Privatisation was introduced into the probation service on the 1st June 2014 whereby work with medium and low risk offenders went to a number of private and voluntary bodies, work with high risk offenders remained with the State. The National Probation Service (NPS) covered State work whilst the 35 existing Probation Trusts were replaced by 21 Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRCs). Staff were allocated to either side of the divide but all remained as probation officers. The effect was that the existing probation service lost control of all but 30,000 of the most high risk cases, with the other 220,000 low to medium risk offenders being farmed out to private firms. Privatisation was justified as the only available way of achieving important policy objectives of extending post release supervision to offenders on short sentences, a group who are the most prolific offenders with high reconviction rates yet who receive no statutory support. This book describes the process by which the probation service became privatised, assessing its impact on the probation service itself, and on the criminal justice system generally. It considers both the justifications for privatisation, as well as the criticisms of it, and asks to what extent the probation service can survive such changes, and what future it has as a service dedicated to the welfare of offenders. It demonstrates how the privatisation of probation can be seen as a trend away from traditional public service in criminal justice towards an emphasis on efficiency and cost effectiveness. This book is essential reading for criminology students engaged with criminal justice, social policy, probation, punishment and working with offenders. It will also be key reading for practitioners and policy makers in jurisdictions where there is an interest in extending their own privatisation practice.

At a time when Europe is witnessing major cultural, social, economic and political challenges and transformations, this book brings together leading researchers and experts to consider a range of pressing questions relating to the historical origins, contemporary manifestations and future prospects for juvenile justice. Questions considered include: How has the history of juvenile justice evolved across Europe and how might the past help us to understand the present and signal the future? What do we know about contemporary juvenile crime trends in Europe and how are nation states responding? Is punitivity and intolerance eclipsing child welfare and pedagogical imperatives, or is 'child-friendly justice' holding firm? How might we best understand both the convergent and the divergent patterning of juvenile justice in a changing and reformulating Europe? How is juvenile justice experienced by identifiable constituencies of children and young people both in communities and in institutions? What impacts are sweeping austerity measures, together with increasing mobilities and migrations, imposing? How can comparative juvenile justice be conceptualised and interpreted? What might the future hold for juvenile justice in Europe at a time of profound uncertainty and flux? This book is essential reading for students, tutors and researchers in the fields of criminology, history, law, social policy and sociology, particularly those engaged with childhood and youth studies, human rights, comparative juvenile/youth justice, youth crime and delinquency and criminal justice policy in Europe.

At a time when Europe is witnessing major cultural, social, economic and political challenges and transformations, this book brings together leading researchers and experts to consider a range of pressing questions relating to the historical origins, contemporary manifestations and future prospects for juvenile justice. Questions considered include: How has the history of juvenile justice evolved across Europe and how might the past help us to understand the present and signal the future? What do we know about contemporary juvenile crime trends in Europe and how are nation states responding? Is punitivity and intolerance eclipsing child welfare and pedagogical imperatives, or is 'child-friendly justice' holding firm? How might we best understand both the convergent and the divergent patterning of juvenile justice in a changing and reformulating Europe? How is juvenile justice experienced by identifiable constituencies of children and young people both in communities and in institutions? What impacts are sweeping austerity measures, together with increasing mobilities and migrations, imposing? How can comparative juvenile justice be conceptualised and interpreted? What might the future hold for juvenile justice in Europe at a time of profound uncertainty and flux? This book is essential reading for students, tutors and researchers in the fields of criminology, history, law, social policy and sociology, particularly those engaged with childhood and youth studies, human rights, comparative juvenile/youth justice, youth crime and delinquency and criminal justice policy in Europe.

This book aims to challenge current thinking about serious youth violence and gangs, and their racialisation by the media and the police. Written by an expert with over 14 years' experience in the field, it brings together research, theory and practice to influence policy. Placing gangs and urban violence in a broader social and political economic context, it argues that government-led policy and associated funding for anti-gangs work is counter-productive. It highlights how the street gang label is unfairly linked by both the news-media and police to black (and urban) youth street-based lifestyles/cultures and friendship groups, leading to the further criminalisation of innocent black youth via police targeting. The book is primarily aimed at practitioners, policy makers, academics as well as those community-minded individuals concerned about youth violence and social justice.

