Previous research indicates that the Canadian Government has stressed that a social development approach continues to be the driving force in its criminal justice system, with an undertow of criticism of the United States’ policies and practices, particularly those identified with the death penalty. The Canadian Government is seen as showing considerable resistance to the type of punitive turn seen occurring in the United States. In light of this research, this paper analyzes whether there has been a punitive turn in Canadian criminal justice, by first reviewing the period prior to the early 1970s, taking this as the baseline from which any punitive turn can be assessed. The review suggests that Canadian criminal justice in the period leading up to 1970 was marked both by discourses of penal modernism and by punitive discourses and high rates of imprisonment. In the period after the 1970s, there was an increased faith in penal reformism with punitive discourses remaining active. There is an attempt to sustain and promote a balanced strategy and to regard both punishment and correction as central aims of criminal justice. In summation, Canadian criminal justice cannot be summed up under a general model of a global punitive turn. Policies and official discourses are turning more to the forms of intervention characteristic of penal modernism. Punishment and penal modernism are articulated together with balance being the sign under which successive Canadian Governments have sustained. Notes, references