The Good Lives Model: A Strength-Based Approach to Rehabilitating Offenders

Abstract

The Risk Needs Responsivity (RNR) model has contributed immensely to the contemporary understanding of offending and its treatment, resulting in effective correctional treatment and lowered recidivism rates. Yet, while its strengths are irrefutable, it has also been criticized for having a number of weaknesses, including a narrow focus on risk. The Good Lives Model (GLM; Ward and Maruna in Rehabilitation: Beyond the risk paradigm, Routledge, 2007; Ward and Stewart in Professional Psychology: Research and Practice 34:353–360, 2003) is an alternative, but complementary, approach to offender rehabilitation that aims to promote offenders’ personal goals and reduce their risk of re-offending. This chapter highlights how this strength-based framework provides a very different way of approaching offender rehabilitation that can overcome the limitations of the RNR.

Case Study

Graham is a 45-year-old married man who is an accountant by training but in recent years has worked as a senior manager for a multinational company. Graham’s alcohol consumption increased following a period of stress at work, including some negative feedback from his manager. Graham’s wife did not approve of his increased drinking and they started to argue. As the tension at home increased, Graham drank even more, struggled at work, and was eventually given a formal warning after making a series of serious errors. He was subsequently demoted at work and his wife moved out on account of his ongoing, heavy drinking. Following an office function, during which he had been drinking heavily, Graham followed a female colleague, whom he thought had insulted him, into a car park and raped her. He was given a medium length prison term.

Graham’s risk level was assessed as medium and the criminogenic needs of substance abuse, problems with emotional regulation, demeaning attitudes toward women, a high need for power and control, and social isolation were identified.

Graham’s overarching primary goods were excellence at work and autonomy. While he took pride in being good at his job, he tended to underestimate his performance. In addition, he was highly sensitive to perceived threats to his independence and resented it when he thought people were telling him what to do.

There were several flaws in Graham’s lifestyle at the time of his offending. First, some means of obtaining primary goods were highly problematic, notably his use of violence, domination, and control to satisfy the primary good of autonomy, and his use of alcohol for tension release. Second, these maladaptive secondary goods were underpinned by a core set of problems that included: a lack of appropriate ways of asserting himself and exerting autonomy, a sense of inadequacy, misogynistic attitudes, poor emotional regulation skills, and social isolation (i.e., problems with internal and external capacity). Third, due to a tendency to overwork, his life was limited in scope. Graham had, in the past, been a good football player and had a few close friends whom he now rarely saw. Finally, there appeared to be a conflict between his desire to excel in his job and his need to have a close, loving relationship with his wife.

The pathway to Graham’s offending was an indirect one whereby increased stress at work, coupled with poor emotion regulation skills, led him to rely on alcohol to relax. His increased alcohol consumption subsequently created a cascade of other stressors, including arguments with his wife and problems at work, leading to his demotion, which he dealt with by drinking even more. Outraged by his female colleague’s perceived disrespect, which elicited feelings of inadequacy, he attempted to obtain a sense of power and control (i.e., primary good of agency) through the rape.

Graham’s marriage remained intact, despite his offending, but he lost his job upon conviction. Work was a key focus of his rehabilitation plan and, through the local church, he obtained a voluntary position as a bookkeeper for a local charity, satisfying his need for mastery and autonomy. Graham’s rehabilitation plan also gave a prominent role to his involvement in his friend’s football team which helped him to increase his social contact and establish better community links. It was expected that these secondary goods (i.e., voluntary work and involvement in the football club) could also help to address a number of his other problems. For example, members of the church and football team could provide Graham with support, assist him to develop his communication skills, and help him learn to be become more sensitive to the needs of others. Further, his adversarial relationships with females and his tendency to overreact to perceived threats to his sense of masculinity and autonomy would be gently confronted by his football teammates. Graham was provided with some specialized therapy to help him build his emotional competence and relationship skills. He was an active participant in the construction and implementation of his rehabilitation plan and, while he struggled to accept full responsibility for his sexual offending, he was fully engaged in the reintegration process.