Is peace relevant to the daily practice of criminal justice?
Michael D.
consider a love hate relationship. Since fear is control and control
is power, how can you truly love something that is designed for you
internally to hate? The last thing people want to do is admit when
their
wrong. I think the question is "Is peace actually something that can
be
accomplished" or just another dream.
(Thank you, Leon)
dbrooker
Much of the hate comes from the way in which the syetem is designed
and its purpose. If crime control is a purpose, then it feeds into
your thesis about fear and control. The key element at play is that
the system was never truly designed to love anything or even care for
anything. Perhaps the juvenile justice system started out as a way to
protect and care for "wayward" youths, but it evolved into yet another
system of dominance and control that objectifies those contained
within the system, including the people who work for the system.
Dale
Michael D.
I just sent you an email.
And just for purposes of clarity, the posting to which you have
responded is from Leon Webb, one of our former students at FSU. Leon
is our newest member.
Funny that you'd mention it, Big D, but we have been in discussions
with some folks from the NC OJJDP to create a juvenile justice
certificate here. The certificate itself has good and bad sides, but
the point I want to make deals with the conversation around the idea
of the juvenile justice system, and its distinctness from the larger
CJ system. The faculty here who are products of Prairie View (both of
whom I love, of course), argued vociferously that the JJ system was
not part of the CJ system. Others of us on the team had a hard time
with that angle. We still pay homage to the idea of separation, of
parens patriae (all the while forgetting that it was the child-savers
that sought to lock kids up for years for things like prank phone
calls), but any more it seems to me that, as you say, compassion (or
at least sympathetic, mindful, connected compassion) was NEVER part of
the parens patriae model, particularly because control was (and
remains) the beating heart of the system.
>
> - Show quoted text -
DeValve, Michael
I know it has been some time. I've got me decks swabb'd and me bilgebay
tidied, so I can get back into the compassion business.
You're right about the system, but that leaves us with the question
about how to make meaningful change that will result in a more
effective, responsive and compassionate system. What Leon is observing
in his post is something many have seen and commented upon, including
Gilbert, Robert Merton, and a host of others. Variously called things
like decoupling, goal conflict, and perhaps organizational-level
sociological ambivalence, the justice system is at loggerheads with
itself regarding the goals it seeks to realize. Even the child savers
you reference were moral entrepreneurs; women finally were given some
authority in a man-dominated system, authority that in the final
analysis was misused.
Organizational compassion is a key construct to which I think we must
turn our attention. Clearly, though, the way to make organizations more
compassionate is to facilitate compassionizing (kinda like Friere's
consciencizationalization - or however you spell it) of relevant
individuals. If deVries and Miller are right about how neurotic
organizations are made, then their insight is useful for making that
organization more compassionate, more loving.
Smiling,
Michael