NCJ Number
208342
Journal
Criminology Volume: 42 Issue: 4 Dated: November 2004 Pages: 979-1008
Date Published
November 2004
Length
30 pages
Annotation
This article reviews the first texts to apply scientific methods to the study of criminal behavior.
Abstract
Criminologists have had different things to say about the origin of scientific criminological research and most differentiate true criminology with what has become known as “proto-criminology or shadow criminology” that does not involve scientific methods of study. The current paper seeks to explore the origins of the scientific study of crime in order to problematize the field of criminology and who is involved with it. Locating criminology’s origins involves two interrelated issues: temporal demarcation and substantive definition. Temporal demarcation seeks to establish a dividing line separating proto-criminology from early scientific criminology, while the issue of substantive definition seeks to differentiate criminology as a discipline from early criminological thought. Criminological thought involves efforts to understand criminal behavior scientifically before the birth of the discipline. The roots of criminological thought are located in the late 18th- and early 19th-century writings on the problem of moral insanity, which was understood as uncontrollable, remorseless criminal behavior. Thus, roots of criminological thought were discovered in the discourses of psychiatrists who were engaged in biological theorizing about human behavior. The Enlightenment’s emphasis on positivistic exploration and on reform also fed early criminological thought, ensuring its scientific focus and steering the emerging discipline toward the idea that criminals could be reformed. References