I Congreso Latinoamericano de Derecho Penal y
Criminología
2011
1
BEYOND ‘SO WHAT?’ CRIMINOLOGY: REDISCOVERING
REALISM
Roger Matthews
Introduction
There is, it would seem, an inverse relationship between the expansion of
academic criminology and its policy...
More
I Congreso Latinoamericano de Derecho Penal y
Criminología
2011
1
BEYOND ‘SO WHAT?’ CRIMINOLOGY: REDISCOVERING
REALISM
Roger Matthews
Introduction
There is, it would seem, an inverse relationship between the expansion of
academic criminology and its policy relevance.
Despite the growing numbers of
criminology students and courses in many countries, and the millions of pounds
and dollars spent on criminological research academic criminology appears to be
becoming more marginalised and irrelevant.
Elliot Currie (2007), for example, has
recently called for a more public criminology that can make a more worthwhile
contribution to crime related issues in order to resist and potentially reverse what
he sees as the development of spiralling punitive and regressive policies.
Currie
argues that there is considerable knowledge about what works to reduce crime and
that there is a broad level of consensus regarding the causes of crime and violence
and the limited ability of incarceration to red
Less