Corrections_Today_March_April_2023_Vol.85_No.2

NIJ Update

largely from studies of police-citizen interactions, with some additional research on legitimacy in the courts. 7 This article looks at the potential of legitimacy to help maintain order and stability in jails. It also examines how, to that same end, procedural justice can be a vital tool for correc tional officers and deputies. Given the generally more fluid and volatile nature of jail environ ments than prisons, procedural justice may be even more important for jails as they address the needs of individuals who are adjusting to incarceration. Jails also have the po tential to enhance legitimacy across the entire justice system. More research is needed to understand whether, and to what extent, proce dural justice applied in a correctional facility can enhance the legitimacy of law enforcement and the courts, as well as the facility itself. Legitimacy, cooperation, and procedural justice To be effective, institutions of social control, such as policing or corrections, depend on the coopera tion and compliance of members of the communities that they serve and protect. Crime reduction strategies are typically imposed from the top down on communities by police, and within the closed environments of correctional facilities by correctional administrators and officers. 8 But in the broader context, protecting com munity safety and security requires cooperation and engagement of all interested parties. Both bottom up and top-down communications among public and other agencies, the public, advocates, and the popula tion of incarcerated individuals are

integral to promoting legitimacy in a correctional facility. Legitimacy of the criminal justice system is important because persons who perceive those entities and systems as legitimate are more likely to abide by their decisions. 9 Research has concluded that legal authorities can maintain an image of legitimacy in the eyes of the public if their decisions are viewed as be ing made fairly. 10 Thus, legitimacy contributes to the willingness of community members (in this in stance, incarcerated individuals) to cooperate with institutions of social control (the jail). Key components of procedural justice include giving individuals a voice in the process, neutrality, quality of treatment, and trustworthiness. Legitimacy goes to the heart of the question, “Why do people cooperate with authorities and obey the law?” One answer could be that people do so after considering the potential penalties for violating the law and other forms of non-com pliance. Another possible answer is that the shared belief among af fected parties in the legitimacy of the law and the agencies charged with

maintaining order and security leads to cooperation with those agencies and obedience to the laws. The work of scholars has also sparked a broader discussion of the relationship between legitimacy and procedural justice in policing. Dis cussions of police legitimacy focus primarily on psychological explana tions of why citizens comply with the law. Procedural justice, on the other hand, focuses on process. That is, it concerns the way that police or others within the criminal justice system can exercise their authority in a fair and just manner by following procedures that consider the qual ity of both the treatment of citizens and the decision-making during police–citizen encounters. Key com ponents of procedural justice include giving individuals a voice in the process, neutrality, quality of treat ment, and trustworthiness. 11 They are also fundamental qualities of a police-community partnership in the co-production of public safety. Legitimacy and corrections Drawing on the work of Tom Tyler, applications of legitimacy in corrections have historically focused on compliance and self-regulation on the part of an incarcerated indi vidual. 12 Those studies proceeded on the assumption that the use of authority in a procedurally fair man ner (procedural justice) will increase compliance and advance the argu ment that perceptions of legitimacy are important for maintaining a safe and secure prison environment. This suggests that corrections officers who assert their authority or respond to challenges inappropriately may ulti mately undermine the legitimacy of

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