Social Justice

Comparing Social and Criminal Justice

A complex relationship exists between social justice and criminal justice. Most noticeably, many social injustices lead to criminal actions. For example, it is no surprise that inequality leads some individuals to engage in crime. In general, social justice looks at the bigger picture; it is a wider concept than criminal justice. Criminal justice, on the other hand, deals with the four dominant agencies that monitor or implement the criminal laws. Social justice focuses more on what is right or wrong in society and not necessarily on what is legal or illegal. Many argue that social justice may lead to criminal justice. However, rarely does criminal justice lead to social justice. Social justice is part of the larger concept of justice. This is why some university departments call themselves departments of justice, justice studies, or social justice. In essence, social justice is a broader yet more intangible term than criminal justice.

Bruce Arrigo presented one of the best explanations of the connection between social justice and criminal justice. He outlined four possibilities with respect to the association between criminal justice and social justice: Social justice is a beginning, criminal justice is the beginning, criminal justice acts dynamically with social justice, and criminal justice is independent of social justice. As he explains, one can see criminal justice as the initial starting point for dealing with individuals and organizations who violate the law, and through this process it leads to social justice. Alternatively social justice is what we start with, and through attempts to achieve social justice we also accomplish criminal justice. Then again social and criminal justice might simply go hand in hand in our attempts to deal with violations of the law, and then finally there may be no relationship whatsoever between social and criminal justice. Finally, Richard Quinney, perhaps the best-known criminologist associated with this perspective, champions the creation of a better criminology based on compassion, forgiveness, and love rather than on the concepts of guilt and retribution.

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