Criminology

One of the most long-standing debates in the criminal judicial system in the United States concerns disparity and discrimination when it comes to arresting and sentencing or following judicial procedures for various groups.  It has been thought that perhaps the cause of this observation might be the racism, which is a common problem to a multiethnic and multiracial state like the United States. For instance, though African Americans form a small percentage of the whole population in the US, they constitute the largest number of arrests and imprisonments when compared to the whites. This disparity remains as a highly debated issue with some people claiming that racial discrimination stands out to be the main reason behind this unequal treatment (Zhao  Zhang, 2004). Others claim that the high rate of involvement of the minority groups in criminal acts could the main factor that drives police disparity when making arrests (Zhao  Zhang, 2004). That is, arrests made out of prejudgments or based on previous criminal records of the group as a whole. 

Disparity refers to differential treatment of people based on prejudgments. A good example is when police officers arrest an individual based on his or her previous criminal records. On the other hand, refers to differential treatment of people based on their group identity rather than considering an individuals character (Beery, 2004). For instance, when police arrests are driven by race, gender, religious affiliation or ethnicity, then this is discrimination. This paper will compare and contrast disparity and discrimination as they apply in the criminal justice system. Examples of each of the terms will also be provided in the paper, especially with reference to law enforcement practices.

In criminal justice system, disparity has been blamed on the gap in terms of minority group involvement in criminal activities, which leads to police disparity in arrests (Oliver, 2009). There has been established a relationship between police arrests and race where the prevalence of arrests and imprisonment for the African American is higher than that of the whites. Although there seems to be a clear observation that the African Americans are more arrested than the whites, there lacks a consensus that can explains such a disparity. For instance, studies have shown that African Americans living in areas governed by majority whites are more likely to be arrested than whites a good example is a study carried in Pennsylvania (Zhao  Zhang, 2004). This is police racial discrimination in arrests.     
Disparity has been observed to be caused by mainly police justifiable judgment. In disparity, legitimate factors such as the offenders past criminal record or the seriousness of the crime committed are considered. For instance, African Americas are more likely to be arrested for drug use or trafficking (Zhao  Zhang, 2004) Discrimination, on the other hand, does not involve any consideration of legitimate factors but extralegal factors such as religious affiliation and race are taken into consideration (Morrison  Shawn, 2001). Perhaps one of the factors that have led to abuse of judgment or discretion on the side of the police is too much power accorded to them. This has always resulted to discrimination that is based on ethnicity and race. The disproportionate rate of arrest for African Americans and whites has been explained by two contradicting theories that try to show whether the disproportionate incarceration is due to police discrimination or police parity. These two theories are consensus theory and conflict theory.  The consensus theory explains the overrepresentation of the African Americans in the statistics of official arrests and postulates the importance of equality (Zhao  Zhang, 2004). Proponents of consensus theory maintain that all sanctions are imposed in an objective manner on all offenders without any bias in terms of the race of the offenders or any demographic characteristics (Oliver, 2009).

Consensus theory maintains that the seriousness of the offense, criminal conduct and the strength of the collected evidence are indicators for justifiable incarceration. Extralegal factors like race and religious affiliation are not considered in consensus theory and the differential arrest pattern of the African Americans and the whites is explained to be due to the high tendency of the African Americans committing serious crimes than the whites (Beery, 2004). However, the theory supports that police disparity has contributed to racial disparity in incarcerations (Zhao,  Zhang, 2004).
Racially biased criminal judicial system has been blamed to cause the racial disparity in arrests according to the conflict theory (Zhao  Zhang, 2004). The theory suggests that the society is made of different groups with conflicting and differing values although the state is only organized to represent the interests of the powerful and wealthy citizens. The theory argues that criminal law is always a function of power that is disproportionately distributed among groups (Zhao  Zhang, 2004). This shows that the criminal judicial system is designed to favor the dominant groups while suppressing the subordinate ones.

Criminal sanctions, according to the conflict theory are based on social class and race which are extralegal factors. The African Americans, who represent the subordinate groups, are more arrested than the whites who are the dominant groups (Morrison  Shawn, 2001). According to the conflict theory, the black people overrepresentation is as a result of police discrimination, which involves the consideration of the individuals group identity like gender or race. These factors are considered extralegal and race tops in the list as the main determinant on the police discretions in arrests (Zhao  Zhang, 2004). Conflict theory therefore supports that police discrimination on the race of the offender results from racial disparities.

The African Americans have been observed to be disrespectful to the police and the more an offender becomes more disrespectful to police officers, the higher the chances of police arrests (Beery, 2004). This is a factor that contributed to police disparity in arrest. This observation suggests that other factors other than the extralegal elements such as social class and race, which fuels discrimination, play a role in disproportionate police arrests. Disproportionate police arrest rates among the whites and the African Americans should not entirely be blamed on racial disparity although race is one of the contributors (Morrison  Shawn, 2001).

All in all, police disparity when making arrests has been observed to be common as compared to discrimination. For example, the high rate of African American arrests can easily be linked to their involvement in criminal activities as shown by most of the crime statistics. However, cases of discrimination, such as racial discrimination in police arrests have been identified. Specifically, there is no clear link between high rates of African American police arrests and racial discrimination.