SOC371H5 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Omnibus Bill, Neoliberalism, Homo Economicus
Risk and The New Punitiveness
October 3, 2018
Questions of the day
• How do incarceration rates compare between Canada and the U.S.
o U.S. has seen massive spike in incarceration populations since 1980s as result on the war on
drugs, now incarceration is up to 800 people per 100,000 population. in ca 150 to 180,000 have
an eight than US. Canada is culture that doesn’t typically incarcerate
• Identify and explain, using Moore and Hannah-Moffat and Meyer and O’Malley, why Canada has not
experienced and punitive turn
o social protective factors; judges are appointed not elected, still have rehabilitation, don’t have
death penalty, different sentencing and policies regarding drugs and has more things to help us
stay stable overtime then US
• what role does risk-based thinking have on bail and the outcomes of specialized courts in Canada?
o eligibility for bail is based on how risky one is. to secure a surety is important. people who are
remanded are there because they’re a public safety risk or can’t secure bail. people at most
marginalized aspects of society are getting more punishment. risk assessment and risk-based
thinking help target interventions where people have to go participate in treatment-based
programs before conviction to get them sorted out and if successful then cases are dropped and
don’t get convicted. risk is a way of diverting people form jail and sanctioning people who have
been convicted of offenses
• Identify and explain how bail continues to act as a vehicle for incarceration for vulnerable groups
o people who spend time in remand are lily to be imprisoned. bail system is structured to keep
underprivileged people in the system, conditions are difficult to manage. can’t post bail or have
someone post bail, stay in jail
Canada
• no overall fluctuations in sentence populations
• fairly stable overtime; at federal level is lower, more people in provincial system than federal more
people in remand than sentence facilities
• provincial system is on an incline because of influx of people on remand
Meyer and O’Malley
• both punitive and rehabilitative aspects; more time where punishment is volatile an contradictory
• in Canada, don’t have any overtly correctional attitudes like U.S. – we don’t have politicization of
rehabilitation than U.S.; people are not as invested and see the systemic issues
• Canada’s system is more balanced
• still aspects that are punitive, but don’t have death penalty, supermax prisons, long sentences
• limited system of mandatory minimums; came with respect to Bill C-10, increase sentences for drug
offenses, generally shorter then U.S.
• desire for rehabilitation; much of it are at the federal level [vocation, education, specific programs from
ethic groups]
• no penal populism; Canadian government isn’t forcing carinal justice system to be more punitive – don’t
see prison as helpful; population that tends to support less imprisonment and more community-based
sanctions
• different drug control policies
