Critical Criminological Perspectives

This book discusses the concept of 'agnosis' and its significance for criminology through a series of case studies, contributing to the expansion of the criminological imagination. Agnotology – the study of the cultural production of ignorance, has primarily been proposed as an analytical tool in the fields of science and medicine. However, this book argues that it has significant resonance for criminology and the social sciences given that ignorance is a crucial means through which public acceptance of serious and sometimes mass harms is achieved. The editors argue that this phenomenon requires a systematic inquiry into ignorance as an area of criminological study in its own right. 

Through case studies on topics such as migrant detention, historical institutionalised child abuse, imprisonment, environmental harm and financial collapse, this book examines the construction of ignorance, and the power dynamics that facilitate and shape that construction in a range of different contexts. Furthermore, this book addresses the relationship between ignorance and the achievement of ‘manufactured consent’ to political and cultural hegemony, acquiescence in its harmful consequences and the deflection of responsibility for them. 

This book seeks to bring understanding of both complexity and temporality into criminology. It outlines why these are important in criminological models of causation and explanation and explores them by drawing on theories and approaches in political science, comparative history, social theory and systems analyses. It discusses what is meant by complexity and introduces historical institutionalism (which is rarely used in criminology) to criminological audiences; it introduces what is known as ‘why-because’ analyses to the social sciences. This style of thinking is used to explore the causes of major transportation accidents (such as aeroplane or ferry disasters) and involves the integration of structural, organisational and agentic inputs in accounting for such disasters. Chapters on realistic evaluation, theories of structuration and agency, and research design and research methods are included with an example project based on the author's recent studies of Thatcherism which shows how these theories can be applied to empirical data. This book speaks to those interested in criminology, sociology, political science, research methods and the wider social sciences.

This book ties restorative justice into the exercise of patriarchal power. It is focused on the individual narratives of 15 girls and young women who have participated in a victim-offender restorative justice (RJ) conference and the perspectives of youth justice practitioners. Gender, Power and Restorative Justice expands feminist engagement with RJ by focusing critical attention on the importance of the social construction of gender, the exercise of power, shame, stigma, muting and resistance to girls’ experiences of RJ conferencing. Drawing upon recent developments to the sociology of stigma and feminist perspectives on shame, the book contends that RJ conferencing can produce harmful implications for girls and young women who participate. Ultimately it is argued that anti-carceral, social policy alternatives, underpinned by feminist praxis, should replace a youth justice jurisprudence for girls. This book will be of particular use and interest to those studying modules on criminology, youth justice, criminal justice and social work courses.

This book explores the ways in which the state and private security firms contribute to the direct and structural harm of asylum seekers through policies and practices that result in states of perpetual destitution, exclusion, and neglect. By synthesising historic and contemporary public policy, criminological and sociological perspectives, political philosophy, and the direct experiential accounts of asylum seekers living within dispersed accommodation, this text exposes the complex and co-dependent relationship between the state’s social control aims and neoliberal imperatives of market expansion into the immigration control regime. The title borrows from former Home Secretary Theresa May’s pronouncement that the UK government aimed to foster a ‘hostile environment’ in its response to illegal immigration. While the Home Office later attempted to rebrand its hostile environment policy as a ‘compliant environment’, this book illustrates how aggressive approaches toward the management of asylum-seeking populations has effectively extended the hostile environment to those legally present within the UK. Through an examination of the expanded privatisation of dispersed asylum housing and the UK government’s reliance on contracts with private security firms like G4S and Serco, this book explores the lived realities of hostile environments as asylum seekers’ accounts reveal the human costs of marketised asylum accommodation programmes.

