Decision-making from Application to Outcome

Abstract

This chapter examines how law, policy, and culture shape organisational decision-making at the Criminal Cases Review Commission. Drawing on Chun Wei Choo's concept of a ‘knowing organisation’, it considers how the organisation aims to influence the work of commissioners and case review managers. Choo's sociology of an organisation is used to analyse those institutional forms of knowledge that seek to direct decision-making at the Commission: primarily, the Formal Memoranda and the Casework Guidance Notes. The chapter goes on to describe the various stages in the progress of an application to show the many points at which discretion might be exercised, namely: screening and reviewing cases. It explains how the Commission decides when it comes to conducting an investigation, collecting evidence, and appointing an investigating officer to the case. It also discusses the Commission's ‘post-decision’ decision-making and concludes by returning to Choo's notion of sense making and knowledge creation.