Author Description

Known for its engaging and accessible writing style, this probing text covers the traditional areas of criminology, but also addresses questions of popular concern and policy debate, using systematic evidence to explore such topics as deterrence and incapacitation; race and social class; the rights of the accused; and domestic violence. Challenging readers to think about even the most obvious and commonsense ideas in terms of the evidence that might support or contradict it, the text delves even deeper, encouraging them to see the connection between abstract theoretical propositions and the reality they see everyday in their own lives and in the media. Using a highly perceptive, lively, and absorbing writing style to make serious ideas and evidence easily understandable to a wide range of readers, the book integrates interesting boxes throughout to bring experientially distant ideas closer and make concepts more relevant: "On Campus Boxes" highlight crime and other topical issues as they relate to campus life, and "Crime in the News Boxes" take items from newspapers to illustrate ideas and provide models for discussing current cases and issues. Reviewer Richard Wright from the University of Scranton says the text "...offers insightful typologies of crime?[presenting] a superb comparison of the interactionist; a cultural and structural explanation of homicide; a first rate discussion of felony murder; and exemplary sections on bookmaking and loansharks." Features new to this edition include an increased number of graphs and tables to help readers get a better grasp of quantitative data; chapter key terms, chapter outlines and a thorough end-of-book glossary for better understanding; and lucid discussions on Hirschi and Gottfredson's self-control theory, community policing, and date rape. For sociologist and criminologists.