Crime Talk, Rights Talk, and Double-Talk: Thoughts on Reading Encyclopedia of Crime and Justice (Review Essay)
Year: 1986
Type: article
Abstract: Under the leadership of Professor Sanford H. Kadish, scholars from several disciplines have contributed articles on virtually every aspect of American criminal justice to an impressive four-volume work, the Encyclopedia of Crime and Justice.'As Justice Shirley S. Abrahamson described in her review, Professor Kadish has performed a difficult and needed service. 2 The Encylopedia should be on the bookshelf of every lawyer interested in the criminal law.I began by thinking to review these books in summary fashion.It is almost impossible to review an encylopedia, even one devoted to a single, multifaceted field such as criminal justice, in any systematic way.As I read through these volumes, however, I became convinced that Professor George Fletcher was right in saying that the Encylopedia is a "window to orthodox thinking" on issues of "criminal law, criminal procedure, and related fields"; 3 hence, one can organize a review around this unifying theme.Fletcher also suggests, and I agree, that it would not be fair to criticize the Encyclopedia's essays for lack of originality, for this is an attempt at synthesis, not innovation.4 I also had thought to note at some length how different this encyclopedia is from Diderot's controversial eighteenth-century Encyclop6die.
Author: Michael E. Tigar
Language: English
Topic: Criminal Law and Evidence
Subfield: Law
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W70517949