Criminal laws force compliance with the norms of behaviour deemed important to individual and collective well-being of society.

Laws are designed primarily to protect the safety and well-being of our communities. Behaviour that falls outside the accepted standard of the Criminal Code or other laws may result in criminal charges and sanctions.

This occurs through both procedural and substantive law. Clear definition of laws in both procedure and substance ensures a greater degree of fairness in the justice system.

Criminal laws may also be instruments of social policy, whereby social attitudes toward a particular action result in the criminalization or decriminalization of the action.

For example, gaming had been illegal in most jurisdictions in Canada until the decade of the 1990s, when governments became involved in the gaming industry. Laws were reformed in order to legalize the establishment of institutions that were previously criminal.

Some suggest that criminal law is an means of power whereby the empowered classes use it as a response to the challenges presented by poverty, alienation, marginalization and exclusion from society.

Others suggest that the effect of procedural safeguards is to prevent law enforcement agencies from effectively controlling crime in our communities.