Vol. 9 No. 10 (October 1999) pp. 417-419.
INTEGRATIVE CRIMINOLOGY (THE INTERNATIONAL LIBRARY OF
CRIMINOLOGY, CRIMINAL JUSTICE, AND PENOLOGY) by Gregg
Barak (Editor). Brookfield, VT: Ashgate Publishing
Company, 1998. 599 pp. Cloth $142.95.
Reviewed by Annette M. Curtis-Carroll, Haas Library,
Western Connecticut State University.
Barak's text is a compilation of previously published
articles and book chapters about the integration of the
study of crime and crime control. It also is part of a
series that ascribes to providing an overview of the latest
theories and findings on criminology. The book is
organized to address five important areas, "On the State of
Criminological Integration", "Crime and Integration in
Black and White", "Delinquency and Integration", "General
Approaches to Integration", and "Integration and The
Future". Some of the material included in this compilation
dates back to the 1970's and 1960's, however newer material
is also included.
The preface does a good job in defining integrative
criminology and gives the reader a background on the
development and scope of integrative criminology. Although
the preface states that integrative criminology as an
emerging paradigm and still in its infancy, I find it
interesting that the editor choose to include material that
was over 20 years old. Although the editor explains that
the need for integration of crime and crime control
"springs not only from the historical and contemporary
reality . but also from the limitations of overly simple
theoretical models that explain very little as well as the
need to overcome what some might call the hegemony of
difference." It is also expressed that "postmodern
integrationists seek to synthesize knowledges of crime and
social control."
The preface further explains the various sections of
the text, as outline above. Each section is provided with
a clear thesis of the purpose of the particular section.
For example, the section "On the State of Criminological
Integration", the editor explains that the "three essays as
a whole . look at, . [analyze], the state of criminological
integration." And further that the essays "critically
[examine] the various meanings and approaches to
integration." This section provides the reader with a
background on integrative criminology.
The second section of the text, "Crime and Integration
in Black and White", provides a look at neo-colonial and
post-colonial theories involved in complex integrations
concerning crime and crime control from a racial
perspective. Two of the three essays in this section are
over twenty years old. The third section, "Delinquency and
Integration," presents theories from the social learning,
social ecology, social
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bonding, social control, Marxist, control-power, class,
labeling, interactional, and networking perspectives.
Although the fourth section, "General Approaches to Integration"
provides seven essays addressing crime, criminal behavior and
crime control and they way they are involved with social structure,
social change, social ecology, social evolution, social
victimization, social politics, and gender relations. The
final section, "Integration and the Future," is a comment
on the need for criminologists to be concerned and active
with the theory and practice of integration.
Looking at the twenty-two readings found in this text
each of them vary in their construction. I find that the
two most important sections of the text are the first and
the last, which provide a background and a jumping off
start for future research and exploration. In the first
section, "On the State of Criminological Integration," the
first article is "Strategies and Requisites for Theoretical
Integration in the study of Crime and Deviance," by Allen
E. Liska, Marvin D. Krohn, and Steven F. Messner. This
article explains what is meant by integrative criminology
as well as considering the rationale for theoretical
integration, examines strategies and directions for
integration, and examines the "criteria for evaluating the
success of attempts to formulate integrated explanations of
crime and deviance."
The second article in this section, "The Peripheral
Core of Law and Criminology: On Postmodern Social Theory
and Conceptual Integration," by Bruce A. Arrigo, considers
such topics as "the social structure of society, role
formation, human agency, discourse construction, knowledge
or sense making, and social change." The third article of
this section, "Theoretical Integration in Criminology," by
Thomas J Bernard and Jeffrey B. Snipes, deals with the many
theories in criminology and the disagreement between them.
In the final section of this text, "Integration and
the Future", there are two articles. The first "Pride in
Criminological Dissensus" by John Braithwaite, examines
several issues. These include inequality and crime,
consensus and explanation of Christopher Uggen's theory
about "consensus and dissensus over the rightness of the
criminal law", community and crime, operationalizing
reintegrative shaming, rights and adversarial proceedings,
and reinforcing moral values with self-interest.
The second article is, "The Need to Integrate
Comparative and International Criminal Justice into a
Traditional Curriculum", by Paul C. Friday. This article as
the title implies discusses the need to incorporate the
integration of comparative and international criminal
justice into the criminal justice curriculum.
This book serves as a large and varied background on
the topic of integrative criminology. Since its coverage
is broad and not in-depth on any one aspect of the topic,
it really serves as a starting point in the topic. All of
the readings in this text come from previously published
material, which limits the need for purchasing the text,
since an interested reader could go to the original source.
Although the
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compilation of previous journal essays is the
intent of the series of which this text is a part of (The
International Library of Criminology, Criminal Justice and
Penology). There is no particular methodology for a text
such as this.
Out of twenty-two readings only ten are less than ten
years old. This troubles me since the editor explicitly
stated that integrative criminology was an emerging
paradigm, still in its infancy, in criminology. I would
have liked to see more recent material in this text. Eight
of the readings are from the 1980's, while three are from
the 1970's, one from 1060 and one from 1930. I believe
that for such a new area of research the text would have
included more recent material. However, it may have been
the editor's intent to bring the historical material into
the text to show the development of the topic, as noted
previously in this review.
Several of the essay authors are important in the
field of criminology. They include Delbert S. Elliott,
Suzanne S. Ageton, John Hagan, Robert K. Merton, Lawrence
E. Cohen, and Marcus Felson. Since many different authors
wrote the text, the clarity and organization of the
material varies. However, I found the essays to be well
written and organized in most cases. The intended audiences
of the text are researchers, teachers and students,
providing an overview of the intended topic. It is a good
text to use in a course or as basis for research in
integrative criminology.
Overall, I think the reader will find this text
provides well-organized background material on integrative
criminology. The teacher could use this as a text in a
course on such a topic. Although the student may find that
they would be able to locate specifically sought after
articles or as a basis for coursework in integrative
criminology, I find in my work that many times an
individual article can be found in such a compilation, so
it is especially useful if a library doesn't have a
particular journal. And, the researcher will find the text
as a source for gaining a background on the topic.
Copyright 1999