Review of James L. Nolan, Jr, Reinventing Justice: The American Drug Court Movement that appears in the March 2002 issue of the Harvard Law Review, p. 1558.

REINVENTING JUSTICE: THE AMERICAN DRUG COURT MOVEMENT. By James L. Nolan, Jr. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. 2001. Pp. 254. $29.95 (cloth).

This beautifully written book explores the development of drug courts in America in the context of both criminal justice and the “culturally dominant therapeutic ethos” (p. 179). James Nolan examines the drug court movement against the backdrop of both the history of the social control of drugs in the United States and the philosophy of punishment. Professor Nolan discusses the structural and cultural causes of the move to drug courts; the drug court’s meaningful departure from the common law tradition, particularly in respect to the new and nontraditional role of the judge; and the centrality of storytelling to the “drug court theater” (p. 13). Intertwining qualitative analysis with narrative, the author analyzes this innovation within the larger framework of therapeutic jurisprudence and the consequent transformation of the social and legal understandings of justice. Professor Nolan argues that the drug court has redefined criminal offenses in pathological terms, making the legal relevance of guilt increasingly obsolete, from both a pragmatic and a philosophical perspective. Those involved with drug courts in any capacity and all those concerned with criminal law, the philosophy of punishment, or changing conceptions of justice in contemporary America will welcome this book.