This book examines social patterns in 2,000 mass shootings in the United States between 2013 through 2020. While mass shootings are often described as psychological, the authors show that there are social factors that produce the anger needed to commit a mass shooting. These factors are fairly common and can be addressed to stem the anger earlier. The factors include chronic poverty, sudden unemployment, relationship problems, domestic violence, social isolation, and alcohol. Common social strains can metastasize and be lethally dangerous. By understanding the social factors, we can reduce the anger and frustration people feel that would drive them to killing others.

This book examines social patterns in 2,000 mass shootings in the United States between 2013 through 2020. While mass shootings are often described as psychological, the authors show that there are social factors that produce the anger needed to commit a mass shooting. These factors are fairly common and can be addressed to stem the anger earlier. The factors include chronic poverty, sudden unemployment, relationship problems, domestic violence, social isolation, and alcohol. Common social strains can metastasize and be lethally dangerous. By understanding the social factors, we can reduce the anger and frustration people feel that would drive them to killing others.

Drawing on feminist theory, as well as theory surrounding the correlation between poverty and suicide, this study explores the increased rate of suicide among women in western Iran. Based on empirical research, including interviews with women from the Kurdish region of the country, the author considers the marginalisation of Kurdish populations in Iran, the suppression of their rights, and violence against women in its various forms. With attention to family violence, such as direct physical or sexual assault, psychological bullying or through practices such as forced marriage or honour killings, the author also considers the political nature of such violence, as certain violent practices are enshrined in the Iranian constitution and legitimised in jurisprudential practice. A study of gendered violence and its effects, Women and Suicide in Iran will be of interest to scholars working in the fields of Sociology, Criminology and Middle Eastern Studies with interests in violence, gender and suicide.

Serves to expand what is currently known and understood about serial and mass murderers Examines offenders based on type (solo male, solo female, and co-offenders) in order to elucidate similarities and differences among multicide offending patterns, theoretical explanations, and outcomes Examines the applicability of criminological theories to the criminality of women and multiple offenders, drawing on psychological theories to add further dimension to our understanding.

In 1932 Einstein asked Freud, 'Is there any way of delivering mankind from the menace of war?' Freud answered that war is inevitable because humans have an instinct to self-destroy, a death instinct which we must externalize to survive. But nearly four decades of study of aggression reveal that rather than being an inborn drive, destructiveness is generated in us by experiences of excessive psychic pain. In War is Not Inevitable: On the Psychology of War and Aggression, Henri Parens argues that the death-instinct based model of aggression can neither be proved nor disproved as Freud's answer is untestable. By contrast, the 'multi-trends theory of aggression' is provable and has greater heuristic value than does a death-instinct based model of aggression. When we look for causes for war we turn to history as well as national, ethnic, territorial, and or political issues, among many others, but we also tend to ignore the psychological factors that play a large role. Parens discusses such psychological factors that seem to lead large groups into conflict. Central among these are the psychodynamics of large-group narcissism. Interactional conditions stand out: hyper-narcissistic large-groups have, in history, caused much narcissistic injury to those they believe they are superior to. But this is commonly followed by the narcissistically injured group's experiencing high level hostile destructiveness toward their injury-perpetrator which, in time, will compel them to revenge. Among groups that have been engaged in serial conflicts, wars have followed from this psychodynamic narcissism-based cyclicity. Parens details some of the psychodynamics that led from World War I to World War II and their respective aftermath, and he addresses how major factors that gave rise to these wars must, can, and have been counteracted. In doing so, Parens considers strategies by which civilization has and is constructively preventing wars, as well as the need for further innovative efforts to achieve that end.

The result of 15 years of research and exclusive information, this is the first book of investigative journalism to tell the complete story of Littleton, Colorado's 1999 mass shooting, its far-reaching consequences, and common characteristics among public shooters across the country. A classic in the tradition of "In Cold Blood "and "The Executioner's Song," it comprehensively explores fundamental American themes of violence, racism, parenting, and policing. This updated and revised edition concludes with new material about public shootings since Columbine and how communities can stop such horrific events from happening in the future.

This book has a multi-disciplinary market across criminology, sociology and gender studies. It would be useful supplementary reading for a range of courses, including gender and crime, violence against women, and sociology of culture.

