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This book brings together ten leading British criminologists to explore the contemporary politics of crime and its control. The volume is produced in honour of Britain's most important criminological scholar — David Downes of the London School of Economics. The chapters are grouped around the three major themes that run through David Downes' work — sociological theory, crime and deviance; comparative penal policy; and the politics of crime. The third theme also provides the overarching unifying thread for the volume. The contributions are broad ranging and cover such subjects as criminological theory and the new East End of London, the practice of comparative criminology including an analysis of variations in penal cultures within the United States, restorative justice in Colombia, New Labour's politics and policy in relation to dangerous personality-disordered offenders, the legal construction of torture, and the future for a social democratic criminology.

Modern Control Theory and the Limits of Criminal Justice updates and extends the authors’ classic general theory of crime (sometimes referred to as “self-control theory”). In Part I, contemporary evidence about the theory is summarized. Research from criminology, psychology, economics, education, and public health substantially supports the lifelong influence of self control as a significant cause of problem behaviors, including delinquency and crime, substance abuse, school problems, many forms of accidents, employment instability, and many poor health outcomes. Contemporary evidence is supportive of the theory’s focus on early socialization for creation of higher levels of self control and other dimensions of the theory, including the roles of self control, age and the generality or versatility of problem behaviors, as well as the connections between self control and later teen and adult problem behaviors. The book provides methodological assessments of research on the theory, contrasting the control theory perspective with other developmental perspectives in criminology. The role of opportunity, the relationship between self and social control theory, and the role of motivation are addressed. In Part II, control theory is taken to be a valid theory and is used to explore the role of criminal sanctions, especially policing and prisons, and policies about immigration, as methods to impact crime. Modern control theory provides an explanation for the general lack of effectiveness of formal, state sanctions on crime and instead provides substantial justification for prevention of delinquency and crime by a focus on childhood. The theory effectively demonstrates the limits of criminal sanctions and the connection between higher levels of self control and positive life-course outcomes.

Crime has become a prominent issue on both national and international agendas, marked by a proliferation of regulations, growing budgets and increased political exchange. Based on sociological institutionalism, this book explains the rise of global crime governance as a process of rationalization in world society. Global crime governance leads to an increasingly homogenous definition and prosecution of crime, but it also shows variance: some crime policies are institutionalized coherently or attached to strong international organizations, while others are only weak or dispersed across different forums. This book examines these developments in one overarching framework consisting of four analytical steps. First, it analyzes the rise of global crime governance with regard to machinery and substance, thus tracing the origin of substantive and procedural norms against crime. Second, it analyzes the role of states in the process of defining crime globally, in particular the United States. By doing so, the book delivers a multilevel picture of emerging global governance. Based on a unique data set, the book also assesses the diffusion of crime policies across countries, showing which policies are more likely to be accepted nationally than others. Finally, the book explains the variance found as being grounded on principles of rationalization, which make some policies more consensual than others. All in all, the book targets questions of structural variance in the institutional design of international cooperation. It explains these differences by analyzing the combination of actors involved and the intrinsic characteristics of the policies.