Beating crime or marking time? Crime research and crime policy: a personal view of the UK government’s approach

Publication Note: This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Mears, Daniel P. 2010. “The Role of Research and Researchers in Crime and Justice Policy.” Criminology and Public Policy 9(4):799-805., which has been published in final form at http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-9133.2010.00671.x. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving: http://olabout.wiley.com/WileyCDA/Section/id-828039.html#terms.

This article is a response to Sherman (2009) and argues that experimental criminology ought to clearly acknowledge the political aspect of much crime research, and expand the timeframe of research involvement in policy making if it is to bring the liberty promised. Failure to do so can lead to a fundamental misconception that experimental criminology is somehow divorced from the political realities that inscribe it, and to possible unintended consequences in the deployment of policy. The example of use of the so-called ‘stop and frisk’ crime policy in Philadelphia is used to examine Sherman’s claims.

From its first publication in 1964–2014, 890 articles have been published by The Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency ( JRCD). During that period, the criminal justice field has experienced major transformations in its policies, theories, and practices. This article identifies major periods in the development of criminal justice policy; which are Prepolitical Era (1964–1972), Tough on Crime Era (1972–1980), National Consensus on Crime Policy Era (1980–1996), and Retrenchment Era (1996–2012). It then traces changes in the subject matter of JRCD over those periods. The articles published by the JRCD over the past half century reflect the changes in eras.

Members of some disadvantaged minority groups in every Western country are disproportionately likely to be arrested, convicted, and imprisoned for violent, property, and drug crimes. This is true whether the minority groups are members of different "racial" groups from the majority population, for example, blacks or Afro-Caribbeans in Canada, England, or the United States, or of different ethnic backgrounds, for example, North African Arabs in France or the Netherlands, orirrespective of race or ethnicity-are recent migrants from other countries, for example, Yugoslavs or Eastern Europeans in Germany and Finns in Sweden. Important social policy dilemmas that are seen in individual countries to be uniquely their own, such as race relations in the United States or assimilation of Maghreb-derived guest workers in France or the experience of Aborigines in Australia, are not unique at all but are instead variations on common themes of social structure

Previous articleNext article No AccessResearch NotesSaying it Wrong with Figures: A Comment on ZeiselPeter H. Rossi, Richard A. Berk, and Kenneth J. LenihanPeter H. Rossi Search for more articles by this author , Richard A. Berk Search for more articles by this author , and Kenneth J. Lenihan Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by American Journal of Sociology Volume 88, Number 2Sep., 1982 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/227677 Views: 2Total views on this site Citations: 10Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1982 The University of ChicagoPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Delia Baldassarri, Maria Abascal Field Experiments Across the Social Sciences, Annual Review of Sociology 43, no.11 (Jul 2017): 41–73.https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-soc-073014-112445Xiaolu Wang Mediation, Statistical, (Jan 2015): 75–80.https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-097086-8.42098-2Herbert L. Smith Research Design: Toward a Realistic Role for Causal Analysis, (Mar 2013): 45–73.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6094-3_4Herbert L. Smith Causation and Its Discontents, (Jan 2009): 233–242.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9967-0_10William Sims Bainbridge Online Multiplayer Games, Synthesis Lectures on Information Concepts, Retrieval, and Services 1, no.11 (Jan 2009): 1–113.https://doi.org/10.2200/S00232ED1V01Y200912ICR013Herbert L. Smith Some Thoughts on Causation as It Relates to Demography and Population Studies, Population and Development Review 29, no.33 (Sep 2003): 459–469.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1728-4457.2003.00459.xMICHAEL D. MALTZ Deviating from the Mean: The Declining Significance of Significance, Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 31, no.44 (Aug 2016): 434–463.https://doi.org/10.1177/0022427894031004005Michael Dalecki, Fern K. Willits Examining change using regression analysis: Three approaches compared, Sociological Spectrum 11, no.22 (Apr 1991): 127–145.https://doi.org/10.1080/02732173.1991.9981960David Rauma, Richard A. Berk Remuneration and recidivism: The long-term impact of unemployment compensation on ex-offenders, Journal of Quantitative Criminology 3, no.11 (Mar 1987): 3–27.https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01065198Laurence Chalip POLICY RESEARCH AS SOCIAL SCIENCE: OUTFLANKING THE VALUE DILEMMA, Review of Policy Research 5, no.22 (Nov 1985): 287–308.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1541-1338.1985.tb00357.x

1HE LITERATURE MAKING USE of quantitative data in the comparative analysis of policy outputs across the American states has largely been dependent upon public expenditure levels as indicators of policy efforts. One of the few potential altematives has been measurements of policy innovativeness, most recently reintroduced for political analysis by Jack L. Walker.' While policy innovation might be measured in a number of ways, Walker has been especially concemed with a general tendency toward innovativeness of state govemments, or as rural sociologists refer to it, adoptionproneness.2 Certainly, American political folklore is rich in suggesting that some states are innovators while others are laggards. Findings by others in later research, however, cast some doubt upon not only the adequacy of the quantitative measures devised

Book Review: Helping Crime Victims, Research, Policy and Practice

Au Etats-Unis, les immigres Philippins resistent a differentes formes de discrimination a travers l'affirmation de certaines specificites culturelles. Par exemple, la chastete des femmes avant le mariage est presentee comme une resistance au modele de la societe dominante blanche americaine, mais ceci se fait au prix de l'autonomie des femmes et renforce le pouvoir patriarcal dans ces communautes

Research on repeat victimisation consistently reveals that crimes to concentrate within a small subset of victims. Given a recent increase on the number of extortions against businesses in Mexico, this research aimed to answer whether extortion concentrates within a small subset of businesses and if so, what could explain this concentration. Drawing from a national commercial victimisation survey conducted in 2013, several hypothesis relating to potential sources of risk heterogeneity were tested using single and multilevel modelling based on the negative binomial regression. Results showed that extortion concentrates far beyond what can be explained by chance, and that extortion incidence is positively associated with corruption incidents, years in business, state homicide rates, and being a restaurant, hotel or bar. Alternatively, it was found that the smallest businesses suffer less extortion than larger businesses. State level effects were found to be comparatively small to differences between businesses. Implications for research and crime policy in Mexico are briefly discussed.

