TOWARDS A CULTURAL APPROACH TO DANGEROUSNESS IN CRIMINAL JUSTICE Dr. Henrique Carvalho ISRF Early Career Fellow 2019–20.
D
angerousness pervades the idea of criminal justice. Our contemporary concern with the prevention of harm has given rise to an ever-increasing array of criminal laws and other preventive measures targeted at handling dangers—that is, unacceptable risks1—posed by individuals. And while the wide scope of criminalisation covers a range of activities that may sometimes carry very low levels of harm or risk of violence—such as watching television without paying for a TV License—it is fair to say that criminal justice derives much of its justification and public support from the perceived need to police and punish those involved in serious and persistent criminal activity. The threat of dangerous offenders such as terrorists, rapists, murderers and gangsters has a strong grip on our social imagination, fuelling much of media discourse and public perceptions about crime, as well as feeding into the punitive populist type of politics that is prevalent in recent times. It is undeniable that these kinds of criminal activity can lead to very serious, sometimes irremediable harm, and that it is therefore quite understandable that they attract a good deal of concern. These are issues that should not be left unaddressed. The main point I wish to raise in this short essay is that there is a big difference between 1. J. Floud (1982), “Dangerousness and Criminal Justice,” The British Journal of Criminology 22(3): 213–228, 213. 21
