Access to the arts is a human right, for prisoners as for students

What do the arts do for us? A 2018 public report looked at the question of how the discourse of ‘outcomes’ and ‘impacts’ affects access to culture in the UK criminal justice system. The cathartic process, the report suggests, might be valued in a range of ways:

as a contribution to desistance; as a means to improve ‘compliance’; as a way to build a better social climate in the prison; or simply in allowing offenders to participate in arts and culture as their human right.

By Emma Gilby, Psyche Magazine