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Experimental criminology is a field within criminology that uses scientific experiments to answer questions about crime: its prevention, punishment and harm. [1] These experiments are primarily conducted in real-life settings, rather than in laboratories. From policing to prosecution to probation, prisons and parole, these field experiments compare similar units with different practices for dealing with crime and responses to crime. These units can be individual suspects or offenders, people, places, neighborhoods, times of day, gangs, or even police officers or judges. The experiments often use random assignment to create similar units in both a "treatment" and a "control" group, with the "control" sometimes consisting of the current way of dealing with crime and the "treatment" a new way of doing so. [2] Such experiments, while not perfect, are generally considered to be the best available way to estimate the cause and effect relationship of one variable to another. [3] Other research designs not using random assignment are also considered to be experiments (or "quasi-experiments") because they entail human manipulation of the causal relationships being tested.
Some date the start of experimental criminology to the Cambridge Somerville Youth Study in Massachusetts in the 1930s, when 506 boys aged 5 to 13 were paired and randomly assigned to receive a multi-year program of support. The 30-year follow-up of this experiment by Joan McCord found that the expensive program had no effect on a difference in the criminality of the two groups, and that the program's recipient actually suffered more premature death. Other early landmarks included the Vera Institute of Justice Manhattan Bail project, which tested the practice of release-on-recognizance ("ROR") in lieu of money bail, and led to international adoption of ROR to reduce discrimination against the poor in justice practices.
The first randomized experiment in policing, according to research by Dr. Peter Neyroud at Cambridge University, began in Liverpool in 1963 to test the effects on juvenile delinquency of decisions to divert arrested juveniles from prosecution. The first randomized experiment in the use of arrest for any offence was approved by the Minneapolis City Council in 1981 at the request of Police Chief Tony Bouza to be led by Professor Lawrence W. Sherman, who was then the Director of Research of the Police Foundation in Washington. The policy impact and scientific attention given to the Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment and its five replications, while subject to controversy, is described by Australian Member of Parliament Andrew Leigh in his 2018 Yale University Press book entitled RANDOMISTAS: HOW RADICAL RESEARCHERS CHANGED OUR WORLD. Leigh's book (p. 919) credits Sherman with forging "a new discipline: experimental criminology." Sherman went on to lead or design over 40 randomized experiments with police in the US, Australia and UK, and to found the Academy of Experimental Criminology in 1998 as its first President.
The field of experimental criminology grew significantly during the 1990s and early 2000s, resulting in the establishment of the Crime and Justice Group of the Campbell Collaboration and other influential organizations, such as the societies of Evidence-based policing in five countries. [2]
In 2005, Springer-Nature Publishing launched the Journal of Experimental Criminology as an international, peer-reviewed publication, with Professor David Weisburd appointed the first Editor-in-Chief, followed by Professor Lorraine Mazerolle. In 2017 Springer launched the Cambridge Journal of Evidence-Based Policing, which focused on experimental criminology and other research led by pracademic police professionals, with Lawrence Sherman as the first Editor-in-Chief.
In 2010, the American Society of Criminology created a Division of Experimental Criminology as one of the currently 8 divisions of the largest society of criminologists in the English-speaking world. [4]
Criminal justice is the delivery of justice to those who have been accused of committing crimes. The criminal justice system is a series of government agencies and institutions. Goals include the rehabilitation of offenders, preventing other crimes, and moral support for victims. The primary institutions of the criminal justice system are the police, prosecution and defense lawyers, the courts and the prisons system.
Michael D. Maltz is an American electrical engineer, criminologist and Emeritus Professor at University of Illinois at Chicago in criminal justice, and adjunct professor and researcher at Ohio State University.
The Institute of Criminology is the criminological research institute within the Faculty of Law at the University of Cambridge. The Institute is one of the oldest criminological research institutes in Europe, and has exerted a strong influence on the development of criminology. Its multidisciplinary teaching and research staff are recruited from the disciplines of law, psychiatry, psychology, and sociology. It is located on the Sidgwick Site in the west of Cambridge, England. The Institute of Criminology building was designed by Allies and Morrison. The Institute is also home to the Radzinowicz Library, which houses the most comprehensive criminology collection in the United Kingdom. The Institute has approximately 50 PhD students, 30-40 M.Phil. students, and 200 M.St students. The Institute also offers courses to Cambridge undergraduates, particularly in law, but also in human social and political sciences and in psychology and behavioural sciences.
The Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment (MDVE) evaluated the effectiveness of various police responses to domestic violence calls in Minneapolis, Minnesota. This experiment was implemented during 1981-82 by Lawrence W. Sherman, Director of Research at the Police Foundation, and by the Minneapolis Police Department with funding support from the National Institute of Justice. Among a pool of domestic violence offenders for whom there was probable cause to make an arrest, the study design called for officers to randomly select one third of the offenders for arrest, one third would be counseled and one third would be separated from their domestic partner.
Lawrence W. Sherman is an experimental criminologist and police educator who is the founder of evidence-based policing. Since 2022 he has served as Chief Scientific Officer of the Metropolitan Police at Scotland Yard, as well as Wolfson Professor of Criminology Emeritus at the University of Cambridge Institute of Criminology Wolfson Professor of Criminology.
Robert Agnew is the Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of Sociology at Emory University and past president of the American Society of Criminology.
The Stockholm Prize in Criminology is an international prize in the field of criminology, established under the aegis of the Swedish Ministry of Justice. It has a permanent endowment in the trust of the Stockholm Prize in Criminology Foundation. The Stockholm Prize in Criminology is a distinguished part of the Stockholm Criminology Symposium, an annual event taking place during three days in June.
