Dr Rod Earle

Professional biography

I joined the Youth Justice team in July 2008. Before that I worked throughout the late 1980s and the 1990s as a youth justice worker in the London Borough of Lambeth, where I also completed a part-time Masters degree in Criminology at Middlesex University Centre for Criminology. My dissertation considered the prospects for restorative justice in the youth justice system of England and Wales and, in 2000, I joined the Public Policy Research Unit at Goldsmiths College to work on the National Evaluation of introduction of Referrral Orders into the youth justice system.

After that, at the London School of Economics I worked with Professor Tim Newburn on an evaluation of the use of visual recordings of police suspect interviews and then secured a fixed term teaching contract at the University of Surrey Sociology Dept, teaching undergraduate and postgraduate criminology.

In 2006 I started teaching with the Open University as an Associate Lecturer in Region 13 (D315), and also taught criminology courses as a visiting lecturer at the LSE, City University and Westminster.

Immediately before joining the OU full time in 2008 I spent two years with Dr Coretta Phillips (LSE) on an ethnographic research project examining men's ethnic and social identities in prison. I have published widely from this research and in 2014 completed my PhD by Publication in the Dept. of Social Policy and Criminology, here at The Open University.  

In 2011 I helped to establish British Convict Criminology, a group modelled on a similar group in the USA that supports and encourages ex-prisoners who are active in criminology. The group has established mentor support for prisoners studying criminology. I have published several articles on the subject and my book, Convict Criminology - Inside and Out, was published in June 2016 by Policy Press. You can take a closer look here:  http://policypress.co.uk/convict-criminology

Research interests

I maintain a variety of research interests around youth justice. In 2015 I completed, with my OU colleague Wayne Taylor, an evaluation of the Milton Keynes Enterpise Mentors project, funded by The Cabinet Office Vulnerable and Deprived Young People's Fund.  I worked with the Welsh Youth Justice Academic Advisory Group (WYJAAG) to help produce their report on the prosepcts and options of developing distinctive approaches to young people's offfending behaviour in Wales (2022/3). I have also been a member of the Youth Justice Board (YJB) Academic Liaison Group since 2019.  

In general terms my interests cluster around gender, race and racism, crime and social justice. More specifically these include interests in prison research, penality and masculinities.

Almost every year since 2011 I have organised Convict Criminology panels at the British Society of Criminology annual conference. These provide 'user' and 'lived experience' perspectives on aspects of criminal justice, prison life and research and criminology. Convict Criminology is a group of academics that helps people with first hand experience of criminal justice and penal sanctions to develop critical perspectives on criminology. 

Most recently I have been writing with Alpa Parmar and Coretta Phillips around questions of race, racism, criminology and criminal justice. Together we organised an international symposium on racism and criminology in 2018 and subsequently edited a Special Race Matters Issue of the journal Theoretical Criminology. Also emerging from the symposium was the formation of a Race Matters Network within the British Society of Criminology. I have published and co-published several papers on 'Whiteness' as a critical dynamic within structures of race and racism. 

Teaching interests

Youth Justice, obviously enough, but with particular reference to the idea of the research practitioner, restorative justice, prisons, penality, criminological and social theory. 

I am committed to developing teaching and learning materials that challenge racism and expose its effects in personal and social life.  

Impact and engagement

I have particpated in consultations and workshops about race and ethnicity with prisoners in HMP Grendon. I facilitiated workshops in Belfast with ex-prisoners to help provide prisoner perspectives on the review of the Northern Irealand criminal justice system. I'm a founder member of the British Society of Criminology (BSC) Prison Research Network and also helped to establish the BSC Race Matters Network. 

External collaborations

I am on the editorial advisory board of the journals Criminology and Criminal Justice and Incarceration. 

I am on the advisory board of the Prison Reform Trust's Prisoner Engagement Project

International links

I've presented papers on my research and convened panels at national and international conferences, including the annual conference of the American Society of Criminology, the Australia and New Zealand Society of Criminology, European Society of Criminology and the Inter-University Conference in Croatia.