case-by-case corrective action. Thirdly, open-ended treatment should be increased. It is necessary to mobilize all the positive factors in society outside the prison, to make concerted efforts to help rehabilitate offenders and to ensure and consolidate the effectiveness of the execution of sentences; prisons are not only organs of the State, but also part of the social enterprise; the prevention and control of offenders should be the prevention and control of society as a whole, and the whole of society has a bearing on the education and rehabilitation of offenders, and should make use of all kinds of social means to rehabilitate offenders. Attempts can be made to establish an out-of-home system, a return-to-leave system, a weekend detention system, etc., and to summarize experience and promote their continuous improvement in practice. Fourthly, community corrections should be vigorously promoted. Community correction is a method of educating and reforming offenders without incarceration but using community resources, and is a general term for all ways of managing and educating offenders in a community environment. At present, China's pilot community corrections are limited to the following five kinds of people? Criminals sentenced to control and deprivation of political rights, criminals who have been pronounced on probation and adjudicated to be on parole, as well as those serving sentences who have been decided to be executed outside of prison. The scope of the program is also concentrated in larger cities, and most of the pilot work is in urban communities, excluding the vast rural areas. Community corrections in China is still in the exploratory stage, the current primary task is to develop a complete legal norms of community corrections, to change the current situation of community corrections in China can not be relied upon, and at the same time, supporting the improvement of the existing criminal substantive law and procedural law. (The author's unit: Beijing Mentougou District Procuratorate)