This doctoral dissertation explores, from a comparative perspective, what kinds of possibilities there are for Finnish civil society organizations (CSOs) working in the area of criminal justice to fulfil their value-based missions and maintain their autonomy. This study is particularly focused on CSOs working with offenders and victims of crime. The positions of these CSOs have been chiefly explored from the perspectives of marketization of public service delivery and institutionalization of victim support services. In addition, this dissertation has examined the possibilities for various types of CSOs to pursue their value-bases in decision-making in criminal policy in the context of law-drafting. The dissertation consists of this summary and four sub-studies. The data include interviews with CSO representatives, CSOs’ annual reports as well as documentation created in lawdrafting processes. These sources have been primarily analysed with qualitative methods, although sub-study IV also included quantitative analysis. In addition to Finland, data has been gathered from Norway, Sweden, Scotland and New Zealand. 

The findings of the first and second sub-studies indicate that although marketization appears to have had more radical consequences in Anglophone CSOs working with offenders, marketization is nonetheless manifested in the possibilities for Finnish CSOs to work according to their value-bases. This emerges especially from the critique of service-delivery arrangements that municipalities use to purchase services from CSOs. Overall, the results of this dissertation indicate that CSOs have experienced difficulty in fulfilling their value-bases within the framework of marketized public service delivery. Nevertheless, the findings illustrate that certain structural arrangements in Finland can enhance the possibilities for CSOs to integrate their values and perspectives into the criminal justice system. 

The findings of the third sub-study show that unlike in Norway, where CSOs working with victims of crime have had a stronger position than those working in Finland, the Finnish CSOs working with victims did not feel that the advancing institutionalization of victim support services would threaten their autonomy. In contrast, the developments in which the public sector has taken more responsibility for arranging victim support services is perceived to improve their possibilities to pursue causes important to them in society. Although the findings of sub-study III also reveal some similarities between the approaches of the Finnish and Norwegian CSOs, the findings nonetheless illustrate the differences between victim movements in Finland and in other Nordic countries. 

The fourth sub-study reveals that CSOs are widely included in law-drafting in the area of criminal policy in Finland. However, apart from CSOs composed of ‘legal professionals’, CSOs are included in these decision-making processes in those stages when it is more difficult to introduce significant changes to what has already been proposed. These results are in line with existing knowledge on criminal policy making in Finland and the participation of CSOs in law-drafting. 

Based on the findings of this research, Finnish CSOs working in the areas of criminal justice and criminal policy have several opportunities to use their autonomy and pursue their values. Nonetheless, the findings indicate that marketized funding arrangements may jeopardize those possibilities to some extent. The findings of this dissertation also raise questions about the ‘alternativeness’ and autonomous position of certain Finnish CSOs in relation to the public sector. Finally, this dissertation suggests that civil society models created in comparative civil society research fail to capture the nature of CSOs working in the area of criminal justice. Future research should therefore aim to formulate specific theoretical models for CSOs in criminal justice that explain how these organizations operate in different countries.