This book provides a comprehensive and thought-provoking introduction to the juvenile justice system in the United States. It begins by tracing the historical origins of the legal concept of juvenile delinquency and the institutional responses that developed, and analyzes the problem of delinquency, including its patterns, correlates, and causes. With this essential foundation, the greater part of the book examines the full range of efforts to respond to delinquency through both informal and formal mechanisms of juvenile justice. Core coverage includes: The history and transformation of juvenile justice, The nature and causes of delinquency, Policing juveniles, Juvenile court processes, Juvenile probation and community-based corrections, Residential placement and aftercare programs, Delinquency prevention, Linking systems of care. This book is designed as a core text for courses on juvenile justice. Each chapter begins with a compelling case study and learning objectives that draw attention to the topics discussed. Each chapter ends with one or two readings that introduce readers to the literature on juvenile justice. In addition, "critical thinking questions" invite analysis of the material covered in the chapter. A companion website offers an array of resources for students and instructors. For students, this includes chapter overviews, flashcards of key terms, and useful website links. The instructor site is password protected and offers a complete set of PowerPoint slides and an extensive test bank for each chapter-all prepared by the authors.

This powerful book reveals how modern strategies of punishment--and, by all accounts, their failure--relate to political and economic transformations in society at large. Jonathan Simon uses the practice of parole in California as a window to the changing historical understanding of what a corrections system does and how it works. Because California is representative of policies and practices on a national level, Simon explicitly presents his findings within a national framework.
When parole first emerged as a corrections strategy in the nineteenth century, work was supposed to keep ex-prisoners out of trouble. This strategy foundered in the changing economy after World War II. What followed was a rehabilitative strategy, where the clinical expertise of the parole agent replaced the discipline of the industrial labor market in defining and controlling criminal deviance. Today, Simon argues, as drastic changes in the economy have virtually locked out an entire class, rehabilitation has given way to mere management. The effect is isolation of the offender, either in jail or in an underclass community; the result is an escalating cycle of imprisonment, destabilization, and insecurity.
No significant improvement in the current penal crisis can be expected until we better understand the relationship between punishment and social order, a relationship which this book explores in theoretical, historical, and practical detail.

This field study features intensive personal interviews of more than four hundred young people who have left home and school and are living on the streets of Toronto and Vancouver. The study examines why youth take to the streets, their struggles to survive there, their victimization and involvement in crime, their associations with other street youth, especially within "street families," their contacts with the police, and their efforts to rejoin conventional society. Major theories of youth crime are analyzed and reappraised in the context of a new social capital theory of crime.

Prisons and AIDS is the first book to offer critical information on the proliferation of HIV and AIDS among prison populations and to provide a much needed resource for the design and implementation of education and prevention programs within correctional facilities. Written by experts in the field - including lead author Ronald L. Braithwaite, one of the foremost authorities on public health in the United States - this comprehensive resource is grounded in solid research, including survey information funded by the National Institute of Justice and the Centers for Disease Control. The book details numerous case studies from a variety of correctional facilities that reveal compelling information on frequency of sexual contact, drug use, needle sharing, tattooing, and the lack of access to condoms among inmates. In response to the disproportionately high incarceration rate of ethnic minorities, the authors provide strategies for developing culturally sensitive HIV/AIDS prevention programs in correctional settings. The book also documents differences in the patterns of HIV/AIDS cases among adult and juvenile and male and female inmates and explores policies and programs relevant to these populations, including education and prevention, testing and disclosure, partner notification, and housing. Written for policymakers, researchers, educators, health and human service providers, managers, and administrators of correctional institutions and community-based organizations, Prisons and AIDS provides the essential information for making informed decisions concerning this growing public health crisis.

Ten years ago there were no faith-based units in prisons outside South America. Today, they are spreading all over the world, including the United States, Europe and the Commonwealth. My Brother's Keeper is the first major study of a global phenomenon. Exploring the roots of faith-based units in South America, it explains why the Prison Service of England and Wales set up the first Christian-based unit in the western world in 1997 - and its rapid expansion. It also explains how, at exactly the same time, the United States introduced Christian-based units - and why they were complimented by interfaith and multifaith initiatives. At the heart of My Brother's Keeper is an interior account of life inside four Christian-based prison units in England. It draws on the findings of a detailed evaluation conducted by the authors for the Home Office, Prison Service and Kainos Community between 2000 and 2001, including an updated reconviction study. It is an authoritative account of an innovative programme. Its analysis of what works and what doesn't in faith-based units around the world makes My Brother's Keeper a valuable roadmap for all who care about improving prison conditions. It presents a vision of justice that is not just concerned with building more prisons but with rebuilding more prisoners. It argues that by making prisons more human and punishment more humane, faith-based units can be of value - and keep faith in prisons.

