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Alternatives to Criminal Courts - The Potential for Non-Judicial Dispute Settlement

NCJ Number
100562
Author(s)
T F Marshall
Date Published
1985
Length
321 pages
Annotation
This overview of alternatives to criminal courts discusses arbitration, mediation, and diversion, focusing on the experience in England and Wales.
Abstract
Following a discussion of the functions of the criminal justice system, private individual and corporate sanctions for nonjudicial dispute settlement are examined. Various dispute resolution arrangements that developed in small-scale communities or tribal societies then are delineated and discussed as they contrast with the adversarial model of legal adjudication. Efforts to emulate some of the positive features of these early community processes are described, including community mediation and arbitration schemes, community courts in socialist countries, neighborhood justice centers in the United States, and community-based programs in Great Britain. Public agency involvement in alternative dispute resolution also is discussed, including the role of tribunals, local government agencies, and central administrative agencies. Finally, nonjudicial programs within the British justice system itself are examined, including decriminalization, civil court, and discretionary and diversionary alternatives. Appendixes cover nonjudicial alternatives in the areas of domestic violence, corporate crime, discrimination, and public order offenses. Chapter bibliographies and an index.