This is an overview of adopted or proposed victim-oriented reforms to the criminal justice system, their philosophical underpinnings, and how they are conceptually related to one another and to other prevailing criminal justice doctrines and ideologies.
The book provides an overview of reforms that have been adopted or proposed and attempts to place them in a more meaningful perspective. It also reviews the role of the victim in the traditional criminal justice system, with a view to determining the backdrop against which the reforms are being developed. It attempts to identify, and then to examine in depth, the parameters of a justice system which any reforms should take into consideration. In this way, the criteria for evaluating the appropriateness and the success of any reforms are established. These criteria are then applied to the new proposals and programs. The book next endeavors to integrate the analysis conducted in the earlier chapters, considering the implications of the various reforms reviewed for the type of justice system which might emerge, and developing a dichotomy of alternative models into which most of the reforms or proposals can be integrated. It also briefly considers some developments indicative of a possible third model. Appendixes, notes, bibliography, index