Actualization

• In Event: Roundtable: Redemptive Criminology: A Humanistic Response to Pycroft and Bartollas

Abstract

Pycroft and Bartollas open their discussion on actualization by highlighting the inherent rehabilitative limitations of the risk-crime control orientation. While the text discusses how the risk emphasis, which is prioritized throughout the criminal justice apparatus, inhibits forgiveness and therefore redemption, the authors open the possibility for the inclusion of a constructionist-oriented critique. The constructed self must be actualized within a given context. Within the context of prison, the rigid social dynamics create barriers or parameters that limit the incarcerated individual’s options for defining his/hers/their actualized self. Despite efforts at self-improvement (e.g., educational, or vocational programing) the incarcerated individual is forced to adopt an understanding of themselves in relation the ubiquitous definition of criminal, not toward psychosocial fulfillment as discussed by Maslow (1943). Although the authors suggest repentance as a conduit to actualization, the constructed shadow (see Jung, 1980) remains cast once constructed, which evokes the question of when, or even if, repentance can be complete, and the process of actualization can be initiated.

Author

• Roger Schaefer, Central Washington University