Comparative Criminal Justice Systems: Examining Legal Traditions - Admission/Application Essay Example

Comparative Criminal Justice Systems: Examining Legal Traditions The Australian criminal justice systems are comprised of nine legal systems, eight territory systems and one federal system. The Australian constitution states that the commonwealth of Australia is for making laws. The state and territories have independent legislative powers. Australia has got one of the oldest continuous democracies in the world which was created in 1901. The Australian colonies had inherited an electoral from Britain. On the other hand china’s criminal justice system is only 20 years old. The imperial era ended in the year 1911 and since then China has being trying to make a legal system. This was affected by the World War2 and political campaigns going on during that time. During the Cultural Revolution all the legal system were abolished. The reestablishment of the legal systems began again in the year 1979 where law schools were opened and judicial and procurator institutions were recreated. Since then the rule of law has become a long term role for the government of China (Richard 2010) The Australian system of government is founded in the liberal democratic tradition and it is based on the values of religious tolerance, freedom of speech and association, and the rule of law. Most of the Australian system of government is similar to the British system. The colonial processes impact the involvement of indigenous peoples in criminal justice. Despite differences, there is pattern that has been seen in criminal justice system. Indigenous people are over-represented as offenders and victims. The government of Australia has failed to address marginalization by focusing on indigenization of criminal justice services. The government has to take into consideration all this and take into account the historical processes when developing policies and making decisions about indigenous people. The national crime authority was established by the commonwealth government in the year 1984 in response to the findings of several Royal commissions into organized criminal activity in Australia. The courts in Australia are aligned this way, the High Court has the final jurisdiction. It is seconded by the federal court that has jurisdiction over the discussions of single judges of the High Court. All the states work independently. They have their own and different Supreme Courts and also have a court of criminal appeal. In the year 1993 to the year 1994 there were 782,000 criminal cases heard in the state and territory courts. Most of these cases were heard in the magistrates’ court (Harry 2011) This is how culture has affected the criminal justice system in china there was this case that parents of China were accused of sexually assaulting a woman in a city apartment they tried to convince the victim to drop charges and so they were arrested. They were charged with tampering with witness after police said they offered money for compensation and to get their son out of trouble but then the charges were dropped after investigators found out that the couple was acting according to their cultural norms which they are familiar with. We learn that cultural differences in criminal justice systems also can affect victims. Many sexual crimes in china will go unpunished. Marital rape is not against the law there and that mindset may affect people living there when they move to other parts of the world. Many Chinese citizens have been charged with prostitution in other countries since they have been affected by these laws since they do not exist everywhere they and they find it hard to adapt (Shahid 2009) The Australian legal system is based on a fundamental belief in the rule of law. Its goal is to ensure that all Australians are treated equally and that the laws safeguard them and make sure that they are treated fairly. The Australian constitution established a federal system of government, where powers were to be distributed between the two parties. Each of the federal and state systems incorporates three separate branches of government. Parliament makes laws and the executive government administers the laws, and the judiciary interprets and implements them. The legal system in china is different compared to that of Australia. The Chinese legal system is based on Confucian ideology that emphasized ethics and relationships between people and their leaders. After the court institution was brought back in 1978 a true institution was introduced mostly to deal with the economy which was growing very fast. As the western people moved their business to China, they demanded the protection that they were getting from the law from their original countries. In 1978 lawyers were trained to modify laws and today we have very many lawyers and law firms in china. China does not have an independent judiciary or legal system that operates independently without influence from the ruling Chinese communist party. This brings in the difference between china and very many countries. China’s legal system lacks neutrality. The international laws affect the whole legal system process in Australia; International law is laws that have been developed at the international level to regulate the relationships between countries. The legal system in Australia is ‘adversarial’ meaning that the competing claims of two parties to a case are put forward for decision by an independent decision maker which is a court or tribunal. The role of the decision maker is to listen to both sides of the dispute then use the appropriate law to settle the dispute. The adversarial system differs from the inquisitorial system that operates in much of Western Europe. Under the inquisitorial system, the role of the decision maker is much broader. For example they are allowed to question witnesses, when deciding what evidence is to be collected and presented when conducting investigations. In the past years the Australian government has adopted characteristics of inquisitorial system mostly when it comes to the section of anti-discrimination law (Francis 2012) The Chinese legal system is in form much closer to legal systems of continental Europe than to the common law, but also contains substantial elements borrowed from the Soviet Union. The Chinese traditional does not trace roots to the private-law systems of Rome or to any religious basis. It is centered on state concerns and dealt with private matters incidentally. When the European countries termed themselves as providers of justice China advanced and produced great deals of documents of rule- like character. This system had few officials with the specialized function of interpreting and applying this rules and their roles were limited to the revision of cases. No institution existed that would apply the law against the state. The original jurisdiction over cases involving individuals was done by the local magistrate who was an official representing the government within his territorial jurisdiction. We conclude that the legacy of traditional Chinese law inherited by modern China is different in most of its most basic principles from the European nations. In this case we get to understand and know that law has no connection with religion and that special court or institution before which disputing parties advance legal claims and the legal system functions to serve state interests not to protect individual rights or to resolve disputes among individuals. In both systems in the Australian setup and the Chinese setup politics has affected the legal systems in a big way since the leadership of all countries is based on the politics and the politicians are the ones who come up with laws those who are in the legislature. At times the law makers make decisions based on their self-interests (Richard 2010) Reference Francis P, (2012). Comparative Criminal Justice. California: Routledge Copyright, inc. Harry, D, (2011). Comparative Criminal Justice Systems. New York: Ceanage learning, Inc. Richard, J.T. (2010). World Criminal Justice Systems: A Comparative Survey. Texas: Newnes Copyright, Inc. Shahid M, S. (2009) Comparative Criminal Justice Systems: Global and Local Perspectives. New York: Jones Bartlett Publishers, inc. Read More