Course syllabus

SEMESTER 2, 2017
Course Information

• Course Coordinator 

Alice Mills - a.mills@auckland.ac.nz 

• Course delivery format

2 hours of lectures and 1 hour of tutorial

(Timetable and room details can be viewed on Student Services Online)

Summary of Course Description              

This course is designed to introduce students to key issues in criminal justice. Using a combination of readings, lectures, discussions, and dramas, students will be familiarized with the basic characteristics of the criminal justice system, and asked to use this knowledge in analyzing various aspects of that system. We will begin with a discussion of how behaviour becomes criminalized and an overview of the role that discretion plays throughout the criminal justice system. As the course continues, students will learn about special populations within the criminal justice system: victims, youth, women, minorities, and mentally disordered offenders. The course will also consider several areas where criminal law is relatively unsettled (i.e., sex work, risk and dangerousness and family violence), as well as considering the outer limits of criminal justice (i.e., the case for torture). The course employs an international, comparative approach and students will be exposed to materials from New Zealand, the US, the UK, Australia, and elsewhere, and expected to relate them to each other.

Course outcomes

By the end of the course, a student should:

• Be familiar with the institutional components of the criminal justice system
• Understand the role that discretion plays within the criminal justice system
• Understand the challenges presented by special populations within the criminal justice system, especially when involving offenders who differ from the majority population in terms of age, gender, race, and mental health status
• Be familiar with areas of unsettled criminal law, particularly those involving risk and dangerousness, sex work and family violence
• Be familiar with the arguments for and against the use of torture, and be able to critically assess whether torture occurs within the criminal justice system
• Be familiar with key issues in criminal justice and be able to critically analyse both sides of the argument
• Be able to write a research paper related to the criminal justice system, combining academic research and critical analysis

Weekly Topics

Prescribed Texts:

Readings for this course are available under 'Reading Lists'.

You are expected to do all assigned reading as well as independent reading; a list of suggested readings can be found in the Course Outline.

Workload:

The University of Auckland's expectation on 15-point courses, is that students spend 10 hours per week on the course. Students manage their academic workload and other commitments accordingly. Students attend two hours of lectures each week and participate in a one-hour tutorial from week 2 of the semester. This leaves seven hours per week outside the classroom to prepare for tutorials, assignments and the exam.

Deadlines and submission of coursework:

Deadlines for coursework are non-negotiable. In extreme circumstances, such as illness, you may seek an extension but you will be required to provide a doctor's certificate before the assignment is due. All late assignments without a pre-approved extension will lose a grade per day late (i.e., an A essay will drop to an A- if it is one day late). Any essay submitted more than one week late will not be graded unless an extension has been negotiated previously with your lecturer. No further extensions will be granted if the revised deadline is missed without prior warning to your lecturer.

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