Brutally dragged 780 metres beneath a taxi – a young woman’s inspiring story of survival, courage, and the will to live.

13 September 2011. The story would shock thousands and be remembered by many for years to come. It would be plastered all over the papers and continue to attract interest well after the shock factor of what happened had passed. Reports and articles would be written, and “facts”, as given to reporters by some of those involved and willing to be interviewed, would be recounted and repeated in all forms of public media over the months and even years that followed. And although these versions would generate widespread outrage, none was entirely accurate.

"The stories were about me. I was there. I am Kim McCusker - the girl who was dragged by a taxi. This, as I experienced it, is the true version of events."

'Sobering, thought-provoking and action-provoking ... I can't recommend it highly enough' Nihal Arthanayake, BBC Radio Five Live 'Thoughtful, empowering and important' Mishal Husain Have you ever... seen a report on the news about male violence, heard a troubling story from a female friend, or witnessed a woman being treated unfairly ...and wondered what men can do about it? In this accessible and inclusive new book, award-winning journalist and campaigner Sophie Gallagher brings men into the conversation and explores how they can help change our society for the better. Looking at everything from the #NotAllMen argument to challenging assumptions about women, and from learning about The Gap to how to act when passing a woman in the street at night, Sophie reveals the biggest issues standing in the way of gender equality and offers practical steps and advice on how to be part of the solution, not the problem. How Men Can Help is an essential book for anyone looking to understand the past, improve their behaviour in the present, and make a brighter, safer and fairer future for everyone.

The academic field of peace studies emerged during the Cold War to address the nature and sources of interstate and internal conflict, as well as the methods to prevent this conflict and deal with its consequences.
Peace studies, much like political science itself, is an interdisciplinary field, built upon contributions from psychology, sociology, history and economics among others. It differs from related fields, such as strategic studies or security studies, in its implicit normative and teleological orientation: an expectation that scholarly research can contribute to reducing the sources of conflict to produce a more just and peaceful world.

Globally, rates of sexual violence remain unacceptably high, with disproportionate effects on women and girls. While most scholars and practitioners uniformly concur about the scope of the problem, there is currently little agreement about how to prevent sexual violence before it occurs.Drawing on diverse disciplines such as criminology, education, health promotion, law, psychology, social work, socio-legal studies, sociology and women's studies, this book provides the first interdisciplinary collection on the primary prevention of sexual violence. The volume addresses the key causes or determinants of sexual violence, including cultural attitudes, values, beliefs and norms, as well as systemic gender-based inequalities that create the conditions underlying much violence against women. Including contributions from internationally renowned experts in the field, the volume critically investigates the theoretical underpinnings of prevention work, describing and analysing the limits and possibilities of primary prevention strategies 'on the ground'. The chapters collectively examine the role that structural violence and gender inequality play in fostering a 'culture' of sexual violence, and reflect on the relationship between macro and micro levels for understanding both sexual violence perpetration and prevention.This book will be a key resource for scholars, practitioners and policymakers involved in the fields of sexual violence prevention, education, law, family violence, and child sexual abuse.Including contributions from Victoria L. Banyard (University of New Hampshire, USA), Alison Cares (Assumption College, USA), Moira Carmody (University of Western Sydney, Australia), Gillian Fletcher (La Trobe Univeristy, Australia), Wendy Larcombe (University of Melbourne, Australia), Claire Maxwell (University of London, UK), Mary M. Moynihan (University of New Hampshire, USA), Bob Pease (Deakin University, Australia) and Antonia Quadara (Australian Institute of Family Studies, Australia).

Why did the Rwandan genocide take place? How could parents feed their own children drinks laced with poison in Jonestown? As we see many parts of the world being engulfed in fratricidal frenzy, we wonder if it can happen in this country. Gupta examines contemporary cases of genocide and mass murder and seeks to explain why certain societies are more prone to these actions and others are relatively immune. Gupta sees a dialectical tension between our two identities: the self and the collective. The end of the medieval period was marked by the emergence of individualism in Europe. With time, the march of individualism engulfed the entire Western world and permeated every aspect of its culture, tradition, and academic paradigm. Neoclassical economics is the embodiment of this single-minded pursuit of the rationality of individualism. However, our psychobiological evolution has also imbued us with the irrepressible desire to form groups and to act upon its welfare. The reason for this eternal conflict lies in our own struggle with our two identities. When the pendulum swings to the extreme end of collectivism, genocide and other forms of social abnormalities--collective madness--occur. When we move too far into individualism, people tend to seek something greater beyond selfish pursuits. Through his panoramic view, Gupta provides an explanation for both social order and political pathology that will be of interest to students, scholars, and other researchers involved with ethnic conflict, collective behavior, and conflict resolution.

This newly revised edition includes two new chapters exploring events in policing since the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO in 2014. More than summarizing historical events, Cooper contextualizes the subsequent riots in light of classic sociological theory and political philosophy, and offers a potential and compelling new direction for improving both police use of force and the relationship between police and communities.

