Setting the Scene and Introduction

Collaborative working in the criminal justice system is complex. This introductory chapter synthesises some of its challenges and the role of innovation and organisational learning to address these. In so doing, we present the work of the COLAB consortium and its ambitions to apply theories and methods of activity systems to the field of interagency collaborations and social innovation within the criminal justice system. We explore the basic principles of these and supplementary theoretical and methodological perspectives that are treated in greater detail in later chapters of this book. We raise, in particular, issues and challenges faced in including service users’ voice in service development and innovation before exploring the concept of multivoicedness and its application. This leads to a discussion of distributed responsibility for offender rehabilitation to which many stakeholders including academic institutions should be held to account. The chapter ends with a consolidation of where we are in our current understanding of collaboration, innovation, and organisational learning in the criminal justice context and proposes ways forward.