CRIME AND JUVENILE DELINQUENCY
Stacy L. Burns*
Loyola Marymount University
2011
While the criminal and juvenile justice systems are committed to producing justice, the extent to which this is accomplished in actual practice is often controversial and debated. What defines the Crime and Juvenile Delinquency Division of the SSSP is a critical examination of the ways in which the administration of criminal and juvenile justice and systems of law, social control and punishment are incompatible with the promotion of social justice. This involves an appreciation that notions of crime, deviance/delinquency and social justice are not static, but are changing, contested, perspectival and embedded in broader socio-historical, political, economic and interpersonal contexts.
The CJDD advances social justice through a humanistic approach to societal/crime problems and the examination of more innovative and restorative, peace-making alternatives to traditional criminal/juvenile justice processes. We can explore perhaps changing the laws to remove certain crimes (e.g., prostitution, drug abuse, or quality-of-life offenses of the homeless) from criminalization. We can remove certain cases from traditional courtrooms into alternative, more restorative forms of conflict-resolution and justice (e.g., community dispute resolution, specialized problem-solving courts, or other non-traditional venues). We can also provide adequate health care, housing, education, employment, drug treatment, counseling and peer support to facilitate the re-integration of those who have served their sentences. It is essential to democracy to acknowledge that our justice system includes everyone. Attention must be paid to the larger structural inequities and many problems that lead to involvement in crime and delinquency in the first place if we are to seriously undertake the obligation of advancing the cause of social justice.
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*Crime and Juvenile Delinquency Division Chair (2009-2011)
