When we consider human economic behavior, sometimes it helps to speak in broad strokes about “the market,” with all of its buyers and sellers. But at other times, we learn more from thinking about the differences among submarkets. What distinguishes the buyer of a used car from the buyer of a new Lexus? What makes the sellers of cotton different from the sellers of diamonds? As we try to understand behavior in the world of criminal justice, the same distinction applies. Many scholars explore plea negotiations and the administrative nature of our modern criminal justice system, writ large. Only a few look more specifically at submarkets of criminal justice.

The enormous range of penalties at stake in criminal cases, along with the huge organizational differences among the investigators and the attorneys who work in different corners of this system, suggest that the submarkets of criminal justice deserve separate attention. Large city criminal justice operates differently from small city or rural criminal justice; felony courts produce different outcomes from misdemeanor courts; drug trials look different from fraud trials. When thinking about appropriate ways to regulate plea-bargain practices, it would be wise to account for these submarkets.