24 NORWEGIAN PARLIAMENTARY OMBUDSMAN National Preventive Mechanism ANNUAL REPORT 2016 Institutional culture and management: risk or protection? The Parliamentary Ombudsman has found in connection with its prevention efforts that institutional culture and management can play an important role in the protection of people deprived of their liberty. They are essential to ensuring that people are treated humanely and with dignity, but they can also present a risk of violation. There will always be an unequal distribution of power in places where people are deprived of their liberty; between management and staff on one hand, and detainees on the other. People deprived of their liberty depend on an institution’s staff to meet their basic needs and enjoy their fundamental rights. This power imbalance and the restricted public access at places of detention allow for different forms of vulnerability to violations of human dignity and fundamental rights. A desire to protect against such vulnerabilities lies at the heart of the Optional Protocol to the UN Convention against Torture and the Parliamentary Ombudsman’s prevention mandate. — An institutional culture is primarily formed by the prevailing values and attitudes of the staff. — When a few people are assigned power over others, rules must be established to define how this power is exercised. The culture at an institution can be a factor in preventing violations resulting from a power imbalance, but it can also pose a risk. When values and attitudes create poor practice An institutional culture is primarily formed by the prevailing values and attitudes of the staff.¹ In an institutional culture, some characteristics and attitudes can represent a clear risk of ill-treatment. This applies in particular to internal cultures where the staff stop seeing those deprived of their liberty as individuals, but treat them as objects or as a group, e.g. based on diagnoses, gender, age, language or cultural background. Such attitudes create distance and lessen possibilities for good human relations. Research shows that 'us/them' attitudes in agencies that exercise power can result in increased use of force.² In prisons, it has been found that such attitudes among staff generally lead to a higher stress level among inmates.³ 1 Penal Reform International (PRI) and the Association for the Prevention of Torture (APT) (2013): Institutional culture in detention: a framework for preventive monitoring. 2 Terrill et al. (2003): Police culture and coercion, Criminology, 4, p. 1003–1034. 3 Liebling (2007): ‘Why prison staff culture matters' in The culture of prison violence, Byrne, Taxman and Hummer (eds.), Allyn and Bacon, page 105.