The Perspectives Of The Criminal Justice System

Throughout history, and especially in this class, crime has been surrounding us for a very long time; whether we are reading about it from the local newspaper or our local news station is covering the story like vulture’s circling their prey, crime is never too far away to be seen or heard about. One part of the criminal justice system that is actually within the people that are witnessing/learning about the crimes is the different perspectives.

Each person is entitled to his or her own opinion on how each and every person that is put through the criminal justice system should be treated, and the debate on how to correctly deal with a certain person or people is something that will probably never have a definitive answer, but with enough factual information, people might just be satisfied. While each perspective has its own pros and cons, the fact of the matter is that they all do their job, in their own way, to make sure that crime rates keep going down and to keep people safe.

The first perspective we shall be diving into in this paper, which is the crime control perspective, is usually one of the more common ways people think about how the criminal justice system should operate. Out of all of the perspectives that are going to be talked about in this paper, the crime control perspective is arguably the most popular of the different perspectives out of the bunch amongst people. However, it is also one of the more controversial perspectives. To summarize this perspective as simply as possible, here is a quote from Hung-En Sung, who is the author of a journal article titled “Democracy and Criminal Justice in Cross-National Perspective: From Crime Control to Due Process”. He says, “As the most visible agents of the state, authoritarian police forces display unrestrained power and emphasize deterrence through extensive regulation of citizens and symbolic demonstration of force rather than prevention through amelioration and persuasion” (314).

From this quote alone, we can see where one of the flaws of this perspective lies; the amount of control the police put on people, especially certain people, is a lot to grasp; on one hand, you are putting fear into the eyes and hearts of criminals, which could possibly put the plans of criminals dead in their tracks. However, on the other hand, there is a very visible abuse of power that cops could have in situations like these. In 2018 alone, there were 1,165 killings made by police officers; a majority of Hispanic people were killed while unarmed, and a majority of people of color were killed while unarmed, as well as not attacking anyone. The real kicker here is that 99% of those officers were not charged for any crime whatsoever.

Nothing is perfect in this world, especially nowadays, but if we see the statistics that come with this perspective, we can see that the cons shine more than the pros. However, even though the pros are out in broad daylight for all to see, one reason for this perspective for arguably being the most popular out all of the perspectives is that these types of situations are happening more and more frequently in today’s world, and some people are beginning to side with the amount of power that the cops have; it is mainly white people that are liking this sense of power because they are not getting prosecuted with the same view as other people.

However, not every person in law enforcement or in the criminal justice system has this type of negative mindset, so one good pro that we can take out of these terrible cons is that there are times when a little bit of force can be used, but not a astronomical amount. For example, when you need to get some answers out of a criminal, it is okay to use a little bit of force, without any physical contact, to scare them to possibly get what you need; it is not a surefire way of getting everything that you need out of a criminal, but is a method that people can try and use to set the stage; as long as the person in question remembers that fighting does not solve everything, then we should be in safe hands. Now that we have finished talking about the first perspective, it is time to delve into the second perspective: the rehabilitative perspective.

The second perspective, the rehabilitative perspective, is not used as much as the other perspectives said in this paper, but it still has its positive values. The rehabilitative process, in layman’s terms, is a view that some people have, which consists of having the mindset that the criminals that are incarcerated need to receive help. Which, in turn would give them a much easier time easing back into society. This view is not the most popular as the rest of the perspectives that are talked about in this paper, but it does have its fans.

According to Anthony Grasso, author of the journal article “Broken Beyond Repair: Rehabilitative Penology and American Political Development’, he says “Supporting rehabilitation first and foremost meant endorsing indeterminate sentencing” (396). If we can delve into the minds of the people that are committing these crimes and try and help them, there is a good chance that we can stop them from doing the crime all over again. Sure, not everyone will be saved using this method, but the information gathered from all the people that the criminal justice system can get to seek help will be vital in the long run; it could help identify patterns which could lead to finding out which crimes are more prominent in certain neighborhoods. Now that we have finished up talking about the rehabilitative perspective, let us hop on over to the next perspective, which is the due process perspective.

The third perspective, which is the due process perspective, is something that everyone should view and have, but that is not always the case. Due process, which is something that everyone is granted when they are going through the criminal justice system, no matter the crime that they committed; it was written in the Constitution when the United States was being formed, and it this principal is still heard and followed to this day, at least for the most part. According to Devika Hovell, author of a journal article titled “Due Process in the United Nations, “This formalistic ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach to due process—in which the only option is to embrace or reject the judicial approach—lacks normative foundation” (2). Not every crime is going to fit in the bubble that due process has provided for us, especially nowadays when everything is becoming more and more intricate.

