Social Science : Criminology

The story of the mafia is not just what we see Tony Soprano and his boys doing on Sunday nights. In this vivid, gripping history of "cosa nostra," a noted historian of Italian culture uses startling new research to reveal what the mafia is and always has been: a secret society whose power is based on murder. 16 pages of photos. more...

Price: $26.95

Examines the American prison system, where rapes, assaults, and deaths are regular occurrences, as well as the powerful political and social forces driving imprisonment. This book charts the negative impact on both inmates and society of what is essentially a wasteful and inhumane system, and offers a series of practical proposals for reform. more...

Price: $13.59

Why are some ethnic minorities associated with higher levels of offending? How can racist violence be explained? Are the reasons for offending and victimization among ethnic minorities different from those among ethnic majorities? This book provides an introduction to the debates and controversies about race, crime and criminal justice. more...

Price: $40.93

Around the world today, access to justice enjoys an energetic and passionate resurgence as an object both of scholarly inquiry and political contest, as both a social movement and a value commitment motivating study and action. This volume brings together cutting-edge work from practitioners and scholars in law, political science, social psychology, sociology, and sociolinguistics. This work reflects a high degree of sophistication in empirical analysis, and, as importantly, evidences a deeper engagement with social theory than past generations of scholarship. Good understanding is valuable both for its own sake and because it is essential to good policy. The richer conceptual frameworks employed by these scholars create more sophisticated research questions that in turn inform a more nuanced policy agenda. This research-- on rights knowledge and police procedure, race and jury deliberation, tort reform and access to lawyers, self-interest and public service, ordinary people’s experience with everyday troubles –reveals new discoveries about law and social process and provides foundation for a deeper understanding of access to justice that can inform wiser, more effective policies. more...

Price: $124.95

This book examines young people's involvement in crime (including crimes of violence, vandalism, shoplifting, burglary and car crime) as both victims and offenders. Although adolescence is the time when involvement in crime peaks, few previous UK-based studies have attempted to provide a methodical and comprehensive understanding of adolescent offending on a city-wide basis. This book seeks a better understanding of adolescent crime by studying the relationship between individual characteristics (social bonds and morality and self-control) and lifestyles (as defined by delinquent peers, substance use and exposure to risky behaviour settings) and their joint influence on adolescent involvement in crime, against the backdrop of the juveniles' social context - taking into account family, school and neighbourhood influences. The findings of this study suggest the existence of three main groups of adolescent offenders; propensity induced offenders, life-style dependent offenders and situationally limited offenders, groups of offenders having different causal backgrounds to their crime involvement, and who therefore may warrant different strategies for effective prevention. more...

Price: $79.95