The Globalization of American Criminal Justice Policy: the New Zealand Case

• In Event: Criminal Justice Policy in a Comparative Context

Abstract

This paper examines the influence of American criminal justice policy in New Zealand. I develop three case studies of American policy impacting different arms of the New Zealand criminal justice system. First, I explore the introduction of “three strikes” sentencing legislation with origins in a fact-finding trip to California by lobbyists and politicians who became instrumental in passing the law. Second, I investigate the impact of “supermax” principles on New Zealand’s only maximum security prison at Paremoremo in Auckland. The architecture of the prison was modelled on United States Penitentiary Marion in Illinois, and as Marion became the first modern supermax, Paremoremo drew directly on the evolving technologies of isolation and control. Finally, I investigate the influence of policing strategies from New York, as New Zealand sent high-ranking delegations to the city and local politicians strategically employed the language of “zero tolerance” and “broken windows” to promote police investment. In developing these case studies, I trace the global spread of American criminal justice policy in an often overlooked national context.

Author

• Liam Martin, Victoria University of Wellington