Title: The Value(s) of Criminology and Criminal Justice
Abstract: Awareness and understanding of values is of critical importance in criminology and criminological enquiry. Why? Because thinking about crime and how such thinking informs actions and systems set up to control or reduce the impacts of crime are not mere abstractions, but derive from beliefs, values and assumptions about the social world and individuals within it.. And these can work in ways that discriminate, oppress and exclude sectors of society, sometimes deliberately but often unwittingly. It is a fairly safe presumption that most in the criminological world would not want to be associated with that. But if we want to see ourselves, in contrast, as caring, moral, humane, civilised, then it is imperative that we identify and articulate our values and ensure they are consistent with those qualities. And that requires more than just saying that we are 'good', principled academics, researchers, policy-makers or practitioners. It means being rigorous in examining our activities--in the academy or in the real world of criminal justice--and questioning where we are going, what values we think are driving us and which ones are driving us in reality. That is an extensive and on-going process, which requires us to reflect and to reconsider what has become matter-of-fact or taken-for-granted in our thinking or our day to day practices. We are often so busy getting on with tasks that we don't take time to step back--so we benefit from prompts now and then to carefully and consciously do exactly that. A good starting point for reflection is Howard Becker's notion of 'taking sides', and the understanding that we can never be entirely objective--indeed the attempt within sociological and criminological research to take a neutral stance is itself underpinned by particular values and assumptions about what counts as valid knowledge and approaches to enquiry. It can be argued that striving to eliminate bias and to be value-neutral may be less productive than overt discussion and reflection on the particular positions, perspectives and values that we adopt. And these positions, perspectives and values stimulate key questions about power and affiliation. For example, the post-modern criminologist might ask, whose science and whose knowledge counts? Where might a Marxist's allegiances lie given the erosion of traditional class structures? And whose 'side' should contemporary feminists take? Similarly, what are the issues about the divide between public and private lives and how does today's criminal justice system understand and respond? Moving beyond conventional disciplinary approaches may lead to different and exciting ways of developing thinking and new knowledge. Appreciative, narrative and other qualitative forms of enquiry change the researcher-subject relationship to one of participation and co-production, and demand that the researcher reflects upon and evaluates his or her role, influence and impact within the research process. This kind of developed self-awareness is also significant within professional education whether in police, the probation service or youth justice. The question of values underscores practice in these agencies, often exposing tensions between their functions and the efficient exercise of responsibilities on the one hand, and due attention to human rights and ethics on the other. This is particularly evident in the police, in terms of friction between sophisticated understandings of the social and political contexts of crime and ethical standards, and the common-sense craft of policing on the ground. This also comes to the fore in the face of civil unrest and demands for military-style responses, for example in the riots of summer 2011. …
Publication Year: 2014
Publication Date: 2014-03-22
Language: en
Type: article
Access and Citation
Cited By Count: 8
AI Researcher Chatbot
Get quick answers to your questions about the article from our AI researcher chatbot