Exploring Predictors of Correctional Officer Power Base Reliance

• In Event: Role and View of Correctional Officers

Abstract

Officers of the correctional system are charged with monitoring inmate behavior, ensuring the safety of all individuals housed within the prison and establishing wider institutional order. Several scholars have noted that correctional officers have at their disposal five social power bases designed to accomplish these missions, and they include reward, referent, legitimate, coercive and expert. Although power base reliance has been researched extensively within other institutional settings, limited attention has been focused on them within prison facilities. Survey data collected from a statewide population of maximum security correctional officers (N = 649) were therefore used to explore not only correctional officer power base reliance, but the antecedents to this decision. It was discovered that respondents relied more heavily upon referent and legitimate bases of power in order to ensure inmate compliance, and that their power reliance was determined their custodial orientation towards inmates, as well as other demographic and work organization variables. Implications for future research and policies designed to enhance prison safety are discussed.

Author

• Frank Ferdik, University of West Florida