In recent years there has been a resurgence of interest in the role of the prison as a source of political ideas and site of political engagement, as well as in the prisoner's quest for citizenship. The rising number of prisoners has increased fiscal burdens, which has meant that imprisonment has become a more important political issue. There is also greater interest in the prison as a site of political activism and in the generation of radical political ideas within the prison context and the formation of political networks within prison which extend beyond the prison walls. This book considers the prison as a site of political protest, discusses the quest for citizenship and the denial or negation of citizenship in prison, examines the discovery of politics in prison and the role of the prison in increasing political awareness, explores the treatment of political prisoners and reflects on the prisoner as a political problem for politicians negotiating pressures from the media and the public when addressing prisoners' demands. Drawing on a range of contemporary and historical topics such as prison riots, radicalisation and the denial of voting rights, and including discussion of cases from the UK, US and Russia, this book examines the prison as a political institution and as a site of both politicisation and political protest. This book will be of interest to students and academics engaged with prisons, penology, punishment and corrections.

Juvenile delinquency and juvenile justice are two essential topics in the criminal justice curriculum. Sanborn and Salerno's The Juvenile Justice System: Law and Process is dedicated solely to explaining juvenile justice.
This text explores the many differences between the juvenile justice and the criminal justice systems, both those that benefit youths and those that are arguably unfair to them. The book concentrates, describes, and explains the unique traits of juvenile justice and what makes it so different from criminal justice.
The Juvenile Justice System specifically addresses what actually happens during the court process, devoting an entire chapter to the adjudicatory hearing as well as all other major decision-making stages. A unique feature is its in-depth coverage of plea bargaining. Also featured are topics such as parental role in the juvenile justice system, school searches, and the origin of juvenile court.
Another unique benefit of this text is the Numbers section at the end of several chapters, detailing how many youths have been affected by various decisions made in the juvenile justice system (such as arrest, detention, transfer to adult court, adjudication, being placed on probation, or committed to residential placement). In addition, the appendices identify juvenile justice standards for all 50 states and Washington, DC, as well as the federal jurisdiction. These standards apply to all decisions made within the juvenile justice system, including arrest, detention, diversion, intake, transfer, adjudication, disposition, and postdispositional stages.
The text is written in a conversational, reader-friendly style. Each chapter describes and analyzes, step by step, what young alleged offenders experience in each successive stage of the court process. For each chapter, outlines of key terms and concepts aid student comprehension and serve as a starting point for class discussion. Each chapter also features discussion questions designed to stimulate students' critical thinking.
A comprehensive Instructor's Manual/Testing Program is available, and an interactive Student Study Guide is included with each copy of the book.

Why do youths commit crimes? Delinquency and Crime contains essays by nine leading criminologists that seek to answer this question by describing current theories of crime and the research evidence that supports them. The contributors offer perspectives on antisocial peer socialization, social development, interactional theory, behavior genetics, and community determinants. Each essay explores the practical implication of the authors' theoretical work for crime prevention and control.

Why is crime persistent over generations, within families and within certain individuals? Is crime the manifestation of an inherited latent trait or the result of a failure of socialization and norm-setting processes? Why do youths commit crimes? Delinquency and Crime contains essays by nine leading criminologists that seek to answer these and other questions by describing current theories of crime and the research evidence that supports them. The authors' views on crime causation go beyond traditional criminological theories of strain, cultural deviance, social control, differential association and social learning to present emerging and integrated models of the origins of crime, including antisocial peer socialization, social development, interactional theory, behavior genetics, and community determinants. Each essay explores the practical implication of the authors' theoretical work for crime prevention and control.

Over the past three decades, the victim movement worldwide has agitated for an enhanced role for victims in the criminal justice system. In this book Heather Strang argues that, despite some progress towards that goal, structural as well as political factors may mean that victims have won as much as they are likely to gain from conventional justice processing. She asks whether restorative justice can offer them more justice than they receive from the formal court-based system. Drawing on a five-year study of the impact of a restorative justice programme on victims of both property and violent crime, Strang presents empirical evidence to show that the restorative alternative of conferencing more often than court-based solutions has the capacity to satisfy victims' expectations of achieving a meaningful role in the way their cases are dealt with as well as delivering restoration, especially emotional restoration, from the harm they have suffered.

