Thoughts about an ethical management of penal institutions Cover Image

Размышления о пенитенциарной педагогике в Германии
Thoughts about an ethical management of penal institutions

Author(s): Philipp Walkenhorst
Subject(s): State/Government and Education
Published by: Новосибирский государственный педагогический университет
Keywords: Empowerment; encouragement; general penal service; educational methodologies; basic forms of educational activities; value systems; professional ethics

Summary/Abstract: Both, the German Prison Act and the Youth Courts Law empower a life in freedom without committing offence as well as social responsibility. In particular the employees of the General Penal Service accompanying the detainees in their everyday life are granted an essential peda-gogical role with regard to the basic forms of educational activities and the perpetual life-long development of each human. Being officials, they are required to represent the basic values of democracy and human rights. In many cases the employees´ occupational choice cannot be at-tributed to a pedagogical motivation as it runs the risk of pedagogy and encouragement fading into the background. This is why the prison practice has to be enriched with professional ethics.