By Tess Bartlett - Rethinking Crime and Punishment

governments in the hope that ‘such a show of strength from the people will convincethe decision makers to act in accordance with [their] preferences’ (Ippolito &Walker, 1980: 333).The Sensible Sentencing Trust and the MediaThe formation of the Sensible Sentencing Trust has since given the public asignificant voice in penal policymaking – at least articulated through the Trust’sspokespeople. This has seen it become an attractive source for the media and no indepthresearch is needed to generate the ‘screaming headlines’ needed to sellnewspapers. Because of the Trust’s eagerness to approach the mass media to gainattention for its cause, it has become a common source of ‘expert’ opinion, despiteits own denunciation of expert knowledge. In effect, it is as if the Trust and itsspokespeople have become new kinds of experts, whose knowledge is based not onbook learning and research, but on anecdote, common sense and newspaperheadlines: a form of expertise that suits the news­making requirements of thecontemporary media.To illustrate the growing amount of attention the Sensible Sentencing Trust hasgained in the press, a search was conducted of the organisation, as well as otherindividuals and groups, within the Dominion Post and the New Zealand Herald (thetwo main newspapers in New Zealand) using Newstext Plus (a newspaper database).The searches included the following search words and were conducted separately inthe two newspapers from 1 January 2004 to 31 December 2004: ‘SensibleSentencing’, ‘Victim Support’, ‘Rape Crisis’ (a support group for victims of rape),‘Howard League’ (The Howard League for Penal Reform – a prison reform grouppromoting open and rational debate on criminal justice issues), ‘John Pratt’(Professor of Criminology at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, whohas researched extensively on the sociology of punishment) and ‘Prisoners’ Aid andRehabilitation’ (New Zealand Prisoners’ Aid and Rehabilitation Society, anorganisation which hopes for a safer society by offering support to offenders andtheir families). Overall, 128 articles were retrieved in the search, all of which are49