Introduction

Eugene McLaughilin & Tim Newburn

Introduction A volume such as this must inevitably begin with a few explanatory words. We will come to what we take the term ‘theory’ to cover shortly. First, however, we must say something about what counts as a criminological theory or, at least, what has informed the choices lying behind the selection of chapters in this volume. At heart, the focus here – criminology – is nothing more or less than a ‘specific genre of discourse and inquiry about crime’ (Garland, 2002: 8); it is a peculiarly modern form of talking and thinking about those activities commonly thought of as criminal. Though an incomplete definition, many of us still turn regularly to Edwin Sutherland and Donald Cressey's (1960) classic summary of the subject as the study of the making of laws, the breaking of laws, and of society's reaction to the breaking of laws. Criminology is the body of knowledge ...

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