England and Wales: The criminal justice system in 'post-industrial society'

Abstract

This chapter examines the current 'state of play' and recent trends in the criminal justice system of England and Wales in the context of developments associated with the so-called 'post-industrial society' (Bell, 1973) and the impact of the processes which have come to be referred to as 'globalization' in terms of crime, citizenship, the welfare state, and challenges to the nation-state. It is the contention here that whilst there is little doubt that the criminal justice system of England and Wales, and for that matter the individual nation-state of the United Kingdom, is being challenged by global and technological processes in the so-called 'post-industrial society,' we should strive to avoid reductionist and essentialist theoretical accounts relying on unitary explanations for complex social phenomena which serve to exaggerate the scale and/or the intensity of 'globalization,' and which underplay the uneven impact of 'globalizing' tendencies. It is the view here that the social world is contingent and not determined by macrostructural motor forces. Drawing upon the antireductionist theories of Sibeon (1996, 2004) and Owen (2006, 2007a, 2007b, 2008, forthcoming), it is suggested here that it is highly doubtful that reliance on unitary explanations of the sort associated with 'crude' globalization and post-industrialism theses will ever be capable of providing an adequate account of policy reproductive processes, trends, and developments in the criminal justice system of England and Wales. The thesis of post-industrialism may indeed refer to some important contemporary economic trends, some of which have undoubtedly impacted upon the criminal justice system, but it is the contention here that the thesis exaggerates the nature and scale of change. © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2009.