South African correctional centres reflect the nation's broader societal complexities, influenced by its diverse population and historical context. As the country navigates issues of crime, rehabilitation, and reintegration, the increasing presence of foreign national offenders adds further layers of complexity. While global research has explored themes of guilt and innocence, it often lacks relevance to the experiences of offenders, especially in developing countries like South Africa. This paper examines the guilt–innocence paradox as perceived by incarcerated offenders in South African correctional centres, where anti-social attitudes, diverse cultures and traditions, and historical and economic factors converge. Furthermore, the paper draws on cognitive dissonance, narrative identity, and neutralisation theory to explore how convicted foreign national offenders manage their moral identity. In-depth, face-to-face interviews were conducted with 40 offenders incarcerated at Baviaanspoort, Kgoši Mampuru, Krugersdorp, and Zonderwater correctional centres using a qualitative approach. The findings indicate that the participants’ guilt–innocence paradox is shaped by factors such as denial of involvement in crime, self-perception, attribution of blame to various sources, including victims, family background, social and environmental impact, and discrimination within the criminal justice system. This study contributes by amplifying the voices of incarcerated offenders and advocating for rehabilitative strategies and sustainable reintegration practices. © The Author(s) 2025. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
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