"There is much of value in Jenkins' work. He manages to discuss CP calmly, while at the same time making clear his personal revulsion, an achievement in itself in an area characterized by so much hysteria."
-- "The Journal of Sex Research"

"Magnificently readable social science on a widely misunderstood subject."
--"Booklist"

"A useful introduction to the methods that the kiddie-porn community uses to hide its activities...a smart history of the child-porn industry"
"--The Washington Monthly," Nov. 2001

"This is a troubling book that exposes how child pornography has found a safe haven on the Internet. Philip Jenkins's innovative research methods let him explore and map the secret electronic networks that link individuals whose deviance seems not just outrageous, but incomprehensible. Jenkins shows how culture and social structure emerge in a virtual--and decidedly not virtuous--world. This book raises profound questions about the nature of deviance in an electronic future."
--Joel Best, University of Delaware

"A disturbing, thought-provoking study"
--"Library Journal"

"A detailed yet engaging account . . . . Engrossing"
--"Liberty," Jan. 2002

Perhaps nothing evokes more universal disgust as child pornography. The world of its makers and users is so abhorrent that it is rarely discussed much less studied. Child pornographers have taken advantage of this and are successfully using the new electronic media to exchange their wares without detection or significant sanction. What are the implications of this threat for free speech and a free exchange of ideas on the internet? And how can we stop this illegal activity, which is so repugnant that eventhe most laissez-faire cyberlibertarians want it stamped out, if we know nothing about it?

Philip Jenkins takes a leap onto the lower tiers of electronic media in this first book on the business of child pornography online. He tells the story of how the advent of the internet caused this deviant subculture to become highly organized and go global. We learn how the trade which operates on clandestine websites from Budapest or Singapore to the U.S. is easy to glimpse yet difficult to eradicate. Jenkins details how the most sophisticated transactions are done through a proxy, a "false flag" address, rendering the host computer, and participants, virtually unidentifiable. And these sites exist for only a few minutes or hours allowing on-line child pornographers to stay one step ahead of the law. This is truly a globalized criminal network which knows no names or boundaries, and thus challenges both international and U.S. law.

Beyond Tolerance delves into the myths and realities of child pornography and the complex process to stamp out criminal activity over the web, including the timely debates over trade regulation, users' privacy, and individual rights. This sobering look and a criminal community contains lessons about human behavior and the law that none interested in media and the new technology can afford to ignore.

Assessing Risk: A Relational Approach offers the practitioner a novel framework for understanding the complex and subtle issues involved in assessing and managing risks related to violence and sexual offending. The authors draw on their considerable experience working with high risk individuals in assessment and treatment. They have for many years consulted to practitioners in forensic mental health services and the criminal justice system and taught renowned courses at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust. This book outlines a comprehensive model of risk which draws on mainstream empirical research, threat assessment, developmental psychopathology, attachment theory, and a relational model derived from psychoanalysis. The framework incorporates intrapersonal and interpersonal dimensions and is designed to enhance the reader's capacity to make a thorough risk formulation. The approach highlights the significance of childhood development in understanding violent and sexually violent acts, and the complicated interpersonal processes involved in managing individuals who have a propensity to violent enactment. These dynamic processes between people impact on risk and risk perception, and can distort judgement if not recognised and understood. Assessing Risk will be of practical use in enhancing the skills of professionals to assess and manage risk in a comprehensive and effective way, and will appeal to all those mental health and criminal justice practitioners working with risky individuals.

Scholarly exploration into how and why people stop offending (desistance from crime) has focused on the impact of internal and external factors in processes of desistance. Prior research has, in general, been undertaken within one nation and neglected the fact that desistance processes are situated within a broad social context which shapes an individual's perceptions and actions. This book begins to fill this gap by exploring how societies and cultures shape desistance processes and experiences. Desistance and Societies in Comparative Perspective offers findings from a cross-national comparative mixed-method study of desistance processes in England and Israel: two countries with different social-political systems and distinct cultural attributes. The study is the first of its kind in criminology, both in terms of its key objectives and the methods utilised. The findings uncover how social structures and cultures shape individual-level experience. In particular, the findings illustrate how external and internal mechanisms in desistance processes were 'oriented' in particular ways, in accordance with contextual factors. The book outlines five contextual factors which were key in shaping the dynamics of desistance across societies and cultures. These are: cultural scripts; social climates; shared values and norms; social interactions and encounters; and distinct cultural characteristics. These five factors provide a contextual framework within which to understand the role of cultures and social structures in shaping agency and experiences in processes of desistance, and with which to account for variances and similarities across societies and cultures. Written in a clear and direct style, this book will appeal to students and scholars in criminology, sociology, cultural studies, social theory and those interested in learning about why and how people desist from crime.

