The construction of ‘So What?’ criminology: a realist analysis

From a realist perspective there is a growing body of criminology that can be classified as ‘So What?’ criminology in that it involves a low level of theorisation, thin, inconsistent or vague concepts and categories, embodies a dubious methodology or has little or no policy relevance. The production of ‘So What?’ criminology is, of course, no accident but the outcome of a number of lines of force that have served to shape the nature of mainstream academic criminology in recent years. The aim of this article is to identify some of these lines of force and to assess their impact.     

Whither Criminology: Its Global Futures?

This paper takes as its starting point the recent interventions of Jock Young (2011) on the contemporary state of criminology. In adding to these observations those made by Connell (2007) and Aas (2012), the case will be made, following de Sousa Santos (2014), for a criminology of absences. In endeavouring to uncover these absences, the paper will consider how the ‘bogus of positivism’ (Young 2011, chapter 4), its associated presumptions and related conceptual thinking, manifest themselves in two substantive areas of contemporary concern: violence against women and violent extremism. With the first of these issues I shall consider the ongoing controversies in which the bogus of positivism is most apparent: the powerful influence of the criminal victimisation survey as the data gathering instrument about such violence. In the second area of concern, this bogus of positivism is most apparent in its ‘nomothetic impulse’ (ibid: 73). Both of these discussions will expose different, but connected absences within criminology. In the final and concluding part of this paper, I shall return to the questions posed by the title of this paper: whither criminology, and in the light of this discussion, offer some thoughts on the place of Asian criminology within criminology’s global future(s).     

Predicting norm enforcement: the individual and joint predictive power of economic preferences,personality, and self-control

This paper explores the individual and joint predictive power of concepts from economics, psychology, and criminology for individual norm enforcement behavior. More specifically, we consider economic preferences (patience and attitudes towards risk), personality traits from psychology (Big Five and locus of control), and a self-control scale from criminology. Using survey data, we show that the various concepts complement each other in predicting self-reported norm enforcement behavior. The most significant predictors stem from all three disciplines: stronger risk aversion, conscientiousness and neuroticism as well as higher levels of self-control increase an individual’s willingness to enforce norms. Taking a broader perspective, our results illustrate that integrating concepts from different disciplines may enhance our understanding of heterogeneity in individual behavior.     

Criminology and genocide studies: Notes on what might have been and what still could be

Scholars of genocide and mass killings have proposed several theories explaining how the behaviors of governments, political leaders, and ordinary citizens contribute to extreme violence. Many of the explanatory constructs developed in these theories bear a striking resemblance to core concepts of criminology or could be readily integrated with criminological ideas. As examples, this paper briefly describes the ideas of Herbert Kelman, Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, and R.J. Rummel from the perspective of criminology and examines their applicabilitythe recent genocides in Bosnia and Rwanda. The conclusion is that criminology, by largely ignoring the crime of genocide, has missed opportunities to both contribute to the field of genocide studies and to improve the specification of its own ideas.     

The Most-Cited Scholars and Works in Women and Crime Publications

ABSTRACT

Previous studies that have reported the most-cited scholars and works in criminology and criminal justice journals and textbooks have seldom acknowledged the important contributions of women and/or women and crime scholars to criminology and criminal justice. Here we extend citation analysis to the examination of 174 women and crime publications appearing from 1990 to 1996. We list the 50 most-cited scholars and the 29 most-cited works in these publications. We then compare our findings to other studies of the most-cited scholars and works in leading criminology and criminal justice journals and textbooks. The paper concludes with some thoughts about the importance of citation analysis in women and crime studies.     

