The systemisation and creeping marketization of criminal justice that has occurred in many Western jurisdictions in the last thirty years has exposed workers to new challenges as the organisations in which they work have been subject to seemingly relentless ‘reforms’ in the name of enhancing efficiency and/or effectiveness. The probation service in England & Wales is perhaps unique in having experienced a sequence of reform programmes which have included four major organisational restructures in the last decade. In this panel we will share emerging findings from a 3-year (2022-2024) ESRC-funded study which seeks to understand the transition of probation services from a 2-tier, part-privatised model to a unified public Probation Service for England and Wales.
The first paper (Robinson) examines 'identity work' in the reconfigured service, arguing that this is best understood as an ongoing, agentic process whereby workers choose from among a range of structures and resources to make sense of who they are and where they belong in a field characterised by shifting boundaries and ongoing turbulence.
The second paper (Millings) considers a police perspective on probation unification, with reference to the 'confidence building' agenda that has been central to the unification project. Drawing on interviews with police personnel who have worked with probation partners at strategic and operational levels before, during, and beyond unification, this paper considers police perspectives on probation - and police - legitimacy, in a dynamic organisational field.
The final paper (Carr) draws on interviews with practitioners and senior leaders in our case study area to explore how recent developments in official resonses to Serious Further Offences by people under probation supervision have contributed to an erosion of professional confidence, a culture of fear and a defensive approach to probation practice.

One of a number of key drivers in the unification of probation services in England and Wales in June 2021 was the need to rebuild criminal justice partners’ confidence in the delivery of offender management and rehabilitation services. This paper - from the ESRC-funded Rehabilitating Probation Project - draws on interviews with police officers and leaders who have worked with probation partners at strategic and operational levels before, during, and beyond unification to capture the assessments they make of working with a service coming to terms with the impact of a period of profound organisational change and seeking to (re)build confidence.

It is possible to separate out judgements made by police partners about the everyday utility and impact of probation work, from assessments made about the integrity and authenticity of the probation service (and its staff) in assuming a necessary and valued place in a shared organisational field. This can be achieved by framing their assessments of the dynamic exchanges between police and probation counterparts as negotiations of organisational legitimacy. Firstly, the analysis shows that policy change, and introducing a mixed economy of service provision in criminal justice, doesn't take place in a vacuum. We can see here how judgements about the performance of organisations, how they are funded, and their perceived level of operational and moral legitimacy, impacts on the willingness and capacity of partners to work together. Secondly, police assessments of the turbulent period(s) of organisational change in probation reveal their own vulnerability and the shared challenge of negotiating and narrating their own organisational and operational legitimacy as a public service.

This paper examines 'identity work' in the reconfigured service, arguing that this is best understood as an ongoing, agentic process whereby workers choose from among a range of structures and resources to make sense of who they are and where they belong in a field characterised by shifting boundaries and ongoing turbulence.