In this work Maurice Vanstone provides an authoritative and original account of the history of probation. This invaluable reference tool offers readers a new way of reading probation history and presents an original context for thinking about current policy and practice. While the study is essentially UK-focused, it also provides a comparative perspective by exploring the history of probation in the USA. The author's research has produced the only history of probation practice that does justice to the mixture of influences on the early probation service and paves the way for today's more evidence-based approach. The work is based in part upon original documents and interviews with retired and serving officers. Supervising Offenders in the Community will greatly interest criminologists and criminal justice, social policy, social history and social work academics and postgraduate students.

Maurice Vanstone is a Senior Lecturer in Criminal Justice and Criminology at the Centre for Criminal Justice and Criminology, University of Wales, Swansea. He has experience of practice, training and research on community sentences over a 30 year period, and has been a regular contributor to teaching and research over the last 24 years. Previous publications include Effective Probation Practice (with Peter Raynor and David Smith), Understanding Community Penalties (with Peter Raynor), Betrayal of Trust (with Matthew Colton) and Beyond Offending Behaviour (with Mark Drakeford), as well as numerous articles and reports arising out of the 'Straight Thinking on Probation' experiment. He has collaborated with Mike Maguire, Peter Raynor and Julie Vennard in ground-breaking research for the Home Office on prison after-care.

Contents: The origins of the probation service: the orthodox accounts; The 'crusade' begins: the origins of the probation service revisited; Early practice: redemption, pledges and terrible warnings; From awakening the conscience to providing insight; Folk theories, practice and the heyday of treatment; The emergence of doubt: the non-treatment paradigm and alternative therapy; The rise to dominance of evidence-based practice; Conclusion: back to where we started; Appendices; Bibliography; Index.