Solitary confinement – A first hand account
This post is about 1200 words and can be read in 5-6 minutes. This post was provided by a former prisoner who wishes to remain anonymous. In light of the current controversy around solitary confinement in Canada, a first-hand account...
Read MoreBenefits of Restorative Justice
This post is about 900 words and can be read in 4-5 minutes. Restorative justice (RJ) is one of those approaches often advocated yet not often used. Despite its seeming advantages and the efforts of some advocates such as Margot...
Read MoreStormy ways or sunny weather? Prisoners’ views of Canadian prisons
This post is about 1000 words and can be read in about 5 minutes. One of the best ways of understanding the state of an institution is to listen to the people who inhabit it. We learn about the reality...
Read MoreMissed Opportunities: Young Adults in Federal Prisons
This post is about 640 words and can be read in 3 minutes. The Canadian federal prison system is missing many opportunities to work more effectively with young people in federal prisons, according to a report issued in 2017 by...
Read MoreNew book on Indigenous issues in the Canadian justice system
This post is about 600 words and can be read in 3 minutes. Everyone involved in criminal justice is aware of the dramatic over-representation of Indigenous people in Canada’s criminal justice system and prisons. But despite all the attention,...
Read MoreFalling Crime Rates in Many Countries
This post is under 800 words and can be read in about 4 minutes. Although many Canadians don’t seem to believe this – perhaps because so much media coverage is about crime – crime rates in Canada have fallen dramatically...
Read MorePositive developments in the US prison system
This post is about 600 words and can be read in 3 minutes. Prisons provide another example of a field in which Canadians can point to our neighbours to the south and feel superior, even when in reality we may...
Read MoreThis blog: One year and 50 posts later
This post is 600 words and can be read in 3 minutes. This blog ran its first post just about a year ago. At that time we stated the goal as being “to help build a well-informed public, which in...
Read MoreCan Canadian prisons be improved?
This post is 800 words and can be read in about 4 minutes. The new head of the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) has been given a huge mandate for change in that organization, which operates Canada’s federal prisons and...
Read MorePolicing Black Lives
This post is about 450 words and can be read in 2 minutes. Canadians who follow the news are used to seeing scenes from the United States of black people being shot by police, or wrongfully convicted, or beaten while...
Read More