Crime

The narrative of law and order is located fundamentally at the level of individual guilt and responsibility. Criminal acts are seen as individual issues of personal responsibility and culpability , to which the state responds by way of policing, prosecution , adjudication, and punishment. This is but one level at which crime and criminal justice can be analyzed. The problem is that so often analysis ends there, at the level of individual action, characterized in terms of responsibility, guilt, evil. In few other areas of social life does individualism have this hold. To take but one instance , it would be absurd to restrict analysis of obesity, to individual greed. It should similarly be widely seen as absurd to restrict the analysis of criminal justice issues to the culpability of individuals.