Constitutive Criminology at Work

Applications to Crime and Justice

Edited by Stuart Henry & Dragan Milovanovic

Subjects: Criminology
Series: SUNY series in New Directions in Crime and Justice Studies
Paperback : 9780791441947, 322 pages, August 1999
Hardcover : 9780791441930, 322 pages, August 1999

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Table of contents

Tables and Charts

Preface

Part 1: Constitutive Theory

Introduction: Postmodernism and Constitutive Theory
Stuart Henry and Dragan Milovanovic

Chapter 1. Constitutive Criminology: An Introduction to the Core Concepts
Andrew Bak

Part 2: Agency, Resistance, and Regulated Bodies in the Constitution of Crime

Chapter 2. Sex, Law and the Paradox of Agency and Resistance in the Everyday Practices of Women in the "Evergreen" Sex Trade
Lisa Sanchez

Chapter 3. Constitutive Theory and the Homeless Identity: The Discourse of a Community Deviant
Bruce A. Arrigo

Chapter 4. Constituting O. J. : Mass-Mediated Trials and Newsmaking Criminology
GreggBarak

Chapter 5. Reconstituting the Monster: Images of Techno-Criminality at Century's End
Dion Dennis

Chapter 6. Bodies of Law: The Supreme Court, the Justices, and Death
John Brigham

Part 3: Societal Responses: Policing and Penology

Chapter 7. Taking It to the Streets: Policing and the Practice of Constitutive Criminology
James W. Williams

Chapter 8. Policing Modernity: Scientific- and Community-Based Violence on Symbolic Playing Fields
Victor E. Kappeler and Peter B. Kraska

Chapter 9. Agency and Choice in Women's Prisons: Toward a Constitutive Penology
Mary Bosworth

Chapter 10. Revisiting Jailhouse Lawyers: An Excursion into Constitutive Criminology
Jim Thomas and Dragan Milovanovic

Part 4: Institutional Transformation and Constitutive Justice

Chapter 11. Intentional Communities, the Fourth Way: A Constitutive Integration
Robert C. Schehr

Chapter 12. A Constitutive Theory of Justice: The Architecture of Affirmative Postmodern Legal Systems
T. R. Young

Conclusion: Constitutive Criminology Engages Its Critics—An Assessment
Stuart Henry and Dragan Milovanovic

About the Contributors

Index

Provides the first applications of constitutive criminology, a theoretical framework inspired by postmodernism, to specific areas of criminological practice.

Description

Constitutive Criminology at Work reveals the value of applying postmodernist-informed constitutive criminology to issues of crime and justice. A holistic, integrated criminological theory, constitutive criminology takes serious account of the interrelated contributions of human agency and social forces and argues that crime is an integral part of the total material and cultural production of society. Consequently, analysis and control of crime cannot be separated from the wider structural and cultural contexts in which it is produced.

This book argues that constitutive criminology can ultimately help society out of its obsession with the crime and punishment cycle. Based on applications and empirical research within the theoretical framework first presented in the editors' earlier volume, Constitutive Criminology: Beyond Postmodernism, this new book brings together scholars and practitioners who have applied constitutive theory to specific areas of crime and justice practice. It extends development of the constitutive project by drawing together studies that found constitutive theory helpful in understanding distinct problems in the applied world of crime and justice.

[Contributors include Bruce Arrigo, Gregg Barak, Mary Bosworth, John Brigham, Dion Dennis, Victor E. Kappeler, Peter Kraska, Lisa Sanchez, Robert Schehr, Jim Thomas, James Williams, and T. R. Young. ]

Stuart Henry is Professor and Chair of the Department of Sociology at Valparaiso University. He is also the author and editor of several books, including Essential Criminology (with Mark M. Lanier); and The Criminology Theory Reader (with Werner Einstadter). Dragan Milovanovic is Professor of Criminal Justice at Northeastern Illinois University. He is the author and editor of several books, including, with Stuart Henry, Constitutive Criminology: Beyond Postmodernism. His other recent books are Postmodern Criminology; Chaos, Criminology and Social Justice: The New Orderly (Dis)Order; and Postmodern Criminology.

Reviews

"This book is a wonderful collection of imaginative work by people sensitively in touch with 'the co-production of crime' and punishment. I think the strength of the field is reflected in the variety of first-rate work this volume has attracted. " — Hal Pepinsky, Indiana University

This book argues that constitutive criminology can ultimately help society out of its obsession with the crime and punishment cycle. Based on applications and empirical research within the theoretical framework first presented in the editors' earlier volume, Constitutive Criminology: Beyond Postmodernism, this new book brings together scholars and practitioners who have applied constitutive theory to specific areas of crime and justice practice. It extends development of the constitutive project by drawing together studies that found constitutive theory helpful in understanding distinct problems in the applied world of crime and justice.