Crimes of the powerful and beyond: An essay review

Conclusion I have argued that the problems withCrimes of the Powerful are instances of the inherent limitation of a criminology of the powerful and thus are not specific to a particular text, but refer centrally to a particular enterprise. These problems result from the contradictions entailed in the conjunction of criminology and political economy and the formal use of concepts derived from the latter as an explanation of, or gloss on, problems generated by the former. The formal introduction of the concepts of political economy does not, of itself, entail a break with the criminological agenda and, as a result, the analysis produced is inadequate to its object — the powerful. It is the position of this article that if one is to theorize upon either corporate crime or anti-trust law then political economy must assume priority — or else one simply establishes, as does Pearce, the criminality of big business. It is not the case that crime and law are irrelevant areas for political economy and, more especially Marxism, but rather that a proper understanding of the theoretical requirements necessary for an adequate analysis of corporate crime and anti-trust law must, of necessity, be founded in political economy, not criminology. Hitherto these requirements have not been met by criminology. This can be witnessed by the way in which criminology has addressed political economy, ie. in a purely arbitrary fashion in which concepts are simply adopted as if they were given — concepts which are effectively riddled with contradictions. Until these theoretical requirements are met, or built upon, then criminology is doomed to receive into itself a simple multiplication of texts likeCrimes of the Powerful together with all the consequent inadequacies associated with such texts. In such a context the powerful remains an ever elusive object     

Towards a global critical justice problematic

This paper argues that a global perspective is demanded by neo-Marxist methodological considerations, pointing out that traditional comparative criminology has been seriously flawed in its assumptions and preconceptions. A critical comparative criminology must be based on a world system and/or dependency model, coupled with human rights concerns. The crucial concerns of critical criminology are re-identified within a problematic of the concepts: “reproduction”, “production”, “the state”, and “transformation”. Their relevance to a comparative criminology is underscored, by way of critiquing north/western (including Canadian) critical criminology. The paper ends by drawing out some of the implications of this approach for justice theory and research in Canada.     

构建和谐社会:中国犯罪学发展的历史机遇——2006年犯罪学研究述评

构建社会主义和谐社会是中国犯罪学当代发展的宏观社会背景和历史性机遇。进入2006年,我国犯罪学发展已经显现出一种进行知识整理和提速成熟的态势。构建和谐社会、犯罪学研究范式、发展犯罪学、宽严相济刑事政策、少年司法、恢复性司法、刑事和解、社区矫正等,是2006年度我国犯罪学发展中的主旋律、关键词或新概念,它们共同组成了本年度我国犯罪学发展基本脉络中的显著标识点。     

SILENCE AND MEMORY IN CRIMINOLOGY—THE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF CRIMINOLOGY 2009 SUTHERLAND ADDRESS*

Two recent American Society of Criminology presidential addresses have identified as a key problem the fact that criminology lacks a history. In this address, I ask why criminology (in contrast to closely related fields) has generated so few studies of its past; I also identify some results of this failure and discuss why intellectual fields need a sense of their origins and development. History molds individual and collective identities; it lays a foundation for sociologies of knowledge; it encourages reflexivity, teaches us where our ideas came from, and gives us a sense of where we are going. To encourage historical work, I propose an overall framework for understanding the evolution of criminology, reaching back to the late eighteenth century and continuing into the present. My overall framework is that of scientific modernism, within which I identify the following three primary phases: exploratory modernism, confident modernism, and agonistic modernism. In conclusion, I suggest ways to stimulate histories of science in the field of criminology.     

EDITORIAL

Abstract

Jane Addams (1860-1935), founder of Hull House in Chicago, was a social worker, sociologist, criminologist, feminist, and pacifist. She dedicated her life to caring for the underprivileged and oppressed and to fighting for the rights of workers, women, and children. This paper examines her life and seeks to demonstrate her many contributions to sociology, criminology, and society. Among her pioneer works in criminology that have not been recognized are the ecological maps of Chicago that preceded Park's and Burgess' concentric zone theory, social justice issues such as child labor, compulsory education, and juvenile offenders. She also was a peace activist during World War I and many of her ideas and concepts are found in the peacemaking writings of current criminologists.     

Development of a black criminology and the role of the black criminologist

In its study of black criminality, the discipline of criminology has failed to cultivate a cohesive, continuous and recognized body of research—what is termed a “black criminology.” Inasmuch as the theoretical framework of the discipline is limited by its failure to develop this subfield, policy recommendations proposed to and adopted by the criminal justice system are limited. It is argued that the development of a black criminology is necessary to fill this gap—in much the same way that feminist criminology filled a void. The components and scope of this subfield are outlined and the role of the black criminologist in the development of a black criminology is evaluated. It is argued that although black criminologists are needed to chart a black criminology, their participation alone is insufficient for the full development and vitality of this subfield.     

