Book Review: Punishment, Places and Perpetrators: Developments in Criminology and Criminal Justice Research

• Author: Rachel Dioso-Villa
• Published date: 01 March 2007
• Date: 01 March 2007
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/1057567707299321
• Subject Matter: Articles

offenses (see, for example, p. 58 of this volume), absent in the volume are articles specifically address-

ing youth and their relationship to car theft. Although these two failings somewhat detract from this

book, Understanding and Preventing Car Theft makes considerable contributions to understanding

automotive-related crimes and will serve as a valuable resource for anyone interested in the topic.

Dale Spencer

Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada

Bruinsma, G., Elffers, H., & de Keijser, J. (Eds.). (2004). Punishment, Places and Perpetrators:

Developments in Criminology and Criminal Justice Research. Cullompton, Devon, UK:

Willan.

DOI: 10.1177/1057567707299321

Punishment, Places and Perpetrators provides a general overview of recent theoretical and

methodological developments in criminology and identifies their associated challenges. The book

stems from papers presented at the 10th annual symposium of the Netherlands Institute for the Study

of Crime and Law Enforcement in 2002. It is organized into three general areas of research: (a) pun-

ishment as a theoretical goal of the criminal justice system; (b) places, including situational factors

that influence aggregate crime; and (c) perpetrators,research on individual factors that influence

criminal behavior. Crime prevention strategies are offered by authors and discussed in each chapter.

Contributors to the volume include leading scholars such as Alfred Blumstein, Malcolm Feeley,

Daniel Nagin, James Sheptycki, Michael Tonry, and Franklin Zimring. This international endeavor

includes chapters from scholars from North America and from the Netherlands that compare

European nations, Canada, and the United States. From this volume of work, it is clear that all gov-

ernments face similar challenges to find effective crime prevention strategies and appropriate alter-

natives to incarceration.

Part I highlights the difficulty in formulating effective crime policies and emphasizes the need for

policies that are theoretically grounded and empirically tested. Authors Gerben Bruinsma and Rolf

Loeber (chapter 1) outline political developments in crime in Europe and North America and the

major theoretical developments in the field of criminology. They identify challenges in determining

effective policies to manage offender risk, locate crime, track offenders, and assess criminal trajec-

tories of offenders. Michael Tonry (chapter 2) reviews criminological developments in Europe and

parallels these developments with those of the United States. He outlines major factors that will

ensure additional developments in criminology in Europe, such as the common economy and lan-

guage among European countries, growth in interest and participation in the European Society of

Criminology, government financial support for criminological research, and the willingness of

European governments to adopt innovative crime policies.

Part II provides a general discussion of punishment and summarizes the theory and history of

punishment in criminology. Within this section, there is some continuity across topics and theoreti-

cal frameworks, including a review of transnational organized crime, actuarial justice, and the risk

assessment of offenders for the goal of crime prevention. Ybo Buruma (chapter 3) examines predic-

tive offender risk assessment instruments and their effects on the legal system of the Netherlands.

Buruma likens the state managing offenders’ risk of recidivism to insurance companies managing

the risk of accidents. Malcolm Feeley (chapter 4) offers an insightful piece on actuarial justice. He

reviews selective incapacitation; goals of bail, probation, and parole; and defensible spaces as the criminal

justice system’s attempt to manage offenders and their potential recidivism. Selective incapacitation

62 International Criminal Justice Review