Crime, Inequality and Social Justice
PostgraduateMAQ-PICX80422025
Course information for 2025 intake View information for 2024 course intake
Look at the for-profit private security industry by examining methods, decision makers and stakeholders. You’ll analyse the working partnerships with the public, police and the wider law enforcement industry.
- Study method
- 100% online
- Assessments
- 100% online
- Enrol by
- 20 July 2025
- Entry requirements
- Prior study needed
- Duration
- 13 weeks
- Price from
- $4,155
- Upfront cost
- $0
- Loan available
- FEE-HELP available
Crime, Inequality and Social Justice
About this subject
On completion of the subject you will be able to:
- Demonstrate an understanding of the interplay between disadvantage, inequality, and crime.
- Analyse the impact of gender, race, ethnicity, and sexuality on the criminal justice system.
- Evaluate the criminal justice system as a response to social, economic, and cultural exclusion.
- Assess the reproduction of social inequality by the criminal justice system.
- Demonstrate a critical understanding of the societal implications of punishment and control systems on different sections of society.
- A week-by-week guide to the topics you will explore in this subject will be provided in your study materials.
This subject was previously known as PICX842 Australia's Approach to Law Enforcement
This unit examines key relationships between the way crime, along with societal understandings of ‘the offender’, are commonly shaped by disadvantage, inequality and, ultimately, injustice. For example, criminologists have long assumed that socio-economic conditions and social inequality play an important role both in why particular individuals become involved in criminal activity and in determining levels of crime within particular societies. Moreover, the criminal justice system has increasingly become the favoured ‘solution’ to conditions of social, economic and cultural exclusion. Bringing together aspects of criminology, sociology and social policy, this unit examines how cleavages of gender, race, ethnicity and sexuality adversely impact people’s experiences of the criminal justice system, calling close attention to the all too close connection between local control, democratic governance and inequalities of punishment. In doing so, the unit seeks to shine a critical lens on the role of the criminal justice system in amplifying and reproducing social inequality, whilst analysing what punishment systems – thinking of how we punish and who we punish – says about us as a society.
- Reflective writing (10%)
- Summary of podcast (25%)
- Annotated bibliography on a contemporary policing issue (25%)
- What is the function of the police! (40%)
For textbook details check your university's handbook, website or learning management system (LMS).
This research-intensive university in north-western Sydney offers a range of undergraduate and postgraduate degrees. With over 44,000 current students, Macquarie has a strong reputation for welcoming international students and embracing flexible and convenient study options, including its partnership with Open Universities Australia.
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- QS Ranking 2024:
- 10
- Times Higher Education Ranking 2024:
- 10
Entry requirements
Equivalent subjects
You should not enrol in this subject if you have successfully completed any of the following subject(s) because they are considered academically equivalent:
MAQ-PICX842 (Not currently available)
Others
NCCW (pre-2020 units) PICT842, PICX842
Pre-requisite Admission to MPICT or MCPICT or GradDipPICT or GradDipCPICT or PGCertPICT or MPICTMIntSecSt or MCPICTMIntSecSt or MIntSecStud or GradDipIntSecStud or MSecStrategicStudMCrim or MIntellMCrim or MCyberSecMCrim or MCTerrorismMCrim
Additional requirements
- Other requirements - Students who have an Academic Standing of Suspension or Exclusion under Macquarie University's Academic Progression Policy are not permitted to enrol in OUA units offered by Macquarie University. Students with an Academic Standing of Suspension or Exclusion who have enrolled in units through OUA will be withdrawn.
Study load
- 0.125 EFTSL
- This is in the range of 10 to 12 hours of study each week.
Equivalent full time study load (EFTSL) is one way to calculate your study load. One (1.0) EFTSL is equivalent to a full-time study load for one year.
Find out more information on Commonwealth Loans to understand what this means to your eligibility for financial support.
What to study next?
Once you’ve completed this subject it can be credited towards one of the following courses
PostgraduateMAQ-CRM-MAS
PostgraduateOUA-PSU-GCE
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