Crime, Police, and Penal Policy: European Experiences 1750-1940

by Clive Emsley

Overview

How did ideas about crime and criminals change in Europe from around 1750 to 1940? How did European states respond to these changes with the development of police and penal institutions? Clive Emsley attempts to address these questions using recent research on the history of crime and criminal justice in Europe. Exploring the subject chronologically, he addresses the forms of offending, the changing interpretations and understandings of that offending at both elite and popular levels, and how the emerging nation states of the period responded to criminal activity by the development of police forces and the refinement of forms of punishment.

The book focuses on the comparative nature in which different states studied each other and their institutions, and the ways in which different reformers exchanged ideas and investigated policing and penal experiments in other countries. It also explores the theoretical issues underpinning recent research, emphasising that the changes in ideas on crime and criminals were neither linear nor circular, and demonstrating clearly that many ideas hailed as new by contemporary politicians and in current debate on crime and its 'solutions', have a very long and illustrious history.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199202850
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	08/30/2007
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	9.30(w) x 6.00(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Clive Emsley was educated at the University of York and at Peterhouse, Cambridge. He was visiting professor at the University of Paris VIII (St. Denis) and the University of Calgary, Alberta, and has held visiting research fellowships in Australia and New Zealand. He is currently Professor of History and Co-Director of the International Centre for Comparative Criminological Research at the Open University, and is also President of the International Association for the History of Crime and Criminal Justice.

Table of Contents

1. IntroductionThe Old Regime and the Enlightenment2. Laws and Punishments3. The Understanding and Nature of Crime4. Coping with CrimeThe Revolutionary Era5. The New French System6. Crime and Police in Revolution and WarThe Discovery of the Criminal Classes7. Measuring a Problem8. Danger in the City: Danger in the Countryside9. Protection, Punishment and ReformationThe Appliance of Science10. 'Scientific Criminology11. New Professionals: Old ProblemsThe Faces of Penal Welfare12. Penal Policies and the Impact of War13. Controlling and Punishing after the Great War14. National Paths: Common Patterns