WJEC Diploma in Criminology Unit 4 Revision

A comprehensive set of vocabulary flashcards covering the WJEC Diploma in Criminology Unit 4 Revision guide, including law making processes, agencies of the criminal justice system, models of justice, and aims of punishment.

Green Paper

A document drafted by the government containing ideas to provoke public discussion of potential changes to law.

White Paper

A document drafted after public discussion that includes more concrete ideas for changes to legislation and usually contains the bill to be presented before parliament.

Royal Assent

The final stage in the law-making process where the bill is presented to the monarch for approval after passing through both houses.

Judicial Precedent

A process where the decisions made by judges in previous cases dictate the lawful outcome of any future case that shares similar facts.

Distinguishing

A judicial process where precedent does not have to be followed because the facts of a case are dissimilar to ones that have been before.

Overruling

When a higher court deems a previous precedent as outdated or incorrect and replaces it with a new ruling.

Literal Rule

A rule of statutory interpretation that allows judges to interpret an Act using the everyday, ordinary meaning of words.

Golden Rule

A rule of statutory interpretation that allows judges to change the literal meaning of a word when it would result in an absurd outcome.

Mischief Rule

A rule of statutory interpretation that allows judges to discard the literal meaning to apply the law as it was originally intended.

Sarah’s Law

A scheme where the police manage the list of known child sex offenders when they are released into the community.

Unduly Lenient Sentencing Scheme

A scheme that allows the CPS to appeal to the courts if they feel the sentence given in a criminal case was not severe enough.

Due Process Model

A model of criminal justice that assumes the greatest threat to freedom is state oppression and emphasizes the rights of the accused, presuming innocence until proven guilty.

Crime Control Model

A model of criminal justice that views crime as a threat to society and prioritizes the swift suppression of crime, often presuming the suspect is guilty.

Internal Social Control

Forming from within ourselves, this is when we conform to rules because we inwardly feel it is the right thing to do.

Superego

A part of the personality that develops when we internalize the values of parental figures, helping to ensure we do not deviate from moral values through feelings of guilt.

Rational Ideology

An internal form of social control where we internalize values about right and wrong through the process of socialization in education, religion, and upbringing.

Coercion

An external form of social control involving the use of physical or psychological force to achieve compliance, such as arrests or the presence of authority figures.

Social Control Theory

A theory by Travis Hirschi ($1969$) suggesting that conformity is the result of four social bonds: attachment, commitment, involvement, and belief.

General Deterrence

A form of punishment aimed at discouraging the whole of society from committing similar crimes by making an example of an offender.

Individual Deterrence

A form of punishment designed to be unpleasant enough to convince a specific offender that it is not worth committing the crime again.

Short Sharp Shock

An initiative introduced in $1979$ involving $3$-month military regimes for offenders under the age of $25$ to deter them from a life of crime.

Rehabilitation

An aim of punishment that seeks to reform the offender by targeting the underlying causes of their behavior through therapies, education, and drug treatment.

Incapacitation (Public Protection)

An aim of punishment that prevents an individual from functioning in society to protect the public, such as through electronic tagging or travel bans.

Retribution

An aim of punishment based on ‘payback’ or an ‘eye for an eye’ approach, where the punishment must be proportionate to the offense.

Reparation

An aim of punishment that looks for ways an offender can make amends for their wrongdoing, either to an individual victim or society.

Determinate Sentence

A prison sentence where the length of time the offender must spend in prison is fixed at the point of sentencing.

Indeterminate Sentence

A prison sentence with no fixed length of time, meaning the offender is only released when a parole board deems them safe.

Conditional Discharge

A release of an offender on the condition that they must abide by the law for a given period; reoffending results in sanctions for both the original and new offenses.

Peel’s Philosophy

A set of core values from $1829$ stating that the police should prevent crime through public cooperation and use physical force only as a last resort.

Full Code Test

A two-stage test used by the CPS to decide whether to prosecute, consisting of the evidential stage and the public interest stage.

Impartiality

A guiding principle for the judiciary meaning their work must be free from bias and they must ‘do right by all manner of people.’

CPTED

Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design; a tactic suggesting that territoriality, surveillance, and limited access reduce the opportunity for crime.

Panopticon

A prison design by Bentham based on the premise of ‘seeing without being seen,’ where prisoners behave because they assume they are being watched.

ASBO

Anti-Social Behaviour Order; introduced in $1998$ to limit low-level anti-social behavior, later replaced by Criminal Behaviour Orders ($CBO$).

Token Economy

A behavioral tactic in prisons using operant conditioning where prisoners receive tokens for desirable behaviors that can be exchanged for rewards.

Phased Discipline

The use of disciplinary procedures that increase in severity as rule-breaking continues to occur.

Recidivism

The rate of reoffending; statistics show around $75\%$ of all adult offenders in the UK reoffend within $9$ years of release.

Moral Imperatives

A limitation to social control where an individual breaks the law because they are following a strongly felt personal principle they believe is morally right.