Spectacular Justice: The Circus on Trial and the Trial as Circus, Picton, 1903 - Book Report/Review Example

The killer, a man named Shorty, had apparently killed another man and in the current case he seemed to have continually planned for the murder. This was explained by a few of the members who argued that Shorty had made several statements such as the victim, who was a Pan African, was a fake person. However, this is just a tip of the iceberg as the main theme of the paper is justice. Justice becomes the main theme due to the emphasis on the circus and the court system which is denoted by the trial.

The circus is portrayed as a majorly social activity which brought people of the same social context together, even though this was seen as an integrative activity it greatly exploited the existent racial or other existent divisions in the society. As the author observes, the circus as a potentially efficient tool in upsetting the existent social divisions was mainly used to reproduce existent social boundaries rather than unsettle them. On the other hand, the courts were seen as platforms where the rich and the poor, white or black, male or female were all seen to stand at the same level that was the view and the role of the law.

Unfortunately, this was not realizable for a sizeable group of the society as was signified by Shorty’s release. . The theme of justice is achieved by comparing a social act with a legal set up, basically the two are supposed to be different but in this case they are seen to be similar enforcing the same things which guarantee neither justice nor equity. Analysis component The main component drawn from this article is the difficulty in attaining justice in a society which has institutionalized divisions.

These divisions may be racially, gender or materially based. This is because the same inequality witnessed in the social contexts will eminently be exposed in the legal context. This is because the same social beings are the very enforcers of law and order, and the fact that they are subject to scrutiny of their social mates then it becomes difficult to remain level headed. To put it in a nutshell, this explains why it is quite difficult to achieve justice in a stratified society such as the one depicted in the article.

The most successful way to convince ones’ thoughts on the reality of this observation is by looking at existent social systems and identifying apparent divisions. This analysis is followed by a scrutiny on the success rate of such a society in achieving justice for every member. The obvious observation is that is definitely no justice for all members, in fact how well up one is or how dominant his grouping is becomes the determinant of their status. This observation becomes relevant especially when a society is faced with the task of streamlining their justice system.

The only way to achieve an efficient justice system is by addressing existent divisions, this way the legal system will treat everyone as equal, a primal requirement of any country’s or society’s justice system. Renisa Mawani’s Article The