NCJ Number
143566
Journal
Justice Quarterly Volume: 9 Issue: 1 Dated: (March 1992) Pages: 47-76
Date Published
1992
Length
30 pages
Annotation
The American Bar Foundation (ABF) Survey of the Administration of Justice is discussed in terms of its history and use from 1953 through 1969, with emphasis on its central role in creating the current criminal justice paradigm.
Abstract
This paradigm involves a systems perspective, in which the administration of justice consists of a series of discretionary decisions about individual criminal cases by officials working in a set of interrelated agencies. The ABF survey undertook the first systematic field observation of criminal justice agencies in operation and marked the emergence of a sociology of the administration of justice. Originated in 1953 at the suggestion of a Supreme Court justice, the survey produced findings that were a product of its methodology. These findings resulted in the abandonment of a paradigm that can be called the Progressive Era Paradigm. The ABF survey focused attention on questions of political influence over criminal justice agencies and, to a lesser extent, over material resources. The paradigm it created, as well as the subsequent research and policymaking, focused mainly on decisionmaking. The survey also had an important effect on criminal justice education, where the systems approach became the main model. Footnotes, 2 case citations, and 97 references