Relying primarily on a narrative, chronological approach, this study examines Ku Klux Klan activities in Pennsylvania's twenty-five western-most counties, where the state organization enjoyed greatest numerical strength. The work covers the period between the Klan's initial appearance in the state in 1921 and its virtual disappearance by 1928, particularly the heyday of the Invisible Empire, 1923-1925. This book examines a wide variety of KKK activities, but devotes special attention to the two large and deadly Klan riots in Carnegie and Lilly, as well as vigilantism associated with the intolerant order. Klansmen were drawn from a pool of ordinary Pennsylvanians who were driven, in part, by the search for fraternity, excitement, and civic betterment. However, their actions were also motivated by sinister, darker emotions and purposes. Disdainful of the rule of law, the Klan sought disorder and mayhem in pursuit of a racist, nativist, anti-Catholic, anti-Jewish agenda.

Violence has always played a part in the religious imagination, from symbols and myths to legendary battles, from colossal wars to the theater of terrorism. The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Violence surveys intersections between religion and violence throughout history and around the world. The forty original essays in this volume include overviews of major religious traditions, showing how violence is justified within the literary and theological foundations of the tradition, how it is used symbolically and in ritual practice, and how social acts of violence and warfare have been justified by religious ideas. The essays also examine patterns and themes relating to religious violence, such as sacrifice and martyrdom, which are explored in cross-disciplinary or regional analyses; and offer major analytic approaches, from literary to social scientific studies. The contributors to this volume--innovative thinkers who are forging new directions in theory and analysis related to religion and violence--provide novel insights into this important field of studies. By mapping out the whole field of religion and violence, The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Violence will prove an authoritative source for students and scholars for years to come.

Legacies of State Violence and Transitional Justice in Latin America presents a nuanced and evidence-based discussion of both the acceptance and co-optation of the transitional justice framework and its potential abuses in the context of the struggle to keep the memory of the past alive and hold perpetrators accountable within Latin America and beyond. The contributors argue that "transitional justice"-understood as both a conceptual framework shaping discourses and a set of political practices-is a Janus-faced paradigm. Historically it has not always advanced but often hindered attempts to achieve historical memory and seek truth and justice. This raises the vital question: what other theoretical frameworks can best capture legacies of human rights crimes? Providing a historical view of current developments in Latin America's reckoning processes, Legacies of State Violence and Transitional Justice in Latin America reflects on the meaning of the paradigm's reception: what are the broader political and social consequences of supporting, appropriating, or rejecting the transitional justice paradigm?

- draws upon 20 years on research in serious and violent youth offenders. - a unique dataset that has implications for policy and future research. - although the data is from youth based in Canada, the findings could be applied to many jurisdictions worldwide.

Survival Driving: Staying Alive on the World's Most Dangerous Roads, Second Edition was written to inform and protect: to keep people alive by making them more situationally aware. Any person is a potential target, either from a criminal or a terrorist threat, depending on your profession and the type of environment you live and work in. Driving is the most important part of a person's security program, whether the person is traveling alone or the executive being moved by his or her security detail. The book is written in plain, easy to understand language providing straight-forward guidance that outlines tools to ensure security whenever in transit in a vehicle. This includes making themselves a hard target in order to avoid attack. While most terrorist or criminal attacks are difficult to predict, the majority of attacks take place when a person is in transit. By providing tools such as rout analysis, identifying choke points, learning where safe havens are located along a route, individuals are able to predict the places that are most vulnerable, and take steps to ensure safety. VIPs, executives, those working in-or traveling to-volatile regions of the world, and those hired to protect such individuals will equally learn how to detect surveillance when it is targeted against them, when they are the potential target. Failing this, the book also provides the tools a person needs to break contact and escape when an attack against them while moving in their vehicle occurs. The book covers basic and advanced driving skills and instructs on how to best understand the transport vehicle and its capabilities. Key Features: Instructs readers on how to recognize and anticipate potential attack sites during movement Illustrates how to properly maintain a vehicle at peak performance in different environments so it will work as required when needed Describes vehicle dynamics and, specifically, how a vehicle can be used as a tool to protect, and aid escape, when under attack Outlines the ways individuals can become more situationally aware in their movements Maps out key security driving elements such as steering, braking, vehicle dynamics, and evasive maneuvers to escape amidst a threat By raising situational awareness, increasing knowledge of the attack cycle, and outlining the nature of threats, Survival Driving can transform any reader from a soft target to an informed hard target who threat actors will want to avoid.

