Contention and the pendulum pivot: Weighting equal justice

  • Geoff K. Ward

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    2 Scopus citations

    Abstract

    In Breaking the Pendulum: The Long Struggle Over Criminal Justice (2017), Philip Goodman, Joshua Page, and Michelle Phelps advocate replacing the pendular notion of penal change with an agonistic approach, where contention is central. This Essay reflects on a pendulum component that has escaped theoretical or empirical scrutiny in pendular accounts of penal change: the pivot determining how freely a pendulum weight swings, and its resting equilibrium. In this parting glance at the pendulum heuristic, I relate this pivot to the agonistic perspective on punishment and-focusing on racial politics of juvenile justice-imagine an antiracist calibration of struggle over penal change.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)806-813
    Number of pages8
    JournalLaw and Social Inquiry
    Volume44
    Issue number3
    DOIs
    StatePublished - Aug 1 2019

    Fingerprint

    Dive into the research topics of 'Contention and the pendulum pivot: Weighting equal justice'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

    Cite this