The Role of Prison Officers in Transforming Prisoners’ Lives in Hong Kong

In this chapter, we explore the work of prison officers serving in the Correctional Services Department (“CSD”) in Hong Kong. To fulfil the CSD’s mission, prison officers focus their work on ensuring safe and humane custody, administering rehabilitation programmes, supporting criminalised people’s reintegration, and crime prevention through community education. In addition to giving an overview of how prison officers accomplish such duties, we discuss a few of the CSD’s recent initiatives on deradicalising young people and developing “smart prisons”. We highlight how these initiatives may potentially affect prison officers’ work routines.