Examining violence against women in the name of honor in Iraqi Kurdistan, this study renders a unique contribution by offering an intersectional perspective. Minoo Alinia reveals the links between destructive, state-sanctioned honor discourse and notions of manhood as they are shaped by a resistance culture dedicated to the struggle against ethnic oppression. Supplying socioeconomic, historical, and political contexts, this book challenges explanations rooted in ideas of individual or cultural pathology. It demonstrates that, in Iraqi Kurdistan, women's bodies have become the battleground for clashes between different masculinities, identity politics, and political projects.

Sociologists and criminologists have long known that there is a relationship between masculinity and crime. Indeed, gender has been advanced consistently as the strongest predictor of criminal involvement. Flesh and Blood provides a fascinating account of the connection among adolescent gender diversity, the body, and assaultive violence. The book is divided into four parts. In Part I, the author explores the history of criminology as a discipline, paying particular attention to the misgivings about the body, gender, and crime. Messerschmidt shows that criminology historically has maintained, in various ways, the mind-body, sex-gender, and gender difference binaries. In Part II, Messerschmidt presents a theoretical framework_structured action theory_for overcoming these binaries. This perspective allows conceptualization of: embodiment as a lived aspect of gender, both gender differences and gender similarities in the commission of crime, how embodied social action is embedded in specific structural gender relations in particular settings, and how embodied social actions may be related to violence and nonviolence. The methodology for the study is also presented in Part II, which seeks to understand, through life-history interviews, certain boys' and girls' use of assaultive violence as a gendered practice. Part III presents in depth life histories of four white working-class boys and girls involved in assaultive violence. The two chief questions addressed in these life stories are: Why is it that some boys and some girls engage in assaultive violence and how are these violent boys and girls similar and different? How are gender relations in specific settings-such as the family, the school, and the street-related to motivation for embodied violence and nonviolence by the same boys and girls? Part IV puts structured action theory to work by analyzing the three major sites (home, school, and street) of the boys' and girls' life histories and how these are related to assaultive violence and nonviolence. The analysis reveals both similarities and differences between assaultive boys and girls and the fallacy of the mind-body, sex-gender, and gender difference binaries. The book closes with a chapter on how girls' assaultive violence may disrupt gender difference in various ways.

This book discusses femicide in Italy, and the cultural conversations that have resulted from feminist discourse on lethal violence against women entering the mainstream, by analyzing journalistic inquiries and literary works produced after 2012. In a global and national context where activism's goals are mainly discursive this study deepens our understanding of the role played by written narratives in the critique of a public interest matter such as gender-based violence. The first part of the book is dedicated to the analysis of three journalistic inquiries published in book format that focus on one or more cases of femicide that happened on the Italian peninsula. The second section draws on the concept of feminist rewriting to propose the analysis of a heterogeneous body of literary texts that explore some of the most controversial and notorious femicide cases covered by previous journalistic, historical, or mythical narratives, before demonstrating the close connection between theoretical and narrative discourse within the analyzed texts. This is a fascinating case study contributing to global understandings of gender-based violence, which will be important for researchers in gender studies, sociology, and media studies.

For many children and young people, Britain is a harmful society in which to grow up. This book contextualizes the violence that occurs between a small number of young people within a wider perspective on social harm. Aimed at academics, youth workers and policy makers, the book presents a new way to make sense of this pressing social problem. The authors also propose measures to substantially improve the lives of Britain's young people in areas ranging from the early years to youth services and the criminal justice system.

Published in 2009, the first edition of Forensic Victimology introduced criminologists and criminal investigators to the idea of systematically gathering and examining victim information for the purposes of addressing investigative and forensic issues. The concepts presented within immediately proved vital to social scientists researching victims-offender relationships; investigators and forensic scientists seeking to reconstruct events and establish the elements of a crime; and criminal profilers seeking to link pattern crimes. This is because the principles and guidelines in Forensic Victimology were written to serve criminal investigation and anticipate courtroom testimony.