The case for a victimology of nonhuman animal harms

For the last twenty years ‘victimology’, the study of crime victims and victimisation has developed markedly. Like its ‘parent’ discipline of criminology, however, very little work has been done in this field around the notion of environmental victimisation. Like criminology itself, victimology has been almost exclusively anthropocentric in its outlook and indeed even more recent discussions of environmental victims – prompted by the development of green criminology – have failed to consider in any depth the victimisation of nonhuman animals. In this paper, we examine the shortfall in provision for and discussions of nonhuman animal victims with reference to Christie’s notion of the ‘ideal victim’ and Boutellier’s concept of the ‘victimalization of morality’. We argue that as victimology has increasingly embraced concepts of victimisation based on ‘social harms’ rather than strict legalistic categorises, its rejection of nonhuman victims from the ambit of study is no longer conceptually or philosophically justified.     

Rejoinder—Personality and crime: Toward knowledge construction

In his response to “Personality and Crime,” Professor Gibbons took issue with several of our specific points. Several of these points are reviewed in this rejoinder, and we list our rationalizations for naming names (or for what Gibbons calls our “verbal thumping” of individual criminologists). More important, we find that Gibbons agrees on the need for a self-consciously “social” criminology to display greater respect for both evidence and human diversity. The paper closes with a specification of the criterion variable within the psychology of crime and with an appeal for an openness to the full range of potential covariates of that criterion variable, be they biological, personal, or social.     

Left Out? The coverage of critical perspectives in introductory criminology textbooks, 1990–1999

DeKeseredy and Schwartz have criticized introductory criminology textbooks published in the United States for their ‘poor treatment’ of critical/radical perspectives. This paper subjects this criticism to empirical analysis by studying the coverage of critical perspectives in 34 introductory criminology textbooks published from 1990 to 1999. Specifically, I examine how the coverage of critical perspectives in the textbooks is influenced by: 1) the theoretical orientations of the texts; 2) the positions of the texts on debate over conflict and consensus theories of law; and 3) the positions of the texts on the evidence supporting critical perspectives. This analysis shows that critical/radical perspectives in general, but in particular recent developments in critical criminology (including critical feminism, left realism, peacemaking criminology and postmodern criminology) are often ‘left out’ of contemporary criminology textbooks.     

Changes in the Most-Cited Scholars in 20 Criminology and Criminal Justice Journals Between 1990 and 2015 and Comparisons with the Asian Journal of Criminology

The main aim of this article is to assess the most-cited scholars in 20 criminology and criminal justice journals in 2015 and to compare them with the most-cited scholars in these journals in 1990–2010 and with the most-cited scholars in the Asian Journal of Criminology (AJC) in 2015. Five American criminology journals, five American criminal justice journals, five international criminology journals, and five international criminal justice journals have been studied since 1990. The most-cited scholars tended to be those who carried out research on developmental and life-course criminology. Most of these highly cited scholars were also highly cited in previous years, showing the persistence of scholarly influence. Generally, the most-cited scholars in criminology and criminal justice journals overlapped considerably, as did the most-cited scholars in American and international journals. Also, the most-cited scholars in AJC in 2015 overlapped considerably with the most-cited scholars in these other categories of journals. We conclude that there is considerable agreement in American, Asian, and international criminology and criminal justice on the most-cited, and therefore most influential, scholars.

     

A Statistical Analysis of Palestinian Terrorism and Israeli Counter-Terrorism Over Time

The idea of a world criminology specialty emerged in response to the increasing magnitude of global social disorder—wars, revolutions, terrorist activities, riots, crimes, delinquency, deviancy. These problems, together with our increasing problems of ecology, overpopulation, starvation, energy, tyranny and injustice, disease, and arms build-up, threaten to produce social disorder the magnitude of which the world has not yet seen. Many scientists have predicted that the next two decades will find the human species submerged under a barrage of severe catastrophes as these unchecked forces repeatedly reach crises proportions.