Also, not everyone receives the same treatment as others; it is an unfortunate thing to say, but in the world that we live in now, even though the criminal justice system strives for equality and fairness, it sometimes does not turn out that way, which turns out being the main con in this perspective; while on paper due process is something that the criminal justice system cannot function without, the perspective does not really calculate how much human error could be comprised in each and every single case that is brought to a court; not everyone is going to give the same amount of respect to each and every person that they meet, and while there are people out in the world that will treat everyone with the same amount of respect every time, nobody is perfect. With three perspectives now looked into, there is only two more to go. Next stop on this criminal justice system filled adventure is the restorative justice perspective.

The fourth perspective, the restorative justice perspective, is a very pacifist way of looking into how to solve and prevent crime, but for some people it is not their cup of tea. The restorative justice perspective, like the rehabilitative perspective and one other perspective that will be talked about later, wants to help people that are being incarcerated and the people that were bystanders to the crime. Sure, all of these perspectives try and help out everyone involved in their own way, but compared to every other perspective already said and coming up later in this paper, the restorative justice perspective is not represented as well as the others presented in this paper. According to Nancy Rodriguez, who is the author of the journal “Restorative Justice at Work: Examining the Impact of Restorative Justice Resolutions on Juvenile Recidivism”, she says that, “The potential benefits of restorative justice programs, although well documented, remain to be fully realized in the United States” (356).

Possibly one of the most helpful ways that the criminal justice system can help someone out in returning to a somewhat normal lifestyle, and the surface of it has not yet been fully scratched by the criminal justice system here in the United States; it is clear that we put time and effort into making this part of the criminal justice system a reality, but we have not even broke the ice compared to the other perspectives mentioned in this paper. You can have all the statistics in the world, but they do not mean much if no one is going to take a look at them and build upon them to make a solid basis for whatever you want to make. This, in turn, is the biggest con for this perspective; the lack of support that the United States is giving to this part of the criminal justice system. Why go through all this effort and come out with all of these documents, if it looks like nothing is going to come out of all of this research? After all of the descriptions and facts that have been said, we have finally arrived at the last and final perspective that people have about the criminal justice system: the nonintervention perspective.

The final perspective, the nonintervention perspective, acts like the restorative justice perspective, with the big difference being that it involves less involvement from the criminal justice system. With this perspective, less is truly more; if the criminal justice system decides to take it easy on everyone, then everything will be all right. What I mean by that is that people who believe that this is the best way for the criminal justice to run, want the law to be taken into everyone’s hands; if all parties agree to work together, then there is a good chance that the people involved in the crime, and the people that saw the crime will be more of a help than if they were all scared of the law, and a lot of people would back this up.

According to Mark Levine, Clare Cassidy and Gemma Brazier, who created a study about non-intervention, they said, “We argue that by developing the analysis of social category relations between all those present in the context of violence, new insights into the behavior of bystanders emerge” (1461). Not everyone likes, or is possibly going to ever like, the police and/or the criminal justice system as a whole; whether it is because of what people have seen on the news or what has blown up on social media, or because someone that they know got hurt or worse by police officers, some people have a stigma that the police only want to help themselves; even if people do not know about all of the components that make up the criminal justice system, some people will try and find something that they do not like and make arguments solely on that one thing. However, if we all combine our minds and help each other out, no one needs to be given the shorter end of the stick. However, even through that is one of the big pros of the perspective, because it allows for the guns to be put down and gives people a chance to talk and not resort to violence, there are a few cons with this perspective as well.

Besides the one already mentioned regarding the stigma that some people might have about the criminal justice system, there is also a possible chance that the people that are going to be talking to the cops might want something in return; sort of an eye for an eye type of policy. With this in mind, this can cause problems for the criminal justice system, the bystander(s), and the person or people that committed the crime; with people possibly accepting bribes from another party, this can compromise the stability that the criminal justice system has established ever since its humble beginnings. Also, it would also break this perspective from the inside out because it would be consist of getting more and more involved into the situation at hand, which is something that people that view the criminal justice system in this way do not want to happen.

The criminal justice system was created and put into place for a good reason: to help stop crimes and to help mitigate future crimes from ever taking place by collecting data by using various methods. Sure, it is not perfect, but in the grand scheme of things, all of the parts that makeup this system do their jobs to the best of their abilities. While everyone will have their own view on the system as a whole, as well as their own opinions on how the system should be spending its time, money and resources on to get the most out of it, what can be agreed upon by all parties is that without the criminal justice system and all of its componenets, the world as we know it would devolve into a world full of chaos with no real means of recovery.