We can reasonably expect it to be just. Countries have Ministries of Justice and Courts of Justice and refer, not to systems of crime control or punishment, but to their criminal justice system. We can also reasonably expect the agencies of criminal justice to be effective, working reliably, diligently and honestly. It should also be effective, but what does this mean? Can criminal justice solve the problems of crime? No. I try to show why here.
“… we are tempted to adopt barbarous measures out of disappointment, or foolish ones of out despair, simply because we fail to achieve what we have no right to hope for in the first place.”
Hyman Gross, Theory of Criminal Justice, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979): 4
What can we reasonably expect of criminal justice?