There are more than 20 theories that explain crime. Each theory has weaknesses, and no scholar knows which theory is best. To remedy this unsatisfactory situation a new research program of comparative theory testing is proposed. Comparing the theories with each other has not yet been successful. The alternative, suggested in this book, is to show how criminological theories must be modified if they are compared with a general behavioral theory. The book shows under which conditions the major criminological theories provide valid explanations of crime. The latter thus become integrated as parts of the general theory. The general theory that is chosen is a version of the theory of rational action. This is not the problematic version discussed in the literature, but states the real conditions of decision making and, thus, explains when people actually violate the law or remain law-abiding. The general theory is a component of a theoretical approach that explains individual behavior in interaction with societal (macro) conditions. This micro-macro approach is summarized in a proposed structural-cognitive model. This is part of the new program of Analytical Criminology. It suggests empirical theory comparison, process explanations, and micro-macro explanations. The book is not only written for readers who are interested in theories of crime and deviant behavior. It is also a treatise in "analytical" (i.e., rigorous) theory construction and empirical theory comparison.

Is it time to give up on rehabilitating criminals? Record numbers of Americans are going to prison, and most of them will eventually return to society with a high chance of becoming repeat offenders. But a decision to abandon rehabilitation programs now would be premature warns Ann Chih Lin, who finds that little attention has been given to how these programs are actually implemented and why they tend to fail. In Reform in the Making, she not only supplies much-needed information on the process of program implementation but she also considers its social context, the daily realities faced by prison staff and inmates. By offering an in-depth look at common rehabilitation programs currently in operation--education, job training, and drug treatment--and examining how they are used or misused, Lin offers a practical approach to understanding their high failure rate and how the situation could be improved.

Based on extensive observation and over 350 interviews with staff and prisoners in five medium-security male prisons, the book contrasts successfully implemented programs with subverted, abandoned, or neglected programs (those which staff reject or which do not teach prisoners anything useful). Lin explains that staff and prisoners have little patience with programs aimed at long-range goals when they must face the ongoing, immediate challenge of surviving prison life. Finding incentives to make both sides participate fully in rehabilitation is among the book's many contributions to improving prison policy.

This book provides an empirically grounded, theoretically informed account of recent changes to the youth justice system in England and Wales, focusing on the introduction of elements of restorative justice into the heart of the criminal justice system, and the implementation of referral orders and youth offender panels. Taken together, this amounts to the most radical overhaul of the youth justice system in the last half century, fundamentally changing the underlying values of the system away from an 'exclusionary punitive justice' and towards an 'inclusionary restorative justice'. The book explores the implications of these changes by using the lens of a detailed study of the implementation of referral orders and youth offender panels to explore wider issues about youth justice policy and the integration of restorative justice principles. It draws upon the findings of an in-depth study of the pilots established prior to the national rollout of referral orders in April 2002. The book will be essential reading not only for those involved in the task of implementing the new youth justice, but others with an interest in the criminal justice system and in restorative justice who need to know about the far reaching reforms to the youth justice system and their impact.

This is the definitive examination of adolescent violence in the United States as both a social phenomenon and a policy problem. Franklin Zimring, one of America's most esteemed scholars of law and crime, scrutinized criminal statistics and demographic trends. The result is a thorough debunking of Congressional predictions of "a coming storm of juvenile violence" and the half-baked policy proposals that accompany such warnings. The book sets forth comprehensive and dispassionate analyses of three key areas of youth violence policy: adolescent firearms possession and use, standards for transfer from juvenile to criminal court jurisdiction, and legal sanctions for adolescents who kill. Throughout American Youth Violence, the core issues of youth violence in the 1990s are examined with an unprecedented degree of analytic rigour. Zimring also offers an appropriate set of responses to youth violence that are consistent with a positive future for the juvenile court and for American youth.

