Desistance and Legitimacy: The Impact of Offender Notification Meetings on Recidivism among High Risk Offenders

Danielle Wallace, Andrew V. Papachristos, Tracey Meares, Jeffrey Fagan

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

39 Scopus citations

Abstract

Legitimacy-based approaches to crime prevention assume that individuals will comply with the law when they believe that the law and its agents are legitimate and act in ways that are “fair” and “just.” Currently, legitimacy-based programs are shown to lower aggregate levels of crime; yet, no study has investigated whether such programs influence individual offending. Using quasi-experimental design and survival analyses, this study evaluates the effectiveness of one such program—Chicago’s Project Safe Neighborhoods’ (PSN) Offender Notification Forums—at reducing individual recidivism among a population of returning prisoners. Results suggest that involvement in PSN significantly reduces the risk of subsequent incarceration and is associated with significantly longer intervals that offenders remain on the street and out of prison. As the first study to provide individual-level evidence promoting legitimacy-based interventions on patterns of individual offending, out study suggests these interventions can and do reduce rates of recidivism.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)1237-1264
Number of pages28
JournalJustice Quarterly
Volume33
Issue number7
DOIs
StatePublished - Nov 9 2016

Keywords

  • high risk offenders
  • legitimacy
  • procedural justice
  • recidivism

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Pathology and Forensic Medicine
  • Law

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