Justice
Manual for the development of a system of criminal justice statistics
Manual on building national system of criminal justice statistics
Authors:
Publisher:
Department of Economic and Social Affairs, United Nations, 2003
This manual sets out an updated general framework for the development of a national system of criminal justice statistics.
The manual reflects certain serious shortcomings in national criminal justice systems, such as abuse of police authority, unnecessary use of force, abuse of human rights, repression and lack of responsibility by the criminal justice system.
The Manual recognises that underlying conditions and readiness to develop a system of criminal justice statistics vary markedly from country to country. National and local circumstances, then, will determine to a great extent how the Manual is used.
It is expected that countries will develop data-collection instruments appropriate to their own situation, reflecting the specific characteristics of their criminal justice system and the level of available resources. These instruments may serve as references for countries embarking on similar types of data collection, and may inform and stimulate countries to participate in future international justice-related survey activities. Comparison with countries of similar structure and nature provides a broader context for better understanding and shaping social development locally.
The Manual includes an annex to highlight some of the practical issues related to the design and creation of a sound data collection system. The annex provides examples of data collection forms, statistical tables, an offence classification scheme, an offence severity scoring rule and data analysis, all or parts of which might be a useful starting point for countries attempting to develop or refine their national systems of criminal justice statistics.
The annex also includes questionnaires for the United Nations survey of crime trends and operations of criminal justice systems and the International Crime Victim Surveys.
Inasmuch as crime and operations of criminal justice systems are part of a society, criminal justice statistics form a part of a larger body of social and economic statistics that has been a subject of a number of international recommendations and publications by the United Nations Statistics Division. The present Manual draws on these extensive previous experience and publications.
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