In the last decade there has been growing international concern about the increasing numbers of women in prison, the effects that imprisonment has on their children, the realisation that gaoled women have different criminal profiles and rehabilitative needs to male prisoners, and the seeming intractability of the associated problems. In response there has been an overarching policy concern in many countries to fashion and co-ordinate gender-specific policies towards female offenders which aim both to slow down the rate of their offending and/or imprisonment, and also to engender flexible programmes which will reduce the time spent in custody and/or away from their young children. The major objective of this book is to describe and analyse contemporary opportunities for, and barriers to, both the reduction of female prison populations and the reduction of the pain of those women who continue to be imprisoned. It assesses the most important recent attempts to reduce both women's imprisonment and the damage it does, identifying and analyzing cross-jurisdiction and gender-specific lessons to be learned, and the unexpected consequences of some of the reform strategies. This book brings together leading scholars and practitioners in the field, providing a critique of the reform initiatives which have taken place, and a much-needed theorization of cross-national policy in this area. It will be essential reading for all with an interest in prisons and prison reform.

Built around the experiences of older prisoners, Punished for Aging looks at the challenges individuals face in Canadian penitentiaries and their struggles for justice. Through firsthand accounts and quantitative data drawn from extensive interviews, this book brings forward the experiences of federally incarcerated people living their "golden years" behind bars. These experiences show the limited ability of the system to respond to heightened needs, while also raising questions about how international and national laws and policies are applied, and why they fail to ensure the safety and well-being of incarcerated individuals. In so doing, Adelina Iftene explores the shortcomings of institutional processes, prison-monitoring mechanisms, and legal remedies available in courts and tribunals, which leave prisoners vulnerable to rights abuses. Some of the problems addressed in this book are not new; however, the demographic shift and the increase in people dying in prisons after long, inadequately addressed illnesses, with few release options, adds a renewed sense of urgency to reform. Working from the interview data, contextualized by participants' lived experiences, and building on previous work, Iftene seeks solutions for such reform, which would constitute a significant step forward not only in protecting older prisoners, but in consolidating the status of incarcerated individuals as holders of substantive rights.

""Delinquency in a Birth Cohort "is a turning point in criminological research in the United States," writes Norval Morris in his foreword. "What has been completely lacking until this book is an analysis of delinquency in a substantial cohort of youths, the cohort being defined other than by their contact with any part of the criminal justice system."
This study of a birth cohort was not originally meant to be etiological or predictive. Yet the data bearing on this cohort of nearly ten thousand boys born in 1945 and living in Philadelphia gave rise to a model for prediction of delinquency, and thus to the possibility for more efficient planning of programs for intervention. It is expert research yielding significant applications and, though largely statistical, the analysis is accessible to readers without mathematical training.
"No serious scholar of the methods of preventing and treating juvenile delinquency can properly ignore this book."--LeRoy L. Lamborn, "Law Library Journal"
"The magnitude of [this] study is awesome. . . . It should be a useful guide for anyone interested in the intricacies of cohort analysis."--Gary F. Jensen, "American Journal of Sociology"
"A book the student of juvenile delinquency will find invaluable."--"Criminologist
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Fights, fraud and drugs racketeering regularly hit the headlines, but they are just news stories for most of us. For others, they constitute a way of life. This book uncovers a world where male identity is expressed each day through physical strength and power. Focusing on professional criminals and violent men, the author shows how workshop camaraderie, hard physical work and criminal reputations allow for changing masculinities. It is all too easy to stereotype criminals, when, in fact, their world is complex and creative. Criminal men adapt and modify their forms of gender expression to fit in with their changing economic, social and cultural circumstance, as do men in all walks of life.
Why is violence attractive to these men? What motivates their crimes, both planned and impulsive? How do criminals themselves view their activities and their reputations, and how do these reputations affect their perception of masculinity?
This book is the first sustained analysis of organized crime and violence to use covert research methods. Far from the sensationalized memoirs of retired gangsters, or the abstract discussions of scholars, this book builds on first-hand experiences and relationships made while working amongst bouncers and criminals. The social world of professional criminals and the working environments of criminal bouncers are demystified and laid bare. The author sets individual criminal careers and experiences in the wider context of de-industrialization and globalization, and provides a thoughtful and stimulating addition to the fields of anthropology, sociology and criminology.