So‐called ‘faith hate’, or religiously aggravated crime stands out starkly as being the uncharted territory in hate crime scholarship and policy research. When the evidence about the problem in the United Kingdom is unfolded, it suggests that there may be valuable policy learning to be gained. There are some fundamental questions that need to be addressed, however. Are victims really targeted because of their faith or because of something else? Are such crimes different to other acts of hate crime, such as racist crime? And who are the perpetrators of ‘faith hate’ crime? Are they any different from those who commit race hate crime? These questions have important implications for policy and practice learning.

In October 1990 the two German states united after 40 years of separation. Since crime rate figures had been manipulated and empirical studies had not been carried out for decades, criminological research needs to be started afresh in the new federal states. This is because in consequence of the differing standards of living and economic situations criminality is almost certain to climb and change its structure and appearance. The population must learn to trust the newly emerging judicial and criminal justice system.

This first chapter presents a basic overview of the book, its topic, and outline. Basic issues related to the perception of media, the perception of crime, and the perception of youth are presented. It is argued that for understanding media, crime, and adolescence, both research and public policy debates must be put into a larger context of sociological phenomena influencing relations between older adults and youth. Concepts such as juvenoia and moral panic are discussed and a basic framework for the remainder of the book is presented.

In previous research, core peacemaking criminology themes addressed by authors within the Pepinsky and Quinney reader were examined. These peacemaking criminology themes are types of crimes/social harms embedded in current social structure, types of theoretical frameworks/perspectives guiding peacemaking criminology, and types of peacemaking alternatives to confront the social injustices underlying crimes/social harms in today's society. Building on this previous research as well as a survey of peace-making authors, this article illustrates how elements of a peacemaking criminology theoretical model come into view. The article then explores the basic nature and connections of the elements in this peacemaking criminology theoretical model. The analysis concludes with suggestions of ways this peacemaking criminology theoretical model can be adapted toward future crime research and policies.

In England and Wales, Section 146 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 made disability hate crimes legal. This advocated for increased sentencing for perpetrators whose crimes were motivated by or demonstrated hate against a person with a handicap or a perceived disability. Currently, this additional sentencing provision is the only legal option for prosecuting disability hate crime perpetrators. This thesis explores the experience and aftermath of hate crimes committed against England’s cognitively challenged senior victim group. The cognitively challenged elderly victim group is far more likely to face bias and violence; they have a greater likelihood of re-victimisation and suffer significant suffering as a result of hate crimes. To date, the voices of cognitively deficient elderly victims and survivors have been mostly absent from scholarly research and hate crime policies. As a result, the purpose of this article is to look into present policy barriers and how the cognitively challenged senior victim group might best receive support, justice, and interventions following discriminatory hate crimes. There has been little examination and discussion of intersectionality in disability studies and hate crime research. Common ideas fail to adequately reflect the multifaceted, overlapping, and complex experiences of danger and victimisation. This paper builds on studies on hate crimes against the cognitively deficient elderly victim group. It noted the challenge of categorising individual encounters as one type of hate crime. Victims and their relatives recognised that they were targeted for a variety of reasons, including their inability to care for themselves and their age. The study contends that the present strand-based approach to hate crime conceals a multitude of cross-identity characteristics that, when combined, might raise the danger of victimisation while decreasing a victim’s chance of reporting their experiences. To address vulnerability, safety, and hate crime against disabled people in England and Wales’ criminal justice, health, social care, and refuge systems, barriers to including the cognitively impaired senior victim group in the policy process are presented, allowing for targeted suggestions and changes on relevant issues.

Articulating the research priorities of government is one mechanism for promoting the production of relevant research to inform policy. This study focuses on the Areas of Research Interest (ARIs) produced and published by government departments in the UK. Through a qualitative study consisting of interviews with 25 researchers, civil servants, intermediaries and research funders, the authors explored the role of ARIs. Using the concept of boundary objects, the paper considers the ways in which ARIs are used and how they are supported by boundary practices and boundary workers, including through engagement opportunities. The paper addresses the following questions: What boundaries do ARIs cross, intended and otherwise? What characteristics of ARIs enable or hinder this boundary-crossing? and What resources, skills, work or conditions are required for this boundary-crossing to work well? We see the ARIs being used as a boundary object across multiple boundaries, with implications for the ways in which the ARIs are crafted and shared. In the application of ARIs in the UK policy context, we see a constant interplay between boundary objects, practices and people all operating within the confines of existing systems and processes. For example, understanding what was meant by a particular ARI sometimes involved ‘decoding’ work as part of the academic-policy engagement process. While ARIs have an important role to play they are no magic bullet. Nor do they tell the whole story of governmental research interests. Optimizing the use of research in policy making requires the galvanisation of a range of mechanisms, including ARIs.