Social Control Mechanisms: Deployment On Young People

A current emerging issue in Australian society is the rising representation of Indigenous Australians in prisons across the country. According to the Australian National Council on Drugs, the Aboriginal population is 13 times more likely to end up in jail than the rest of the population (Donovan, 2010). This is despite the Aboriginal population representing only three percent of the total Australian population. In order to combat this problem, a range of legal solutions such as circle sentencing, Indigenous courts and Justice Reinvestment have been implemented. However, the current trend of incarceration rates for the future of Aboriginals suggest that the effectiveness of these solutions need to be put

The Aborigines Protection Act 1909 (NSW) was a law that changed Indigenous Australian lives forever. The act enabled the New South Wales Board for the Protection of Aborigines to essentially control the lives of Aboriginal people. It was the Aborigines Protection Act 1909 (NSW) that had major provisions that resulted in the containment and suffering that Aboriginal people endured. This suffering included the practice of forcible removing Indigenous children from their families. These major provisions help us understand what the Aborigines Protection Act 1909 (NSW) involved and the impact it has had on the daily lives and cultures of Indigenous Australian peoples today.

It is a commonly known issue in Australia that as a minority group, the people of Indigenous Australian ethnicity have always been treated, or at least perceived, differently to those of non-Indigenous disposition. This can be applied to different contexts such as social, economic, education, or in relation to this essay – legal contexts. Generally, Indigenous Australians face issues such as less opportunity for formal education, less access to sufficient income, more health issues, and higher rates of imprisonment (Steering Committee for the Review of Government Service

Since the time of federation the Aboriginal people have been fighting for their rights through protests, strikes and the notorious ‘day of mourning’. However, over the last century the Australian federal government has generated policies which manage and restrained that of the Aboriginal people’s rights, citizenships and general protection. The Australian government policy that has had the most significant impact on indigenous Australians is the assimilation policy. The reasons behind this include the influences that the stolen generation has had on the indigenous Australians, their relegated rights and their entitlement to vote and the impact that the policy has had on the indigenous people of Australia.

The rate of imprisonment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians has dramatically increased since 1992. Statistics went from “1 in 7 prisoners in 1992 to 1 in 4 in 2012 and to almost 1 in 3 in 2014.” There have been an abundance of proposals, plans and programs established, some of which have failed and some which are still in development, to try decrease the high numbers. The high incarceration rate of Indigenous people in Australia is considered to be a global issue that must be addressed.

The Stolen Generation has left devastating impacts upon the Aboriginal culture and heritage, Australian history and the presence of equality experienced today. The ‘Stolen Generation’ refers to the children of Aboriginal descent being forcefully abducted by government officials of Australia and placed within institutions and catholic orphanages, being forced to assimilate into ‘white society’. These dehumanising acts placed these stolen children to experience desecration of culture, loss of identity and the extinction of their race. The destructive consequences that followed were effects of corruption including attempted suicide, depression and drug and alcohol abuse. The indigenous peoples affected by this have endured solitude for many

This essay looks at Indigenous Australians in relation to the institution of ‘Criminal Law’. In this context, criminal law refers to legal processes such as police questioning, investigation and detainment as well as arrest, custody and bail. It also encompasses associated court procedures up to the point of sentencing. The focus will be to first outline the importance of criminal law to Indigenous Australians and then provide a critical analysis of the unique experiences and barriers that this group encounter in accessing criminal law in a positive way. Following this analysis, the development of possible ways to improve Indigenous access to criminal law will be discussed. Particular attention will be given to the way in which Indigenous Australians are affected by the transition of our modern justice system toward broader social justice concepts that incorporate risk management of potential criminal behaviour. From this discussion a conclusion will be drawn as to whether or not Indigenous Australians enjoy equality of criminal law and whether the structural elements of the law itself perpetuate Indigenous injustice and disadvantage.

Misfit. Rebel. Troublemaker. These are all names that may be given to people who go against the social norm. According to Andersen, Taylor, and Logio, the authors of Sociology: The Essentials, norms are defined as the specific cultural expectations for how to act in a given situation (2016). When someone disrupts the expectations, they commit a norm violation and may display deviant behavior. Since norms are so automatically built into our everyday lives, the rules of social interaction can be subtle and may be imperceptible to the people who participate in them. Therefore, sociologists often purposefully commit a norm violation in order to study what the rules or norms are. This approach, known as ethnomethodology, interprets society as being

