The criminal justice system consists of loosely interdependent government and private institutions intended to maintain social order and public safety, respond to crime, and manage offenders. The system deals with the criminal branch of the law, and typically has three components: (1) the investigative (police, prosecution authorities, and other specialist agencies); (2) the adjudicative (the criminal courts); and (3) the correctional (prisons, community corrections, and probation and parole services). The system relies on the use of discretion at every level of the criminal justice process to efficiently, effectively, and as fairly as possible navigate the pathway through which an offender may pass from detection to investigation, to arrest, to trial, conviction, sentencing, and possible incarceration, and eventually to release.