Refractions of Violence collects the recent essays of leading cultural critic and intellectual historian Martin Jay. Ranging over a wide variety of subjects, from Walter Benjamin's response to World War I to the Holocaust and the events of 9/11, this collection addresses the troubling issues of the intersection of violence and visual culture. It argues that we live in a closed economy of violence in which no outside can provide us with a safe haven from the treat of sudden, perhaps even fatal injury, either real or symbolic. By examining a number of ways in which the dialectic of violence and counter-violence finds its way into the arts, both high and low, and permeates visual experience in general, it hopes to cast some light on the dark recesses of contemporary life.

Weaving together a social history of the American beef industry with her own account of growing up in the shadow of her grandfather's cattle business, Halley juxtaposes the two worlds and creates a link between the meat industry and her own experience of the formation of gender and sexuality through family violence.

The "fascinating" true story behind the HBO Max and Hulu series about Texas housewife Candy Montgomery and the bizarre murder that shocked a community (Los Angeles Times Book Review). Candy Montgomery and Betty Gore had a lot in common: They sang together in the Methodist church choir, their daughters were best friends, and their husbands had good jobs working for technology companies in the north Dallas suburbs known as Silicon Prairie. But beneath the placid surface of their seemingly perfect lives, both women simmered with unspoken frustrations and unanswered desires. On a hot summer day in 1980, the secret passions and jealousies that linked Candy and Betty exploded into murderous rage. What happened next is usually the stuff of fiction. But the bizarre and terrible act of violence that occurred in Betty's utility room that morning was all too real. Based on exclusive interviews with the Gore and Montgomery families, Edgar Award finalist Evidence of Love is the "superbly written" account of a gruesome tragedy and the trial that made national headlines when the defendant entered the most unexpected of pleas: not guilty by reason of self-defense (Fort Worth Star-Telegram). Adapted into the Emmy and Golden Globe Award-winning television movie A Killing in a Small Town-as well as the new limited series Candy on Hulu and Love and Death on HBO Max-this chilling tale of sin and savagery will "fascinate true crime aficionados" (Kirkus Reviews).

From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Prairie Fires comes a terrifying true-crime history of serial killers in the Pacific Northwest and beyond—a gripping investigation of how a new strain of psychopath emerged out of a toxic landscape of deadly industrial violence.

Caroline Fraser grew up in the shadow of Ted Bundy, the most notorious serial murderer of women in American history, surrounded by his hunting grounds and mountain body dumps, in the brooding landscape of the Pacific Northwest. But in the 1970s and ’80s, Bundy was just one perpetrator amid an uncanny explosion of serial rape and murder across the region. Why so many? Why so weirdly and nightmarishly gruesome? Why the senseless rise and then sudden fall of an epidemic of serial killing?

As Murderland indelibly maps the lives and careers of Bundy and his infamous peers in mayhem—the Green River Killer, the I-5 Killer, the Night Stalker, the Hillside Strangler, even Charles Manson—Fraser’s Northwestern death trip begins to uncover a deeper mystery and an overlapping pattern of environmental destruction. At ground zero in Ted Bundy’s Tacoma stood one of the most poisonous lead, copper, and arsenic smelters in the world, but it was hardly unique in the West. As Fraser’s investigation inexorably proceeds, evidence mounts that the plumes of these smelters not only sickened and blighted millions of lives but also warped young minds, including some who grew up to become serial killers.

A propulsive nonfiction thriller, Murderland transcends true-crime voyeurism and noir mythology, taking readers on a profound quest into the dark heart of the real American berserk.

Recent research has begun to highlight the importance of German arguments about legitimate resistance and self-defence for French, English and Scottish Protestants. This book systematically studies the reception of German thought in England, arguing that it played a much greater role than has hitherto been acknowledged. Both the Marian exiles, and others concerned with the fate of continental Protestantism, eagerly read what German reformers had to say about the possibility of resisting the religious policies of a monarch without compromising the institution of monarchy itself. However, the transfer of German arguments to England, with its individual political and constitutional environment, necessarily involved the subtle transformation of these arguments into forms compatible with local traditions. In this way, German arguments contributed significantly to the emergence of new theories, emphasising natural rights.

School shootings have raised considerable interest among scholars as a global (media) cultural phenomenon and have increased specifically in the 1990s developing into a seeming cultural epidemic. This book contributes to the current academic discussion on school shootings by analysing this phenomenon in a broader context of mediatization in contemporary social and cultural life. Mediatized logic has the power to influence us as individuals communicating about the shootings and experiencing the shootings as victimizers, victims, witnesses or bystanders. In three sections, this book explores shootings from different, yet interconnected, perspectives: (1) a theoretical focus on media and school shootings within various sociological and cultural dimensions, specifically how contemporary media transform school shootings into mediatized violence; (2) a focus on the practices of mediatization, with emphasis on mediated coverage of school shootings and its political, cultural, social and ethical implications; and (3) an examination of the audiences, victims and witnesses of school shootings as well as organizations which try to manage these public crimes of significant media interest.

