Enactivism and Correctional Science: An Analysis of Forensic Treatment of Agency in a Neoliberal Climate
This paper critiques the Risk-Need-Responsivity (RNR) framework used in correctional practice, arguing that it relies on a 'thin' and internalized view of agency that ignores the active, affective, and social nature of cognition. Drawing on enactivism, a contemporary cognitive science paradigm, the author contends that RNR's cognitivist model, embedded in a neoliberal context, limits rehabilitative practice by abstracting mindedness from material and social contexts. The author proposes a pluralistic approach to rehabilitation that includes enactive perspectives to move beyond entrenched normative assumptions about agency and human functioning.