This book provides a comprehensive, global exploration of the scale, scope, threats, and drivers of wildlife trafficking from a criminological perspective. Building on the first edition, it takes into account the significant changes in the international context surrounding these issues since 2013. It provides new examples, updated statistics, and discusses the potential changes arising as a result of COVID-19 and the IPBES 2019 report. It also discusses the shift in trafficking ‘hotspots’ and the recent projects that have challenged responses to wildlife trafficking. It undertakes a distinctive exploration of who the victims and offenders of wildlife trafficking are as well as analysing the stakeholders who are involved in collaborative efforts to end this devastating green crime. It unpacks the security implications of wildlife trade and trafficking and possible responses and ways to combat it. It provides useful and timely information for social and environmental/life scientists, law enforcement, NGOs, and policy makers.

This book critically explores how and to what extent artificial intelligence (AI) can infringe human rights and/or lead to socially harmful consequences and how to avoid these. The European Union has outlined how it will use big data, machine learning, and AI to tackle a number of inherently social problems, including poverty, climate change, social inequality and criminality. The contributors of this book argue that the developments in AI must take place in an appropriate legal and ethical framework and they make recommendations to ensure that harm and human rights violations are avoided. The book is split into two parts: the first addresses human rights violations and harms that may occur in relation to AI in different domains (e.g. border control, surveillance, facial recognition) and the second part offers recommendations to address these issues. It draws on interdisciplinary research and speaks to policy-makers and criminologists, sociologists, scholars in STS studies, security studies scholars and legal scholars.

This edited collection revisits Steven Box’s book, Power, Crime and Mystification, published in 1983, and considers its relevance thirty years on. It introduces the critical analysis developed by Box which examined corporate crime, police crime, rape, and female crime and analyses the continuities and discontinuities since that time in relation to crime, the state and the exercise/mystification of power. It explores the ways in which we can see his influence nationally and internationally on critical criminological, zemiological and abolitionist writings today and how these can be applied to the present moment to understand criminal justice and criminal injustice. It asks: how can some of the neglected aspects of his work be revived in the contemporary literature? And how can his ideas and concepts help shine light upon issues, controversies and harms that were not covered in the original book? It provides a toolkit for students and academics to critically analyse the issues around crime/harm, power/powerlessness, justice/injustice, and truth/mystifications. This book brings together leading critical scholars to engage with a classic text in critical criminology.

Evidence Based Policing (EBP) exerts significant influence on how actors think, act and speak about UK policing to the point that it is becoming institutionalised. Inspired by the insights of Michel Foucault into power-knowledge, governmentality and institutional reform over time, this book provides a comprehensive account of the emergence of EBP in Britain as well as original discourse analysis and analytical research into the texts produced by EBP. It presents a new history of EBP presented around EBP's story-lines, subject positions and the institutional changes it has created. This history shows EBP shares a genealogical heritage with modern discourses of managerialism and neoliberalism. EBP's roots are traced and it is re-presented as an extension of the problematic relationship in the production of criminological knowledge and the British state. This history fundamentally challenges the notion on which EBP rests: basing policing policy upon independent, robust knowledge. Instead this book argues EBP should be subject to greater illumination and challenge, suggesting EBP is a contestable device that is doing political work. It speaks to those interested in policing, critical criminology and political science.

This book addresses a variety of key issues surrounding mental health and the criminalization of certain individuals and groups by the Criminal Justice System and the impact this can have on their mental health. It challenges the assumption that people with mental health problems are in some way a risk or danger to society (and themselves) and therefore have a greater propensity for committing crimes, when in reality they are more likely to become the victims of crime. It argues that the misguided correlations drawn between mental health and crime, as perpetuated by the media, policy makers, clinicians, agents of the criminal justice system, and ultimately the public, lead to the criminalization of the vulnerable. Furthermore, the criminalization, stigmatization, stereotyping, labelling and discrimination endured by people with mental health problems has a devastating effect on their mental health and well-being and has negative consequences for society as a whole. Each chapter focuses on a specific area relating to mental health, identifying key themes and issues, as well as offering recommendations for improvements with regards to the treatment and support for people with mental health problems. In addition, the treatment of offenders with mental health problems who engage with the criminal justice system and its services, such as the police, prison and probation services, is critically evaluated.