Encouraged by the crisis of confidence in the social sciences engendered by postmodernism, many scholars in the 1980s began to question, amongst other things, the nature of the ‘facts’ and ‘truths’ that they had supposedly ‘found’ (Ellis, Adams & Bochner, 2011: 1).

Paul Ransome’s book represents a critical and throughout effort to stimulate the reader to reflect about how Ethics, Theory, and Values interact and interplay with the wider socio, historical, and political context.

This special issue of the British Journal of Community Justice will focus upon the experiences of researchers making their entry into the field of criminological research.

It is with great pleasure and a deep sense of honour that I offer you the following thoughts to close this special edition of the British Journal of Community Justice.

Only Paul could pull it off! For some time I had been aware that Paul Senior had been planning to organise an extended ‘conversation’ in his favourite Lakeland hotel for colleagues and friends from his career in probation.

During our ‘Conversation with Paul Senior’ in Kendal in January 2016, we reflected on the role of the Probation Institute (PI) in the future of Probation, especially its role in training and research.

Alongside its strategy for privatising the probation service, the Ministry of Justice in the Conservative-led Coalition government (2010-2015) hatched a plan to upgrade from radio frequency electronic monitoring (EM) to a much larger scale, and solo use of GPS tracking.

This is a manifesto outlining a relationship between higher education and the new agencies of probation, community rehabilitation and public protection. It argues for constructive partnership.