Alcohol, Offending and Strong-Arm Sobriety: A Qualitative Longitudinal Study of Alcohol Treatment Requirements

This PhD is a highly original study of the experiences and perceptions of offenders sentenced to alcohol treatment requirements (ATRs) that will extend academic knowledge and shape the future delivery of criminal justice interventions around alcohol. It is founded on collaboration with the charity Humankind, one of the biggest providers of ATRs in England.

Created in 2003, ATRs can be attached to community or suspended sentences and were given to 5,000 offenders in 2021/22 alone (UK Government, 2023). They are intended to tackle alcohol dependence while supporting offenders in desisting from crime. This twin emphasis on penalty and welfare, on care and recovery alongside the imperative to control offenders and monitor their compliance with a court-mandated punishment, makes ATRs a prime example of 'strong-arm sobriety' sentences (Piehowski and Phelps, 2023), which are used in multiple countries. Despite broad usage,

strong-arm sobriety measures are under-researched. Important questions remain about whether they meaningfully impact on the root causes of offending and support desistance from crime.

Alcohol consumption is seldom the focus of desistance studies on the 'turning points' (e.g. relationships, employment etc) which instigate the cessation of offending (e.g. Laub and Sampson, 1993). For Piehowski and Phelps (2023), 'strong-arm sobriety' interventions elevate drinking above other factors that cause crime; they reduce offending to an expression of the criminal addict's disordered thinking, negating the criminogenic significance of other socio-economic or

psychological factors. Existing studies of ATRs have used quantitative methods and found those who complete treatment are likely to drink less in future (Ashby et al, 2010; Baldwin et al, 2010), but have found no evidence of reduced reoffending (McSweeney, 2015). Detailed inquiry into the role of drinking in offenders' actions and the position of ATRs within the penal-welfare continuum is needed to better understand how ATRs operate in practice and impact on offenders and offending.

The research questions are: What role has alcohol played in the offending behaviour(s) of ATR recipients? What are recipients' experiences and perceptions of ATRs and their short and long-term impacts? What are the implications of these findings for the delivery of ATRs?

These questions will be answered through a qualitative examination of the lived experiences of ATR recipients. Existing studies of ATRs are exclusively quantitative but it is now recognised that qualitative research is needed to further understandings of their operation and effects (McSweeney, 2015; UK Government, 2023). Crucially, the potential for relapse into drinking and offending plays out through time yet, beyond the handful of studies cited, no data exists on what happens to ATR recipients post-treatment.

Hence, the project is qualitative and longitudinal. Supported by Humankind, the PhD will transform understandings of the impacts of ATRs in England and Wales and make significant contributions to literature on desistance from crime by exploring the interaction between alcohol dependence, offending and 'strong-arm sobriety' measures, thereby potentially reshaping how practitioners deliver ATRs.

Based primarily in criminology, it will speak to both the intellectual and impact-oriented goals of the Security, Conflict and Justice and Wellbeing, Health and Communities pathways.