ATS3231 - Study tour: Human rights and criminal justice USA - 2019

This intensively delivered unit is part of our Criminology Overseas program. Students study human rights in relation to criminal justice and criminology through interactive experiences delivered on location in New York with criminal justice system and NGO actors. The unit will trace the impact of human rights across the differing phases of the achievement of justice in the criminal justice system. Students will be presented with and analyse issues of human rights affecting the United States and consider how dominant Australian ideas of criminological theory, practice and research might/might not apply in the European countries through comparative studies. Focusing on some specific rights as case studies students will contrast definitions of human rights in understanding responses to crime. Examples of topics for comparative understanding include: human rights and difference, human rights and social media, human rights and the criminal justice system, and human rights and the contemporary world. Students gain on-location access to experienced professional practitioners - police, crime investigation agents, prosecutors, judges, prison staff and NGO workers to understand how human rights impacts their professional activities and daily operations.

The unit seeks to enhance the ability of students to undertake independent research under the guidance of supervision.

On successful completion of the unit, students will be able to:

1. identify and explain key human rights at the various stages of criminal justice proceedings;
2. discuss and evaluate the impact of human rights on national and international efforts to combat crime in various historical and current social contexts;
3. compare and critique contextual differences between understandings of human rights, crime and criminal justice;
4. critically evaluate applications of human rights and criminology to practices of national and international justice;
5. undertake an independent research project under supervision.

Within semester assessment: 100%

Minimum total expected workload to achieve the learning outcomes for this unit is 288 hours per semester typically comprising a mixture of scheduled learning activities and independent study. A unit requires on average three/four hours of scheduled activities per week. Scheduled activities may include a combination of teacher directed learning, peer directed learning and online engagement.

See also Unit timetable information

Bachelor of Criminology

Criminology