As with the first, this second edition of Forensic Victimology is an applied presentation of a traditionally theoretical subject written by criminal justice practitioners with years of experience-both in the field and in the classroom. It distinguishes the investigative and forensic aspects of applied victim study as necessary adjuncts to what has often been considered a theoretical field. It then identifies the benefits of forensic victimology to casework, providing clearly defined methods and those standards of practice necessary for effectively serving the criminal justice system.
30% new content, with new chapters on Emergency Services, False Confessions, and Human TraffickingUse of up-to-date references and case examples to demonstrate the application of forensic victimologyProvides context and scope for both the investigative and forensic aspects of case examination and evidence interpretationApproaches the study of victimology from a realistic standpoint, moving away from stereotypes and archetypesUseful for students and professionals working in relation to behavioral science, criminology, criminal justice, forensic science, and criminal investigation

This topical book engages with a wide range of issues related to social work practice with people who have sexually offended. It addresses the emotional impacts of 'facing the sex offender', the importance of values and ethics in practice, and reviews popular and academic understandings of sex offenders and sex crimes. Its accessible style and use of practice based learning exercises will help readers to reflect on theory, practice and developing emotional resilience.

From the popular video game Mortal Kombat to reality TV, this book offers a candid compilation of the history, problems, impacts, and solutions relating to media violence. Violence in the Media: A Reference Handbook documents the issues, impact, controversies, and consequences of one of the most insidious phenomena facing American society. With 99 percent of American homes having TV sets, the book's main focus is on television violence and in particular its effects on children, who spend an average of 28 hours a week watching television. A historical synopsis, covering early concerns that continue to be hotly debated, describes congressional hearings and their outcomes. Brief biographies present perspectives on key players like theoretician Albert Bandura, communication scholar George Gerbner, and Representative Edward Marke (D-MA). A discussion of the evidence both supporting and condemning media violence includes its use by perpetrators in the Columbine High School shootings and recent sniper attacks. A chronology dating back to the Payne Fund Studies, published in the 1930s, outlines congressional hearings and other pertinent events Provides information about relevant organizations and websites that can be used by parents for more detailed information about television violence and how to deal with it in the home

Activist and scholar Kitty Kelly Epstein tells the unique story of a city that recruits a progressive mayoral candidate, defeats a political machine, mobilizes a thousand residents to make policy, and then implements many of the policies created by this participatory process. Violence, jobs, education, and gentrification are all addressed by the ongoing social justice movement and its victories, including a 40% drop in the homicide rate, 8,000 likely new jobs, and a program that produces diverse and effective teachers. This very accessible book will be useful in urban studies, sociology, education, ethnic studies, civic engagement, political science, and policy studies classes and to those who are studying protest movements. The author explains the history of modern urban inequity and the racial wealth gap and then proposes on-going strategy and tactics for social activists in every city. Her co-authors, Lynch and Allen-Taylor, add their own intimate perspectives on these dynamic developments.

This book is about environmental defenders and the violence they face while seeking to protect their land and the environment. Between 2002 and 2019, at least two thousand people were killed in 57 countries for defending their lands and the environment. Recent policy initiatives and media coverage have provided much needed attention to the protection and support of defenders, but there has so far been little scholarly work. This edited volume explains who these defenders are, what threats they face, and what can be done to help support and protect them. Delving deep into the complex relations between and within communities, corporations, and government authorities, the book highlights the diversity of defenders, the collective character of their struggles, the many drivers and forms of violence they are facing, as well as the importance of emotions and gendered dimensions in protests and repression. Drawing on global case studies, it examines the violence taking place around different types of development projects, including fossil fuels, agro-industrial, renewable energy, and infrastructure. The volume also examines the violence surrounding conservation projects, including through militarized wildlife protection and surveillance technologies. The book concludes with a reflection on the perspectives of defenders about the best ways to support and protect them. It contrasts these with the lagging efforts of an international community often promoting economic growth over the lives of defenders. This volume is essential reading for all interested in understanding the challenges faced by environmental defenders and how to help and support them. It will also appeal to students, scholars and practitioners involved in environmental protection, environmental activism, human rights, social movements and development studies.

This book, first published in 1930 and reissued in 1961, examines the Western phenomenon of the rise of the 'mass-man'. Analysing the state of society before the Second World War, acclaimed philosopher Ortega y Gasset lays bare the problems that faced the countries of Europe in a book that resonates today in the imposition of direct action over discussion.