Our growing Criminology list takes a critical stance and features boundary-pushing work with innovative, research-led publications.
A particular focus of the list are books that engage with our global social challenges, both on a local and international level. We aim to publish books in a wide range of formats that will have real impact and shape public discourse.
The oppression of women, children and animals are intertwined in patriarchal systems, and nowhere is this interconnection more apparent than in the co-occurrence of animal abuse and domestic abuse. A humancentric approach dominates definitions and the prevailing public story about domestic abuse across society. This conceptualisation focuses on the human victim-survivor in isolation but undermines the status of the animal and the significance of the animal in the dynamics of abuse. We need to extend our construction of domestic abuse to include animals as victim-survivors.
The oppression of animals is compounded by the dominant status of animals in society as ‘less important’ than human beings and ‘property’ that is ‘owned’ by humans. This conceptualisation of animals is underpinned by animal welfare legislation in the UK that provides a platform for perpetrators of domestic abuse who abuse animals to continue the abuse of animals, often with little consequence or challenge.
This research highlights the many parallels between the abuse of animals and people in the context of domestic abuse. Research findings highlight the importance of an integrated approach across human and animal welfare services in order to safeguard the whole family (including animals), prevent homicide, and manage a perpetrator’s behaviour.
While there exists increasing awareness and legal remedies in relation to domestic violence in China, victim-blaming still exists – especially in online discourse. This research investigated public reactions to domestic violence in China, using comments made by women on Weibo – China’s largest social media platform. Thematic analysis was used to analyse 500 comments related to four extremely high-profile domestic violence cases. The analysis reveals that victim-blaming is manifested in six overlapping ways, blaming victims for: 1) choosing the wrong partner, 2) not resisting abuse, 3) failing to leave the relationship, 4) having ‘weak personalities’, 5) lacking rationality, dignity and self-love, and 6) being overly influenced by love – known as ‘love brain’. The findings not only shed light on the complexities of victim-blaming on social media in China but also illustrate the ongoing clash between modern feminist thought and entrenched patriarchal values within contemporary Chinese culture.
Alex Ardalan-Raikes MBE serves as the Director of Stand Against Racism & Inequality (SARI), a Bristol-based charity dedicated to supporting victims of hate within the local community and beyond. Under her leadership, SARI assists over 900 victims of hate crimes annually. The organisation also delivers training, restorative justice programmes, youth offender rehabilitation initiatives, and expert consultancy on equality and antiracism strategies.
Alex and her team played a crucial role in responding to the unprecedented far-right riots that erupted across England between 30 July and 5 August 2024. Triggered by a tragic mass stabbing in Southport on 29 July, where three children lost their lives, false claims propagated by far-right groups fuelled the unrest. Misinformation that the attacker was a Muslim asylum seeker escalated Islamophobic, racist, and anti-immigrant sentiments, culminating in the largest wave of racist violence, arson, and looting seen in England since the riots of 2011.
In this interview, conducted in November 2024, Alex sits down with Justice, Power and Resistance journal co-editor Nasrul Ismail to discuss the challenges, strategies, and lessons from this critical moment in her advocacy against hate.
This article explores the consequences of penal repression for 16 former prisoners in Kachin State, Myanmar, contributing to the literature on imprisonment effects in an under-researched context and drawing attention to the ongoing struggle for rights and recognition. We report on a study exploring whether encounters with a repressive, weaponised criminal justice system against the backdrop of a revolutionary situation extinguish or enable political hope and action. We learn about how everyday politics for ordinary citizens is about organising, participating, and resisting the oppression and changed circumstances elicited by the military coup of 1 February 2021 – often collectively and almost incidentally. We document the obstinacy of political hope and the way in which the debilitating effects of penal repression ultimately fail to extinguish former detainees’ commitment to an alternative future. Learning more about the effects of detention on political consciousness adds important dimensions to understandings of penal repression under highly charged circumstances.
There is growing recognition of the issue of sexual violence experienced by women university students in the UK. Despite increased attention, problems with prevalence, reporting, support and institutional responses persist. There is, therefore, a need to better understand students’ experiences and perceptions of sexual violence and the context in which these incidents occur in order to develop effective, theoretically informed responses which follow from students’ experiences. This article presents findings from research which explored the nature and extent of women students’ experiences of sexual violence at one university in England. Reporting on semi-structured interviews with students, the article addresses a gap in evidence by using a poststructuralist framework to understand the dominant gendered and heterosexed discourses which shape the nature, extent and understanding of sexual violence and construct a ‘truth’ about expectations of university life. It applies and extends Gavey’s (2005) concept of the cultural scaffolding of rape to consider students’ experiences in the university context in which they took place. It is argued that these discourses produce contextually contingent gendered subjectivities which are at times resisted but are also amplified in the space of the university, further limiting the ways in which students can make sense of their experiences.
