What Works Scotland co-director Oliver Escobar is contributing his expertise in participative and deliberative democracy to a new project that is challenging views of offender rehabilitation.
The project, called Coming Home, has been set up by Distant Voices, which is a partnership between Vox Liminis and the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research (SCCJR). Distant Voices is looking at how we find ways to engage communities in rehabilitation of offenders, and to challenge public attitudes about punishment and reintegration.
The Coming Home project will be led by the SCCJR’s Fergus McNeill, Professor of Criminology and Social Work at the University of Glasgow, working with:
- Alison Urie from Vox Liminis
- Jo Collinson Scott, Lecturer in Commercial Music at the University of the West of Scotland, and
- Dr Oliver Escobar, Lecturer in Public Policy at the University of Edinburgh
As a collaborative action research project drawing on criminology, popular music, politics and other disciplines, Distant Voices combines creative practices (principally songwriting and sharing), research and knowledge exchange to enable dialogue and learning about re/integration – and to practice and experience it.
Its participatory methods draw together a wide range of differently situated citizens, organisations and associations to form a ‘community of enquiry’ and of creative practice.
The project is co-funded by Economic and Social Research Council and Arts and Humanities Research Council and is also supported by Creative Scotland, the Scottish Prison Service and Glasgow Community Justice Authority.
See more about the Coming Home project on the Gateway to Research website.