It is here suggested that criminologists and criminal justice practitioners begin scholarly and applied efforts toward development of a world criminology. This world criminology would take a global approach to the problems of social disorder and attempt to identify universal causative elements as well as universal principles and strategies relevant to the achievement of world order and the advancement of a world civilization. This paper presents and discusses seven assumptions which are held to be vital to the advancement of this new discipline. Further, a series of objectives and questions are posed, which are suggested as a means of encouraging initial exploratory work in world criminology.     

Teaching to shift people’s thinking toward peace: the relevance of Colman McCarthy’s work for peacemaking criminology

Peacemaking criminology is often conceived as a theoretical perspective built upon linkages between religious, feminist, and critical traditions. Equally important in peacemaking criminology is its teaching tradition, which promotes educating people about the values of peace, integration, cooperation, and caring over the values of control, repression, power, and domination. Teaching from a peacemaking perspective has generally involved efforts to design crime‐related courses that feature core concepts, readings, and policies within peacemaking criminology writings. However, such peacemaking teaching and writings have not commonly provided a central focus upon what needs to be taught to shift people’s thinking. This article thereby illustrates the work of peace educator Colman McCarthy, whose teaching experiences in high schools and universities are predicated upon influencing teenagers and young adults to embrace the idea that nothing can matter more than the struggle for and embracing of peace. This article also explores the ways in which Colman McCarthy’s books, I’d Rather Teach Peace and All of One Peace: Essays on Nonviolence, offer a foundation to help people shift their thinking toward a culture of nonviolence and peace.     

<Emphasis Type="Italic">Cultural Criminology: An Invitation</Emphasis>… to What?

Since the mid 1990s, a strand of criminology emerged that is concerned with the co-constitution of crime and culture under the general rubric of ‘cultural criminology’. In the titles Cultural Criminology Unleashed and Cultural Criminology: An Invitation, criminologists spearheading this brand of criminology make claims for its originality and its status as a subversive alternative to conventional criminological approaches to studies of crime and deviance. The basis for the ‘new’ cultural criminology is its ostensible ability to account for the culture and subcultures of crime, the criminalization of cultural and subcultural activities, and the politics of criminalization. This paper offers a comparison of cultural criminology to 1960s and 1970s labeling theory to assess whether or not cultural criminology has developed a grammar of critique capable of resolving fundamental contradictions that haunt critical criminology and contesting contemporary administrative criminology. Points of comparison are made through ontological categories of power and criminal identity and a consideration of the epistemological categories of the respective bodies of literature.     

Academic criminology: A need for change

An exploratory examination of criminology curricula, scholarly books, professional journals and reports is presented to substantiate the neglect of women in the works of most mainstream criminologists. Recent publications by Leonard (1982) and Schur (1984) suggest that this male view of criminology has distorted our definitions of crime and our responses to victims of male crime. These authors also indicate that the failure to include women in intellectual pursuits of the discipline has resulted in inadequate theories that do not explain women’s behavior and research based on false assumptions about the roles of men and women. While there have been numerous efforts to remedy this neglect of women during the last two decades (e.g., Bowker, 1977, 1980; Cullen, 1983; Reid, 1981, 1982), academic criminology continues to present a predominantly male perspective. In order to hasten the integration of women into the criminological curricula, theories, and research projects, this paper suggests changes in program policies that could be implemented by the leadership in professional associations (American Society of Criminology and Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences) that would encourage research in the area of women and crime as well as enhance the prestige and credibility of scholarship in this area of criminology.     

THE LIFE COURSE OF CRIMINOLOGY IN THE UNITED STATES: THE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF CRIMINOLOGY 2003 PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS*

The field of criminology lacks a sense of its own history. To rectify this situation, I apply the concepts and framework of the life‐course perspective to the development of criminology as a discipline. Examining criminology in the United States over the last 100 years, I discuss three eras (or life‐course phases), intellectual continuities and turning points in the field. My thesis is that if we knew our history, we would realize that ideas about crime matter. I offer a revised version on how to view criminology and in doing so address the theme of the 2003 annual meeting of the American Society of Criminology, “The Challenge of Practice, the Benefits of Theory.”