Abstract
A defining feature of the drug treatment court movement is the judicial adoption of the disease model for explaining drug using behavior; an interpretive paradigm that historically has not played a defining role in the adjudication of drug offenders. In drug treatment courts, however, the disease model finds a very central place in the adjudicative process, and profoundly shapes the way judges view and treat defendants. This article examines the application of the disease model to drug and non-drug-related crimes in the context of drug treatment courts, and considers the significance of these developments as it concerns the meaning of criminal justice.
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James L. Nolan
James L. Nolan Jr. is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Williams College. He is the recipient of several awards including a Fulbright scholarship and two NEH fellowships. He spent the 1999–2000 academic year as a visiting Fulbright Scholar at Loughborough University in England, pursuing comparative research on recent Anglo-American criminal justice innovations. His most recent book is Reinventing Justice: The American Drug Court Movement (Princeton University Press, 2001). Nolan is also author of The Therapeutic State: Justifying Government at Century’s End (New York University Press, 1998) and editor of The American Culture Wars: Current Contests and Future Prospects (University Press of Virginia, 1996). His forthcoming edited volume, Drug Courts: In Theory and Practice will be published by Aldine de Gruyter and released sometime in 2002.