Government policies authorising the removal of Aboriginal children have caused extensive and unrepairable damage to every aspect of Indigenous culture. It could be argued that the emotional turmoil which occurred as a result of this policy, is greater than any physical abused ever faced by the Australian Aboriginal people. The act of child removal would be a scarring experience for parents and children of any race or culture. This policy had a particularly damaging impact on the Indigenous people as their identity is based within a set of strong traditional guides and teachings. These lessons are not recorded, but can only be taught through speaking with elders and learning through a connection to others within the mob, connection to art forms

Contentious debate continues to rage in present society opening a floodgate of ethical issues which can have detrimental effects on all parties involved. Ethics vary from each individual and tend to stem from their own belief systems external to that person (Dosen, Harris, Brock, Imariso and Smith 2007:336). These ethics give rise to conflicting arguments in present society. 50 years ago, Indigenous Australians were not entitled to enter a bar, cafe, swimming pool, or a cinema, if that deprivation of basic rights wasn’t enough; they then took children from their mothers later on known as the ‘stolen generation’ (www.creativespirits.2008). The stolen generation, estimated at over 100,000 children were taken from their homes and placed in missions, reserves or dormitories (www.creativespirits.2008). “I feel our childhood has been taken away from us and it has left a big hole in our lives” an Indigenous Australian part of the stolen generation (www.creativespirtis.2008). The loss of ones culture and identity was deemed worse then being poor and living in sub standard living with their families.

The realities and everyday necessities in Indigenous communities seem concealed and compromised in the enduring Indigenous criminal law discourse which is framed by issues throughout history, jurisdictions, prisons, courts and the criminal justice system. Whilst today’s intergeneration effects of poverty and the loss of autonomy fuel Indigenous disadvantage, the criminal law institution is another contributor which vividly displays disadvantages and barriers which preclude Indigenous Australians from sufficiently accessing justice. However, the pursuit for justice is more multifaceted than a return to Indigenous tradition and retainment of the dominant criminal justice system. The following essay will highlight this

The over-representation of Indigenous people in the criminal justice system is a large problem in society and reasons as to why this may be occurring need to be examined (Walker & McDonald, 1995; AIC, 2013). Indigenous Australians make up less than three per cent of the overall Australian population, however Indigenous people are over-represented in Australian prison populations, with imprisonment rates that are around 12 times those of the rest of the Australian population (AIC, 2013). Rates of over-representation are even higher in juvenile detention, with a 10-17 year old Indigenous person being around 24 times more likely to be in detention than a non-Indigenous person of the same age (AIC, 2013; Cunneen & White, 2011). Indigenous Australians overrepresentation in the criminal justice system is usually due to offences pertaining to violence and public disorder (ABS, 2010; Hogg & Carrignton, 2006). This is endorsed by the fact that Indigenous Australians currently make up 40 per cent of those imprisoned for assault offences (AIC, 2013). The over representation of Indigenous Australians in the criminal justice system may be attributed to a variety of reasons, known as risk factors (AIC, 2013).

64, Commonwealth of Australia 2011). Policy then moved towards more assimilationist strategies in which attempts were made to convert Aboriginal Australians into ‘responsible citizens’ (Gilbert 2005, Haebich 2000). The protectionist and assimilationist policies share the core values that Aboriginal culture is inferior and on its way to an ‘evolutionary end’ (Gilbert 2005, p. 64).

Social control theory has become one of the more widely accepted explanations in the field of criminology in its attempt to account for rates in crime and deviant behavior. Unlike theories that seek to explain why people engage in deviant behavior, social control theories approach deviancy from a different direction, questioning why people refrain from violating established norms, rules, and moralities. The theory seeks to explain how the normative systems of rules and obligations in a given society serve to maintain a strong sense of social cohesion, order and conformity to widely accepted and established norms. Central to this theory is a perspective which predicts that deviant behavior is much more likely to emerge when

In our lifetime we are brought upon the normality in our lives. And once we someone doing or dressed in an abnormality way in public we are usually drawn to them. We tend to think of why they are dressed like that or why they are doing that particular thing. Folkways are the traditional behavior or way of life a particular community or group of people. Just like in life we get used to things being the same or normal each day these are norms. A norm is something usual, typical, or standard. Our society is used to things being like a folkway or a norm day to day lifestyle. This lifestyle is considered a mores. Mores are the essential or characteristics customs and conventions of a community. To someone that does something out of the norm there must be a reason or a meaning to them thats important to them. This is their value, a value is the regard that something is held to deserve; the importance, worth, or usefulness of something. Sanctions are the mechanisms of social control. Sanctions are the opposed to form of internal control, like cultural norms and values, sociologists consider sanctions a form of external control.