First Advisor

Lindley, Don

Thesis Committee Member(s)

McGrath, Jack

College

College for Professional Studies

Degree Name

MS Criminology

School

School of Humanities & Social Sciences

Document Type

Thesis - Open Access

Number of Pages

41 pages

Abstract

Due to the failure of some crime control approaches in law enforcement alternatives are being examined to determine their applicability in today's society. One of the approaches gaining criminological attention is "Navajo Peacemaking". another similar style of crime control is the Māori restorative justice process used in New Zealand. The purposed of this research study is to examine and compare these processes to determine their applicability as crime prevention tools in U.S. towns and cities. Walter Miller's Focal Concerns Theory was used to address the difference in motivation between mainstream culture and its subcultures. The results from this study demonstrated that much of the success of these two approaches is a result of the religious and cultural backgrounds of the subcultures that developed them. Both methods rely on communication between victim, offender and members of the tribe to decide the appropriate response to incidents. The Navajo Peacemaking process is better developed to work within their legal framework and is better documented than the Māori restorative process. This difference makes the Navajo approach the better choice for adaptation for modern societal needs. Since there is no single dominant religion or culture in the U.S. there is not currently a stable basic for building a new crime control process employing either of these methodologies. However, these processes provide inspiration for a different, less retribution-oriented method of crime control and are a possible resolution for some criminological issues.

Date of Award

Summer 2012

Location (Creation)

Colorado (state); Denver (county); Denver (inhabited place)

Rights Statement

All content in this Collection is owned by and subject to the exclusive control of Regis University and the authors of the materials. It is available only for research purposes and may not be used in violation of copyright laws or for unlawful purposes. The materials may not be downloaded in whole or in part without permission of the copyright holder or as otherwise authorized in the “fair use” standards of the U.S. copyright laws and regulations.

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