Problem-solving justice: responding to real problems, real people

The American criminal justice system can be seen as one of polar extremes – too harsh, to some; too soft, to others. Unfortunately, framing the justice system reductively has created paralyzing obstacles to reform – all too often, change efforts are seen as a zero-sum game – what’s good for one side is necessarily and correspondingly bad for the other. But there’s another truth percolating up through the American criminal justice system, a new approach – problemsolving justice – that has shown some success at cutting through the political knot choking reform. Emerging over the last fifteen years, a wave of specialized courts – community courts, drug treatment courts, domestic violence courts and mental health courts – are testing innovative ways to deliver justice. Their objective is to provide more lasting and meaningful resolutions for thousands of difficult cases. The conditions giving rise to these new problem-solving courts are not hard to identify. In recent decades, courts have increasingly become the public institution of choice for dealing with the social problems that other institutions can’t seem to handle: addiction; mental illness; family dysfunction; repeated petty assaults against property; anti-social behaviour. Not surprisingly, traditional litigation approaches can yield distinctly unsatisfactory outcomes when applied to these non-traditional issues. As New York State Chief Judge Judith S. Kaye has written: judge to link offenders to community service, drug treatment, job training, education and numerous other services. To ensure accountability, compliance is rigorously monitored. Community courts also seek to transform the experience of justice for citizens. As Home Secretary David Blunkett remarked after a 2003 visit to the Red Hook Community Justice Center, a community court in Brooklyn, New York: “What I saw . . . was about engaging the community in finding a way of resolving problems . . . .It was about the community coming together physically as well as intellectually, and practically, to help do something about it, and using volunteers.” The community court concept has captured the interest of the British government, and community residents and court administrators are currently engaged in planning a Liverpool Community Justice Centre. International interest is not limited to the UK: Australia, Canada and South Africa are also actively evaluating the feasibility of community courts for their justice systems – and closely tracking the UK’s progress. Community courts represent just one model of creating more responsive justice. Indeed, all problem-solving courts embrace a common-sense operating assumption: that court stakeholders – the public at large, victims, witnesses, even defendants – are meant to be treated as customers. Justice is achieved by serving real people with real problems.

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