| GAMES CRIMINALS PLAY by Bud Allen and Diana Bosta |
[Jan. 28th, 2008|05:55 pm] |
GAMES CRIMINALS PLAY
by
Bud Allen & Diana Bosta
A BOY SCOUTS' MANUAL for corrections officers, now in its twenty-eighth printing, GAMES CRIMINALS PLAY sets out to teach prison employees how to recognize inmate manipulation, and dismantle common ploys for contraband. The set-ups themselves are generally more complex than you might expect, often impressively subtle, and hardly unique to prisons--readers who have spent time in any institutional environment, be it an office or a school, will recognize similar strategies at play in their own workplaces.
The tone of GAMES can be almost humorously authoritarian (its last line is, "IT CAN HAPPEN TO YOU") but it's also strangely idealistic--according to Allen and Bosta, the trick of good corrections work is learning to set strong behavioral examples without either hardening to the point of coldness, or softening to the point of vulnerability.
That's worthwhile advice for any profession, though particularly ironic when paired with the environment it is being applied to here. |
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