Current Events in Criminology

Series produced by Cory Potts

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At the edges of our penal systems in the United States and Europe, prisons overflow, nets widen, windows break, neighborhoods gentrify and capital's liquid. Administrative sanctions? Dispersal zones? Alcohol confiscation rights? Bans on squatting? We look at where the penal system has come from and where it is going.

Criminology is a rare bird among your typical penal, public, commercial and human rights courses at law school. It's transdiciplinary: the object of study is crime, although a criminologist studies crime across multiple fields. Is crime caused by a criminal's mental problems, by social pressures, by the effects of capital, by the effects of our environment, by his own moral failing? For how long have we talked about "crime" and a penal "system"? Is it better to treat criminals or punish them?

Focusing more on the technical aspects of criminality, which tend to be overlooked, rather than the spectacular crimes--terrorism, white collar crime, the "War on drugs"--the goal is to understand make a link between how we see everyday deviancy and how states respond to it.


2 Pieces

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Olympic Paranoia starts at St. Pancras. It scurries to Russell Square and Southwark, interviewer accompanied by the interviewed: Josie Appleton, Ma...

  • Added: Aug 21, 2012
  • Length: 38:52
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Guided tour through the creation and application of Belgium's communal administrative sanctions.

  • Added: Aug 03, 2012
  • Length: 34:46