RT Article
T1 Criminal justice as a production line: ASAP and the managerialization of criminal justice in the Netherlands
JF European journal of criminology
VO 17
IS 6
SP 826
OP 844
A1 Salet, Renze
A2 Terpstra, Jan
LA English
YR 2020
UL https://krimdok.uni-tuebingen.de/Record/1745628673
AB Since the 1990s criminal justice systems in West European countries have increasingly been affected by the process of managerialization. The managerialization of criminal justice may result in fundamental tensions between different sets of values: efficiency and cost-effectiveness against values such as the rule of law or careful decision-making. This article concentrates on one example of the managerialization of criminal justice: the policy programme ASAP (As Soon As Possible) in the Netherlands, aimed at making the settlement of cases of high-volume petty crime both faster and more efficient. The introduction of ASAP has resulted in a strong standardization of work processes and strict time limits, for both the police and the public prosecution service. In this article we analyse how ASAP operates in practice and to what degree the policy goals of ASAP are realized. This analysis shows that the introduction of ASAP has transformed an important part of the Dutch criminal justice system into an assembly or production line. This example of the managerialization of criminal justice has resulted in important tensions between, on the one hand, managerial values and, on the other, the values of occupational (legal) professionalism.
K1 Criminal Justice
K1 NPM
K1 Managerialism
K1 Police
DO 10.1177/1477370819828332