Cultural Competence

Cultural competence is defined as a set of behaviors, attitudes, policies, and practices that enable and empower a practitioner or organization to provide culturally maximizing service to a culturally complex clientele. Cultural competence goes beyond simply acknowledging cultural diversity or a conglomeration of groups. In practice, culturally competent practitioners and organizations should acknowledge the influence that culture plays in communication and action, recognize the dynamics within cross-cultural relations, enhance their cultural competence through the acquisition of additional knowledge, and amend and adapt existing knowledge and practice with accompanying shifts in cultural competence.

Throughout most of the history of the American criminal justice system, practitioners used a “one size fits all” approach to community corrections. This philosophy assumed that criminal justice services and interactions should cater to groups of offenders as offenders rather than recognizing their varying cultures and backgrounds. The shift toward a more culturally competent criminal justice system began taking shape through the larger social changes and challenges of the 1950s and 1960s and the resulting value placed on diversities of culture. Consequently, criminal justice officials have recognized the role that cultural competence plays in both the improvement [Page 101]of services and interactions and the improved outcomes for offenders.

The cultural expansion of both offenders and practitioners in the criminal justice system has intensified the need for and value of cultural competence systems and practices. Increases in the numbers of women, people of color, juveniles, elderly, openly gay (or lesbian, bisexual, or transgender), international, disabled, lower-socioeconomic-status, and mentally challenged offenders have produced a more culturally diverse criminal justice system than at any other point in recent history. For community corrections practitioners, the value of cultural competence has additionally expanded, as they are interacting with diverse offenders, families, and communities. Contemporary efforts toward cultural competence have further expanded the traditional definitions of culture to include age, disability, religion, and sexual orientation, although most work in cultural competence in community corrections remains focused on race, ethnicity, nationality, gender, and class.