Abstract:
On the basis of the Labour Conditions Act of 18 March 1999, employers are
obliged to take care of their employees’ safety and health, and to pursue a
policy aimed at creating the best possible labour conditions. The prevention
of aggression towards employees falls under this obligation.
In November 2005, the Scientific Research and Documentation Centre
(WODC) carried out a large-scale study into the prevalence of aggressive
behaviour targeting employees of penitentiaries during their work, which
was commissioned by the Judicial Penitentiary Service (DJI) (Bogaerts
& Den Hartogh, 2006). One of the remarkable findings of this study was
that ‘aggression and violence among employees’ is a frequently occurring
phenomenon within the prison system; of the 5,750 responding employees,
no less than 641 reported to have fallen victim to one or more forms
of aggression and violence among employees in the course of the previous
twelve months. In this context, the term ‘aggression and violence among
employees’ includes experienced unwanted sexual attention, intimidation,
and physical violence. Aggression and violence among employees
consists either of incidents between staff members, or of incidents
between executive staff members and ordinary staff members.
A substantial part of prison personnel is comprised of penitentiary workers
(in Dutch, so-called ‘PIW-ers’). In order to improve the safety of penitentiary
workers, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment, the DJI,
and the unions have reached an agreement about a reduction of aggression
and violence among employees, laid down in the ‘Arboplus Covenant
Judicial Penitentiary Service on the Policy on Absenteeism, Integral
Personal Safety, and the Career Perspective of Executive Personnel’2. The
goal was for this reduction to be brought about halfway through 20073.
To enable itself to successfully act upon the agreement, in addition to
many actions and measures, the Sector Directorate of the Prison System
asked the WODC to conduct an in-depth study on aggression and violence
among employees within the penitentiaries.
It was decided to examine only personal factors in this study. Organisational
and economic factors and the institutional features of organisations
that, without any doubt, play an important role in both the
prevention and the occurrence of aggression and violence among employees
were not studied. Framing mechanisms, for instance, which occur
in every organisation, were not included in the study, the importance of
this and other concepts notwithstanding. In his book ’Frame analysis: An
essay on the organization of experience’, Goffman writes: “The concept of
framing is taken to label schemata of interpretation that allows individuals
or groups to locate, perceive, identify, and label events and occurrences,
thus rendering meaning, organizing experiences, and guiding actions.” (Goffman, 1974, p. 21) The study ‘Benchmark Penitentiaries’, which will
start in the autumn of 2007, will include institutional, organisational, and
economic characteristics as well, besides the personal indicators, in order
to assess the quality of the penitentiaries. In this way, aggression and
violence among employees will not only be linked to personal factors, but
will also be related to institutional factors and characteristics specific to
the organisation. Another correlation not included in the present study
is that between domestic violence (partner violence), violence at work,
absenteeism, and the economic costs, even though this correlation is
regularly established in the literature (e.g. Reeves & O’Leary-Kelly, 2007;
Swanberg, Macke, & Logan, 2007).
With this study, the aim of the Judicial Penitentiary Service is to gain
insight into the possible effects of aggression and violence among employees
and in the factors which are at the roots of it. The DJI is especially
interested in absenteeism as a possible effect of aggression and violence
among employees, and in the psychosocial factors that play a role. In the
present report, we will present the findings of this study. It is set up as
follows.
In chapter 2, we will examine the potential effects of aggression and
violence among employees and the factors at their source, such as can be
assumed to exist when we base ourselves on the literature.
Next, we will take these findings as the basis for our hypothetical model
presented in chapter 3, which will be the starting point for the empirical
part of the study. We will also discuss how this model was tested.
In chapter 4, we will present de results of this test and we will examine
whether it is necessary to break down the model into sub-models.
In chapter 5, we will subsequently formulate twelve specific research
questions, which deserve further exploration in the researchers’ view,
both on the basis of the literature study and of the hypothetical model
derived from it. All these questions are in logical keeping with the formulated
hypothetical model. Again, we will indicate how these questions
were tested.
Finally, chapter 6 will provide a summary of the study. In this chapter we
will present some conclusions as well.
