Avant de nous étendre sur les méthodes psychologiques, thème qu'il nous est donné de relater, il convient de faire une synthèse brève des hypothèses criminelles, vu que l'emploi des méthodes psychologiques varie suivant les écoles prédominantes en ce qui concerne la genèse du crime.

The concept of social methods of treatment is an ambiguous one. For this ambiguity there are two main reasons. The first is the ambiguity of social treatment itself. The second is the well-recognized fact that treatment through social methods alone, without reference to the psychiatric or the psychological, is bound to be a sterile process.

The integration of the various methods of treatment within the treatment programme as a whole is perhaps the most important, and certainly the most difficult, problem in penology. All penologists have seen cases in which successful treatment has subsequently proved ineffective because aftercare has been inadequate. Although many of the difficulties can be overcome by goodwill, and especially by increasing the degree of communication between individuals, it is useless to deny that those who deal with offenders include professions who have very different roles to play in society, and that one must look for the best compromise between these roles rather than the abolition of all tension between them.

Wide recognition of the need for evaluative research in criminology is only about ten or fifteen years old, and it is therefore not surprising that little of this kind of research has been performed to date. There is usually a lag between announced awareness of a social need, bureaucratic budgeting to work on the need, and action to fulfill it. Moreover, the field of corrections has not had a prominent history of research, although every country has had long experience with the treatment of offenders, if “treatment” is interpreted in its broadest sense of societal reaction to crime and the captive criminals. In its more narrow meaning, treatment may be said to refer to the methods of control and reconditioning that today embrace sociological, psychological and allied disciplinary tools to train the minds of men to adjust to the prescriptions and proscriptions of the society in which they live. In this latter and more restrictive sense, correctional systems have had less experience: and it has been experience limited by money, time, and creative thinking.

The task of reporting on the evaluation of delinquency treatment regimes by objective tests is not an easy one. There are two main reasons for this:

• a) The tests which exist in this field are often suspect from the point of view of validity and reliability, and:

• b) So far, it is only rarely the custom for treatment regimes to be objectively measured, especially since psychologists—who are inclined to use measurement—rarely treat, and psychiatrists who do treat rarely measure, with the result that no close team approach exists. Fortunately, however, some exceptions do exist.

Avant de nous engager dans l'étude du thème qui nous a été imparti, il nous paraît nécessaire d'en préciser brièvement les limites afin d'éviter les malentendus. Comme l'indique le programme du Congrès, nous devons présenter l'état actuel des recherches effectuées pour connaître les réactions vécues que provoquent les divers traitements chez les délinquants.

Je n'ai pas l'intention — ou plus exactement la prétention — de vous présenter la synthèse des travaux du Ve Congrès international de criminologie. Je dois même vous avouer que cette nuit devant le nombre élevé des documents et des rapports que je devais consulter, j'ai éprouvé un sentiment de découragement. Je me suis demandé si je pourrais arriver à vous dire quelque chose de solide, en guise de conclusion à vos travaux.