Cultural Competence In The Criminal Justice System

Since its instigation, the Criminal Justice System (CJS) has had many difficulties and misunderstandings surrounding the culture and ethnicity of First Nation Australians. The Cross Cultural Model can be used to support and aid culturally and ethnically informed practice and improve current engagement with and response to First Nations people within the CJS. This can be illustrated through the six different stages of cultural competency, including, cultural destructiveness, cultural incapacity, cultural blindness, cultural pre-competence, cultural competence and cultural proficiency. Each of these stages explain the attitudes, policies and practices involved in becoming culturally competent. With the current issue of overrepresentation of First

Firstly, cultural pre-competence is when an organisation is aware of its weaknesses around cultural competency, and attempts to improve its services to a specific culture group (Cross 2008). An example of cultural pre-competence is when an organisation hires various minority staff members for leadership positions (Cross 2008). However, in some cases, this level of competence can lead to tokenism, which is when an organisation only recruits different minority groups to give the appearance of equality within the organisation (Yoder 1991). Furthermore, cultural competence is when an organisation respects and accepts the differences of cultures and pays careful attention to the different needs required for them (Cross 2008). Organisations that are culturally competent tend to have a high level of cultural knowledge and provide a variety of services to meet the needs of different cultural groups (Cross 2008). Lastly, cultural proficiency is when an organisation continuously strives in developing culturally competent services by conducting various research methods (Cross 2008). This can include developing new therapeutic approaches to being culturally competent and publishing information on cultural competence for other organisations to adapt (Cross 2008). Adapted from Cross’s (1989) Cultural Competence Model, the fundamental idea of cultural competence is cultural awareness, cultural respect, cultural responsiveness, cultural safety and cross-cultural practice and care. This can allow organisations and individuals to understand roles of cultural differences, provide safe and welcoming environments to assist people of different cultures, commit to building respectful partnerships with First Nations people and minority groups, and to be able to provide specific services for different cultural groups (Cross