"101 East" @ Al Jazeera English, 8 Nov., 2013

New Zealand ranks as one of the world's most peaceful countries in the Global Peace Index every year. Yet despite a strong reputation for social justice and equality, the South Pacific nation has the second highest rate of imprisonment rates in the western world.

In the past two decades, the jail population has doubled. One international study examining law and order across western nations attributes it to a "tough on crime" approach by New Zealand's political parties since the 1980's, even though crime rates are low [....]

One in two prisoners is indigenous Maori even though they only account for just 15 percent of the population. Maori are overrepresented in all sectors of the criminal justice system due to soaring rates of child poverty, school dropout, unemployment and family breakdown within indigenous communities.

Many say going to prison has become normalised in Maori society because every child has a relative who is locked up [....]