NCJ Number
119062
Date Published
1988
Length
24 pages
Annotation
This paper summarizes the writings of five authors regarding the role of religion as an informal mechanism of crime control in West Africa, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Egypt, and Venezuela.
Abstract
Although the contributors agree that religion and religious institutions are a force in social control, they differ over whether such control is consensual or imposed. They differ in their appreciation of the essence of the relationship between religious values and principles and the State. There are also conflicting views concerning the inevitability of the connection between religion and the State. Stemming from this, there is disagreement over whether religious values are the appropriate basis for State law. There are differences as well regarding relationships between religion, education, and family structure; and there is a fundamental conflict concerning how religion should be represented within the sociocultural structure as a whole.