Question

What is community justice? Are there characteristics of a practice that must be present for a strategy to be deemed community justice?

Answer 1

Community justice is a philosophical concept on how criminal justice can transform societies. It refers to all variants of crime prevention and justice activities that explicitly include the community in their processes and set the enhancement of community quality of life as a goal. Community justice is rooted in the actions taken by citizens, community organizations, and the criminal justice system in order to control crime and social disorder.

The following principles could guide efforts to gain greater commitment to community justice:  

1) Localized operation

Community justice emphasizes the local area as a single unit for analysis. Each location has its own specifications which will have to do with the criminal mentality of the people and its solution. Three dimensions of community ought to be considered with regard to community justice: geography, interdependency, and identity.

2) Driven by information

Community justice must be an information-driven process. It is not simply concerned with crime rates, but with fear and disorder of the society, relations between criminal justice professionals and community members, and the correlates of crime. Over the time, strategies of data collection, identification and application of successful solutions should become a routine process.

3) Problem solving

There must be an underlying force behind every crime. It could be inequality, poverty, lack of love, lack of purposefulness etc. Without solving this underlying factor, the crime rate cannot be grounded.

4) Decentralization and accountability

The professionals working in a single locality should be given the authority to deal with cases in that area. Because each locality has its own problems and solutions. These professionals must be accountable for their activities.

5) Citizen participation

Citizen participation is an unavoidable process of community justice. The professionals could rely on citizens for information, help and support. They should be given a sense that the wellbeing of the community means their own well being. The citizen participation in the process will make it a community thing. Otherwise it will be just a business of the professionals involved.

6) Process-oriented

There should always be a plan and strategy for each case. An input, a plan and desired output should be envisioned in each case as well as for the whole community.