NCJ Number
87327
Journal
Social Defence Volume: 17 Issue: 68 Dated: (April 1982) Pages: 5-15
Date Published
1982
Length
11 pages
Annotation
Crime as a sociopolitical problem is increasing throughout the world, while criminal justice and criminology are showing increasing deficits.
Abstract
In the area of common crime, data show that the United States, the Federal Republic of Germany, France, Austria, the United Kingdom, Sweden, India, and Venezuela, to cite a few countries, have experienced an increase in the 1970's, taking into account improved crime reporting methods and increased crime reporting. Violent urban crime is a particular problem. Although the socialist countries report a decrease in common crime, the official or semi-official violations of human rights appear to be significant. Nonconventional crime, such as human rights violations; ecological, industrial, and economic offenses; criminal corruption; and terrorism exceed the gravity of common offenses in many countries. Overall, crime has asserted itself as a sociopolitical phenomenon and not an ensemble of behavioral cases. The main features of criminal justice worldwide are increasing punitiveness, inadequate legal assistance, prison overcrowding, scarcity of prison labor and adequate remuneration, an excessive number of inmates awaiting trial, the abuse of plea bargaining, limited compensation to the crime victim, extensive use of short-term imprisonment, and the decreasing effectiveness of probation and parole and equivalent measures. The contributions of criminology could be improved by adding to its curriculum political science, the sociology of law and international relations, political sociology, history, economics, development and planning problems, human rights theory and practice, and logic and methodology. Twelve references are listed.