A revealing survey of ongoing settler colonialism in Canada's criminal justice system. This book argues that Canada's criminal justice system continues to reinforce colonial power structures. Through mechanisms of surveillance, segregation, and containment, Canadian law enforcement deprives Indigenous peoples of economic stability, social inclusion, and political agency. Examining both overt and more insidious racist practices, contributors reveal the ongoing reinforcement of white-settler privilege and domination in Canada.

Canada’s criminal justice system reinforces dominant relations of power and further entrenches the country in its colonial past. Through the mechanisms of surveillance, segregation, and containment, the criminal justice system ensures that Indigenous peoples remain in a state of economic deprivation, social isolation, and political subjection. By examining the ways in which the Canadian justice system continues to sanction overtly discriminatory and racist practices, the authors in this collection demonstrate clearly how historical patterns of privilege and domination are extended and reinforced.

There is powerful evidence that the colonization of Indigenous people was and is a crime, and that that crime is on-going. Achieving historical colonial goals often meant committing acts that were criminal even at the time. The consequences of this oppression and criminal victimization is perhaps the critical factor explaining why Indigenous people today are overrepresented as victims and offenders in the settler colonist criminal justice systems. This book presents an analysis of the relationship between these colonial crimes and their continuing criminal and social consequences that exist today. The authors focus primarily on countries colonized by Britain, especially the United States. Social harm theory, human rights covenants, and law are used to explain the criminal aspects of the historical laws and their continued effects. The final chapter looks at the responsibilities of settler-colonists in ameliorating these harms and the actions currently being taken by Indigenous people themselves.

The problem of overrepresentation of Indigenous peoples in the Canadian criminal justice (legal) system, particularly its prisons, has been well documented. In 1996, following a comprehensive review of the Criminal Code of Canada, federal legislation, commonly known as Bill C-41, received royal assent. One of its legislative amendments, section718.2 (e), was, in part, introduced to remedy the overrepresentation problem, legally obligating judges to utilize incarceration as a remedy of last resort and with particular attention to the circumstances of Aboriginal offenders. In 1999, the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) handed down the seminal R. v. Gladue decision, which constituted the first-time court responsibilities were set out in response to amendments made in the Criminal Code. Analytically centring settler colonialism, this project examines how section 718.2 (e) and R. v. Gladue has been implemented in the Province of Prince Edward Island (PEI). This research project reveals that in most jurisdictions across Canada, including PEI, remediation of the overrepresentation problem has not yet been fully realized, and, in fact, is getting worse. It explores, by way of case-law (document)analysis; interviews with key informants in the conventional adversarial Canadian criminal justice (legal) system, Indigenous Gladue Writers and Elders; the application of section 718.2 (e), R. v. Gladue, along with its guiding principles, and assesses how the implementation process should be operationalized in “theory,” compared to how it is currently taking place in “practice” in PEI. Keywords: Indigenous peoples, section 718.2 (e), R. v. Gladue, key informant

In 1791 when the Constitutional Act created a legislative assembly for Upper Canada, the colonists and their British rulers decreed that the operating criminal justice system in the area be adopted from England, to avoid any undue influence from the nearby United States. In this new study of early Canadian law, David Murray has delved into the court records of the Niagara District, one of the richest sets of criminal court records surviving from Upper Canada, to analyze the criminal justice system in the district during the first half of the nineteenth century. Murray explores how far local characteristics affected the operation of a criminal justice system transplanted from England; his analysis includes how legal processes affected Upper Canadian morality, the treatment of the insane, welfare cases, crimes committed in the district, and an examination of the roles of the Niagara magistrates, constables, and juries. Murray concludes by arguing that while the principles and culture of British justice were firmly implanted in the Niagara district, this did not prevent justice from being unequal, especially for women and visible minorities. Integrating the stories of the individuals caught up in the legal system, Murray explores law from a local perspective, and illuminates how the Niagara region's criminal justice system operated under hybrid influences from both Britain and the United States.

The administration of justice is an area of social policy that defies attempts to achieve a balance between order and the protection of the public and respect for individual rights. The media contain daily accounts of the failure of the criminal justice system to repress crime. It is within this social and legal context that this work is situated. In addition to including a range of articles in the standard areas of policing, courts, and corrections, recent articles deal with such controversial issues as aboriginal justice, the recruitment of visible minorities by Canadian police forces, and the role of women in the Canadian criminal justice system. The collection concludes with a critical assessment of the retributive model that currently serves as the philosophical underpinnings of the Canadian criminal justice system.

The Routledge International Handbook on Decolonizing Justice focuses on the growing worldwide movement aimed at decolonizing state policies and practices, and various disciplinary knowledges including criminology, social work and law. The collection of original chapters brings together cutting-edge, politically engaged work from a diverse group of writers who take as a starting point an analysis founded in a decolonizing, decolonial and/or Indigenous standpoint. Centering the perspectives of Black, First Nations and other racialized and minoritized peoples, the book makes an internationally significant contribution to the literature. The chapters include analyses of specific decolonization policies and interventions instigated by communities to enhance jurisdictional self-determination; theoretical approaches to decolonization; the importance of research and research ethics as a key foundation of the decolonization process; crucial contemporary issues including deaths in custody, state crime, reparations, and transitional justice; and critical analysis of key institutions of control, including police, courts, corrections, child protection systems and other forms of carcerality. The handbook is divided into five sections which reflect the breadth of the decolonizing literature: • Why decolonization? From the personal to the global • State terror and violence • Abolishing the carceral • Transforming and decolonizing justice • Disrupting epistemic violence This book offers a comprehensive and timely resource for activists, students, academics, and those with an interest in Indigenous studies, decolonial and post-colonial studies, criminal legal institutions and criminology. It provides critical commentary and analyses of the major issues for enhancing social justice internationally. The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.