Objective:
Analyse the psychometric properties of a scale to evaluate attitudes towards gender violence in nursing students.
Method:
Cross-sectional observational study with 197 participants from various nursing schools and faculties. Supo’s taxonomy and Robles Garrote’s methodology, with the participation of nine experts, ensured content validity. Metric properties evaluated through pilot testing. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was used to determine reliability, validity, and internal consistency, along with tests such as Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) and Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity. Exploratory factor analysis of Principal Components and Rotation Method was performed: Oblimin with Kaiser Normalization.
Results:
The results revealed rigorous content validity, ensuring adequate representation to measure the construct. Internal consistency was demonstrated with a Cronbach’s alpha instrument reliability of 0.915. The KMO analysis and Bartlett’s test confirmed the suitability of the data for factorisation, identifying two factors associated with confrontation toward the aggressor and assistance toward the victim. These factors provided a solid conceptual structure for the scale.
Conclusion:
The tool was revealed to be effective in evaluating attitudes towards gender violence among university nursing students.
Descriptors:
validation studies; behaviour rating scale; attitude of health personnel; nursing students; gender-based violence.
Legal responses to domestic abuse have been a political priority of the UK Government since at least 2010, eventually leading to the passing of the seminal legislation in this area for England and Wales, the Domestic Abuse Act 2021. However, the exclusion of protection for migrant victim-survivors with precarious immigration statuses under the Act demonstrates a failure in understanding that the experience and risk of domestic abuse differ for these individuals from that of the mainstream, due to their intersectional identities as (predominantly) migrant women. Many migrant victim-survivors still find themselves trapped in abusive situations, as the law fails to safeguard their rights to reside legally should they choose to present themselves to authorities by reporting their abuse. A distinct lack of acknowledgment as to inequalities faced by those at the intersection of migrant status and gender (Crenshaw, 1989; 1991) has led to increased insecurity for some of the most vulnerable. This article shines a light on this discrimination under the law in England and Wales. It adopts an intersectionality framework to examine such inequality, analysing Appendix Violence Domestic Abuse and the Migrant Victim Domestic Abuse Concession in UK immigration law, as well as the Support for Migrant Victims Pilot and its relevant Evaluation Report, against the international standards of the Istanbul Convention. It argues that the UK Government is failing to tackle the problem of migrant victim-survivors’ protection concerning domestic abuse, and in some situations, has made it worse. This article aims to state the law as of 1 May 2024.
The radical-feminist, urban-guerrilla group, Rote Zora (Red Zora), operated in West Germany between 1974 and 1995 and was responsible for several bombings and arsons. The attacks were aimed against those the group considered as ideological enemies; these ‘enemies’ were targeted because they were promoting and engaging in sexist practices and reactionary politics to maintain and extend the hegemony of the capitalist, imperialist and patriarchal society of the West.
The article aims to contribute to the emerging discussion, and hopefully to give some visibility to the important tradition of anarchafeminism. As such, by means of a close reading of Rote Zora’s interviews, communiqués and actions, I want to highlight the importance that these texts may have in advancing and enriching an anarchafeminist theory and practice that can oppose different forms of oppression, coming both from the apparent enemies (the law, patriarchy, the state, capitalism, the police) and from the enemy within (any tendencies of domination and/or the neglect of certain groups and sensitivities within radical groups themselves).
The forensic medical examination is often lauded as an effective intervention to reduce case attrition by providing evidence that supports a rape or sexual assault complaint. We show that, despite nearly universal enthusiasm for such programmes, the examination also serves as an extra-legal opportunity for criminal justice and medical personnel to assess the credibility of rape and sexual assault complainants. Drawing on five case studies from three countries, we investigate the medico-legal exam as a complicated process that helps shape case outcomes often in ways unanticipated by proponents of forensic medical examinations. We argue that through co-optation of language about choice, consent, and empowerment, and despite significant variation in procedures, protocols, and legal rules, personnel involved with the medico-legal process often use it to impose formal and informal ‘tests’ for assessing complainant credibility and to dismiss or cast doubt upon some rape and sexual assault reports.