Survivor Criminology: A Radical Act of Hope is a trauma-informed approach to the study of crime and justice that stems from the lived experiences of crime survivors. The chapters within this volume explore our authors' who have each had close personal encounters with violence and death, as well as institutionalized oppressions based on racism, heterosexism, sexism, and poverty. As scholars, professors, practitioners, and students in the field, these lived experiences with crime and criminal justice have shaped their research, teaching, and advocacy work. Their voices represent experiences that are intersectional, mult-igenerational, global, trauma-informed and resiliency focused. They are deliberately and decidedly anti-racist, and their experiences acknowledge the harm that has resulted from institutionalized and structural trauma. Most importantly, their stories are grounded in their lived experiences. This volume offers survivor criminology as a radical act of hope. Our hope comes from the belief that a trauma-centered approach to crime, justice, and healing provides the opportunity for criminology to expand its theoretical and methodological roots. We see this work as transformative for the discipline - for students, scholars, members of the community, and policy-makers.

How to manage and respond to escalating violence towards staff working in the human services is a pressing professional problem. This workbook.
Empowers individuals by providing a range of useful skills that can help in managing aggression
Enables staff placed in difficult or dangerous situations by their employers to address the issue effectively
Clarifies the responsibilities of the manager in ensuring staff are safeguarded
Builds confidence in staff and their managers by offering workable solutions to reducing levels of aggression in the workplace.
Highlighting examples of good and bad practice, Managing Aggression is a book for anyone who has ever faced, or is likely to face, aggression at work.

As a global problem, human trafficking frequently victimizes the most vulnerable: children. Offenders often use the Internet as a vehicle for criminal activities, including acts to sexually exploit children. With Internet access growing exponentially, more children are online every day, increasing their risk of becoming involved in sexual exploitation or being treated as a commodity. Inconsistent law among States and their lack of cooperation across borders makes combatting this issue increasingly difficult. Therefore, it is crucial to establish legal and policy frameworks that can be used to fight practices of online child sexual exploitation and increase the effectiveness of States' responses. This book offers alternative solutions using a human rights approach and promotes multi-stakeholder collaboration in the context of corporate social responsibility to prevent and combat these offenses. This book explores the intersection of children's human rights, cybersex trafficking, and international legislation. It provides helpful insights for lawmakers, legal practitioners, scholars, law enforcement officers, child advocates, and students interested in human rights law, criminal law, and child protection.

Research in Human Social Conflict

Guns are everywhere: three quarters of a billion guns - from pistols to machine guns - exist in the world today. And guns are everything: a hard-won symbol of individual freedom, an index of crime and disorder, a whole industry legitimately contributing to an economy, a popular piece of sports equipment, and an object of desire, endlessly duplicated by toys, video games and films. Open Fire presents a broad analysis of the social, cultural and political significance of firearms and the worlds they create. Illustrated with a wide range of case material - from North and South America, Europe, Asia and Africa - Open Fire explores and questions this global icon of our times. Why do guns proliferate? What does it mean to shoot or to be shot? Who owns guns and who does not? How is a firearm, a manufactured thing, very different from any other object? Is there such a thing as a "gun psychology"? How are firearms regarded in places where they are largely non-existent? Is a gun a different thing when held by a white man?

"While most analyses don't define violence and regard it as an essentially contested concept, this book argues for an ontological definition of violence as a reduction of being. This enables a critical sociology to move beyond tacit acceptance of a historically contingent definition of violence as profferred by the state"--Provided by publisher.

America is fascinated by violence - where it comes from in ourselves, how it spreads through society, and what effect it has on the next generation. This collection of essays examines numerous facets of violence in contemporary American culture, ranging across literature, film, philosophy, religion, fairy tales, children's play, photojournalism, and sports. In particular, Why We Watch is the first book to offer a careful look at why we are drawn to depictions of violence and why there is a market for violent entertainment.

The preparation of this volume began with a conference held at Trier University, approximately thirty years after the publication of the first Belief in a Just World (BJW) manuscript. The location of the conference was especially appropriate given the continued interest that the Trier faculty and students had for BJW research and theory. As several chapters in this volume document, their research together with the other contributors to this volume have added to the current sophistication and status of the BJW construct. In the 1960s and 1970s Melvin Lerner, together with his students and colleagues, developed his justice motive theory. The theory of Belief in a Just World (BJW) was part of that effort. BJW theory, meanwhile in its thirties, has become very influential in social and behavioral sciences. As with every widely applied concept and theory there is a natural develop mental history that involves transformations, differentiation of facets, and efforts to identify further theoretical relationships. And, of course, that growth process will not end unless the theory ceases to develop. In this volume this growth is reconstructed along Furnham's stage model for the development of scientific concepts. The main part of the book is devoted to current trends in theory and research."

The chapters of Religion, Gender, and Family Violence: When Prayers Are Not Enough have been written from multiple disciplinary perspectives (sociology, religious studies, law) and based on research within diverse religious traditions including Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, as well as new religious movements. Similarities and differences between traditions are highlighted based on empirical research which shows how people actually deal with family violence in different contexts. This book also addresses some of the larger historical and political backgrounds that impact the experiences of family violence amongst ethno-religious minorities. The lives of religious victims and perpetrators of family violence are considered, as well as the responsibilities of religious leaders, congregations and secular professionals in addressing this widespread social problem.