Criminology is the interdisciplinary study of crime and deviant behaviour. Criminology is a multidisciplinary field in both the behavioural and social sciences, which draws primarily upon the research of sociologists, political scientists, economists, legal sociologists, psychologists, philosophers, psychiatrists, social workers, biologists, social anthropologists, scholars of law and jurisprudence, as well as the processes that define administration of justice and the criminal justice system.
David L. Weisburd, is an Israeli/American criminologist who is well known for his research on crime and place, policing and white collar crime. Weisburd was the 2010 recipient of the prestigious Stockholm Prize in Criminology, and was awarded the Israel Prize in Social Work and Criminological Research in 2015, considered the state's highest honor. Weisburd is Distinguished Professor of Criminology, Law and Society at George Mason University. and Walter E. Meyer Professor Emeritus of Law and Criminal Justice in the Institute of Criminology of the Hebrew University Faculty of Law. At George Mason University, Weisburd was founder of the Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy and is now its Executive Director. Weisburd also serves as Chief Science Advisor at the National Policing Institute in Washington, D.C. Weisburd was the founding editor of the Journal of Experimental Criminology, and is editor of the Cambridge Elements in Criminology Series.
The idea of regulatory crime control is to reduce and control crime. Many factors can make a place or area a victim of criminal activity. John and Emily Eck, two primary scholars that work within the area of regulatory crime control, explain how places can either create crime opportunities or crime barriers (2012). Eck also defines the two types of regulatory crime control strategies as ends-based and means-based. He states that means-based strategies focus on the use of different procedures and technologies, while ends-based strategies concentrate on the overall outcome (2012). Another primary scholar, Graham Farrell, discusses how repeat victimisation is becoming an important area for policing and crime control.
Jerry Lee is a noted crime prevention philanthropist, proponent of evidence-based policy-making, and the former owner of the Philadelphia radio station WBEB-FM 101.1. Currently he is working on promoting the effectiveness of radio commercials, owns SpotQ Services, Inc., is the President of the Jerry Lee Foundation, and is involved in continuing to encourage the adoption of evidence-based criminology.
Bail in the United States refers to the practice of releasing suspects from custody before their hearing, on payment of bail, which is money or pledge of property to the court which may be refunded if suspects return to court for their trial. Bail practices in the United States vary from state to state.
Evidence-based policing (EBP) is an approach to policy making and tactical decision-making for police departments. It has its roots in the larger movement towards evidence-based practices.
Anthony Allan Braga is an American criminologist and the Jerry Lee Professor of Criminology at the University of Pennsylvania. Braga is also the Director of the Crime and Justice Policy Lab at the University of Pennsylvania. He previously held faculty and senior research positions at Harvard University, Northeastern University, Rutgers University, and the University of California at Berkeley. Braga is a member of the federal monitor team overseeing the reforms to New York City Police Department (NYPD) policies, training, supervision, auditing, and handling of complaints and discipline regarding stops and frisks and trespass enforcement.
Police legitimacy is the extent to which members of the public view the police as higher power authority figure, often measured in terms of the public's willingness to obey and cooperate with the police. Police legitimacy is linked to the degree of public support for, and cooperation with, the police's efforts to fight crime. When a police officers ability and authority to effectively complete their job is compromised there is potential for a lack of police legitimacy.
David Philip Farrington is a British criminologist, forensic psychologist, and emeritus professor of psychological criminology at the University of Cambridge, where he is also a Leverhulme Trust Emeritus Fellow. In 2014, Paul Hawkins and Bitna Kim wrote that Farrington "is considered one of the leading psychologists and main contributors to the field of criminology in recent years."
Lorraine Green Mazerolle is an Australian criminologist and professor at the School of Social Science at the University of Queensland, where she is also an affiliate professor at the Institute for Social Science Research. She is also a chief investigator in the Australian Research Council's Centre of Excellence for Children and Families over the Life Course, as well as a former Australian Research Council Laureate Fellow. She is the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Experimental Criminology. She is also a fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia and the Academy of Experimental Criminology. She served as president of the Academy of Experimental Criminology. Her research interests include problem-oriented policing, civil remedies, and third-party policing.
The Academy of Experimental Criminology is a learned society founded in 1998 in order to recognize scholars who have made influential researchers in the field of experimental criminology. It does so by electing fellows annually, and by honoring criminologists with its Joan McCord Award and Young Experimental Scholar Award. The Academy was co-founded by David P. Farrington, who served as its second president from 2001 to 2003. The other founder was Lawrence W. Sherman, who served as its founding president from 1999 to 2001. It sponsors the Journal of Experimental Criminology, which was established in 2005.
Kerry Lyn Carrington is an Australian criminologist, and an adjunct professor at the School of Law and Society at the University of the Sunshine Coast (USC). She formerly served as head of the QUT School of Justice for 11 years from 2009 to 2021. She was editor-in-chief of the International Journal for Crime, Justice and Social Democracy. She is known for her work on gender and violence, feminist criminology, southern criminology, youth justice and girls' violence, and global justice and human rights.
Laurie Robinson is an American scholar and public servant who has held multiple positions across government, academia, and the nonprofit sector. Robinson's most notable roles include serving as Assistant Attorney General in charge of the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs under former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, and co-chairing Obama's Task Force on 21st Century Policing. She also served on the congressionally created Charles Colson Task Force on Federal Corrections and on an independent commission that explored the potential closure of New York City's Rikers Island jail complex. Most recently, Robinson served as founding Chair of the Board of Directors of the Council on Criminal Justice, a nonpartisan policy and research organization.