In the 2024 lecture, Ben Jarman explored the myth and reality of how society responds to serious crimes, charting the uses and abuses of society’s responses to crime: retributive punishment, rehabilitative intervention, public protection, and calls for incremental or radical reform. Drawing on personal and professional experiences, Ben invited Friends to reflect on where current prison conditions belong in the longer flow of Quaker witness on penal reform, and to asked: who (if anyone) gets what they deserve from the institutions we have?
Preparing for the Swarthmore Lecture
Interview with Ben Jarman
Get to know the 2024 Swarthmore Lecturer, Ben Jarman, in conversation with Aled Vernon-Rees, Woodbrooke’s Communications Officer.
Panel Discussion
Alex South and Simon Scott both have extensive, and different, experience of the prison and the criminal justice system. In this discussion Alex and Simon share some of their experiences and insights and explore the current situation and problems with prisons in the UK. We hope that this will provide helpful background to Ben’s lecture whatever your level of knowledge of the UK prison system.
Alex South is a former prison officer and writer. She has ten years’ experience working in a range of prisons. She has BSc in Psychology and Criminology and a Masters in Forensic Psychology. She is the author of Behind these Doors; stories of strength, suffering and survival in prison which was published in 2023 and was a Radio 4 book of the week in October 2023. It has recently been published in paperback.
Simon Scott served 16 years in prison after pleading guilty to murder. Since release he has worked as a consultant including for User Voice, Prison Reform Trust, Clinks and as a trustee of Prisoners’ Education Trust. He is nearing completion of a PhD based on his research of the experiences of men serving life sentences in the community after release from custody and the extent to which family members vicariously serve the sentence.
