New Agendas for Social Policy and Criminology: Globalization, Urbanism and the EmergingPost‐Social Security State

Abstract

The subjects of social policy and criminology have long been concerned with the criminalization and regulation of the poor. The premise of this paper is that in recent years new forms of criminalization and regulation have emerged that various authors, from both disciplines, have begun to theorize. The paper aims to contribute to this growing literature by bringing together diverse themes that deserve to be extensively discussed in conjunction with one another. These are: first, globalization; second, the changing nature of the state; third, the reorganization of space and time, especially at the urban level. It proceeds through examinations of some of the recent work of Jock Young, David Garland, Ramesh Mishra, Peter Taylor‐Gooby and Zygmunt Bauman. It concludes that theoretical and empirical research should analyse the reorganization of space and time which is being effected by the “post‐social security state” and it is this which constitutes the new agenda for social policy and criminology.