From Correction to Prevention: An Analysis of the Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice, 1958-1983

Abstract

As a forum for research and discussion in the justice disciplines, the Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice provides an opportunity to examine the development and the contours of the justice disciplines. This article surveys the Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice from its creation, in 1958, to 1983. The article connects discussion in the Journal to broader historical developments in Canadian society during this period. Accordingly, initial discussion in the Journal demonstrates a modernist faith in positivism, government intervention and correctionalism, like individual treatment. Later, in the 1960s, the decade’s counterculture influences discussion in the Journal. During this period, discussion in the Journal reflects on positivism, correctionalism, and society’s ability to construct crime and criminals. As well, in the 1970s, the concerns of marginalized populations, such as women and Indigenous people, receive credence in the Journal. Finally, at the end of the 1970s, the ascendancy of neoliberalism in Canadian society begins to reshape the Journal. Instead of work focused on the individual, institutional analyses of the criminal justice system are seen in the Journal and economic reasoning, such as actuarial penology, is used to discuss crime. By 1983, institutional analyses and economic reasoning culminate in discussion that, instead of correction, endorses crime prevention. Ultimately, this article argues work in the Journal and, in turn, the justice disciplines is shaped by developments in Canada’s broader social, political and economic climate.