The policymakers’ dilemma: change, continuity and enduring rationalities of English penal policy

This article analyses how penal policymakers interpret, rationalize and thereby instantiate ‘external’ change. In order to do so, it presents a critical reconstruction of penal policymaking during the 2010–15 UK coalition government, drawing on interviews with senior policymakers. It explores how policymakers sought to respond to the uncertainties of this unusual period in British politics. We see the ‘shallow roots’ of the 2010–15 coalition: in the face of novel challenges, policymakers grasped for traditional, exclusionary rationalities and practices. This study demonstrates the complex interaction between conditions ‘out there’, the rationalities and practices of specific policymakers, and eventual policy outcomes