NCJ Number
231605
Editor(s)
Kristiina Kangaspunta,
Ineke Haen Marshall
Date Published
2009
Length
124 pages
Annotation
The four essays in this publication contribute to its aim of framing a global research agenda on environmental crime based in a commitment to the value of evidence-based policymaking, the importance of theoretical insights drawn from different disciplines, and the balancing of human and ecological rights.
Abstract
The first essay presents a perspective and action plan based on an emerging eco-global criminology. It identifies four areas in which climate change and associated environmental transformations are stimulating social conflict. These conflicts pertain to access to environmental resources (e.g., water); the differential exploitation of resources (e.g., "bio-piracy"); and the transference of harm (e.g., cross-border pollution). The essay argues that a research agenda on these matters ought to consider how environmental criminology interprets and analyzes these environmental trends that lead to conflict. The author recommends understanding such conflicts from within an eco-justice framework. The second essay focuses on building a bridge between some of the concerns of criminological theory and method relevant to an environmental research agenda and the arenas of criminal justice and human and environmental rights. The essay emphasizes the development of typologies of environmental harm that can be used to guide research efforts. The author recommends incorporating the concept of "intergenerational justice" in any global research program on the scope of environmental harm. The third essay develops a transnational environmental crime research agenda. The proposed research agenda is based in network concepts intended to provide a clearer understanding of the practices associated with transnational environmental crime methods and harms, along with the identification and evaluation of effective policy responses. The fourth essay analyzes what the author calls the United States' "polluter-industrial complex." A case-study format is used to illustrate the political-economic forces that undermine legal and regulatory efforts to prevent and limit environmental harm caused by economic enterprises. Chapter notes and a bibliography of approximately 260 listings