Routledge Redemption and Recovery: Further Parallels of Religion and Science in Addiction Treatment

This ethnography continues the "thick description" of faith-based and science-based drug programs begun in Addiction Treatment. Using extensive interviews and his own participation in daily rounds of treatment, Hood provides a vivid comparison of resident experience at each type of institution. Redemption and Recovery tells the stories of two houses in the Bronx, NY that serve people with drug problems: "Redemption House" and "Recovery House." These stories include the direct accounts of residents' "druggin'" lives before treatment and their search for normalcy after recovery or redemption. Other chapters dissect the religion of science-based treatment and compare success rates, religious vs. secular. Addiction Treatment had detailed a similar process of personal conversion central to both treatments. This sequel uses the "contextualized demographics" of residents to uncover profound parallels between the two "unique" programs and debunk their shared ideology of abstinence. Review -Hood's overall analysis of similarities between religious-based and science-based addiction treatment and training programs offers readers a sophisticated and nuanced analysis of the life of a drug user and the obstacles that must be overcome to live a life of normalcy. In a shrewd way, Hood was able to use this comparison to under-score how science-based addiction treatment programs incorporate religious ideas to foster an environment that is conducive to social and ideological control.- --J. S. OnEsimo Sandoval, Contemporary Sociology -This book provides a welcome look at the inner workings of both science-based therapeutic communities and faith-based drug treatments. Through extensive comparison, it challenges conventional medical wisdom about the 'scientific' grounding of current drug treatment methods and outcomes. Dr. Hood disputes conventional notions of addiction as an ever-downward spiraling disease and the root of users' problems. His interviews detail, instead, how the pull of different lifestyles and cultural disenfranchisement influence relationships with drugs. Dr. Hood's provocative analysis finds harm reduction a viable alternative and will be of value to substance abuse treatment professionals, policymakers, and the recovery community.- --Sharon Stancliff, Medical Director, Harm Reduction Coalition -Redemption and Recovery is the second and final volume of Dr. Hood's excellent study on addiction treatment....Dr. Hood clearly demonstrates through close ethnographic analysis the overriding similarities of these seemingly different approaches and their reliance on a common view of 'the addict' grounded in the long-standing pro-temperance view of drugs as threats to the very fabric of society....Whether the political will exists to consider evidenced-based analyses in reforming our national and local drug policies is an open question. If we are successful in doing so, it will be in part because of books like Redemption and Recovery that demonstrate the failure of our current treatment modalities focused on fighting the 'dreaded evils of addiction.'- --Charles Lawrence, Associate Provost, Seattle University "Hood's overall analysis of similarities between religious-based and science-based addiction treatment and training programs offers readers a sophisticated and nuanced analysis of the life of a drug user and the obstacles that must be overcome to live a life of normalcy. In a shrewd way, Hood was able to use this comparison to under-score how science-based addiction treatment programs incorporate religious ideas to foster an environment that is conducive to social and ideological control." --J. S. OnEsimo Sandoval, Contemporary Sociology "This book provides a welcome look at the inner workings of both science-based therapeutic communities and faith-based drug treatments. Through extensive comparison, it challenges conventional medical wisdom about the 'scientific' grounding of current drug treatmen