Stigma and Drug Users

A report published yesterday said that calling problem drug users 'junkies' or 'addicts' provides a major obstacle to their rehabilitation, because of the terms' labelling affects. The report by the UK Drugs Policy Commission said that the Government's current moves toward an abstinence based approach will not work unless underlying prejudice towards drug users is tackled. See the story in the press.

Made me think about labelling theory generally and other attempts to put it into policy. The Children's Hearing System is one obvious example, can anyone else think of any others?

For evidence of stigma towards drug users in action and the many ways in which attitudes are disseminated, see today's daily mash. Sometimes it gets it really right, sometimes really wrong.

Summer Reading Project: 24th August 2010

Just a quick reminder that this Tuesday 24th August, Ellie will be presenting chapter 7 of 'Governing Through Crime'. We will be meeting in room 406 again, at 3pm as usual.

Summer Reading Project: 10th August 2010

Our reading group meets next Tuesday at 3pm when Ioannis will give an overview of Chapter 8: 'Penalty Box: Crime, Victimization, and Punishment in the Deregulated Workplace'. Please note the change in venue to Room 406 in Old College.

Summer Reading Project: 27th July 2010

Just a reminder that the next meeting is in the Inner Common Room at 3pm on Tuesday 27th July. Christine will be giving an overview of Chapter 6 from Jonathan Simon's Governing Through Crime. Look forward to seeing you there.

BBC suggests why crime falls or rises

You may be interested or entertained by an article in the BBC online magazine today which in response to the latest results from the British Crime Survey (BCS) has decided to run an article on why crime rises or falls.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-10635206

Some interesting theories are mentioned here, but many others are missing.

Their choice of experts is interesting too. They use Adam Crawford, Ian Marsh and also the human geographer Danny Dorling who has done some projects for the BBC in the past.

The article has left me pondering which theories I would include and which I would leave out if trying to summarise this topic. There's no mention of the link between age and crime for example (and the various theories relating to this). Given that the population of the UK is ageing and the majority of crime tends to be committed by younger people this might have been an interesting area to discuss. A quick look at population statistics for England and Wales (i.e. the area covered by the BCS) shows that the proportion of population aged between 15 and 34 has declined:- 30.1% in 1981, 29.6% in 1991, 26.5% in 2001 and 26.2% in 2008; the population aged 60 and over has increased: 20.5% in 1981, 21.0% in 1991, 20.7% in 2001, 22.1% in 2008(Source Office for National Statistics, 2009, Population Trends Table 1.4).

What would you include? Which experts would you have ideally liked to comment?

Summer Reading Project: 13 July 2010

Just a reminder that the next meeting is in the Inner Common Room at 3pm on Tuesday 13th July. Katrina will be giving an overview of Chapter 5 'Project Exile: Race, the War on Crime, and Mass Imprisonment' from Jonathan Simon's Governing Through Crime. Look forward to seeing you there.

By way of a slightly tenuous link you might be interested that the Chief Inspector of Probation Andrew Bridges has called today for a 'deeper debate' on prison and punishment - whilst he recognises that prison can prevent offending, he also argues that this is a very expensive way of doing this. You can listen to the interview from Radio 4 Today programme here:-
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8809000/8809436.stm

Guardian Series: Crime and Fear

For your interest... the Guardian is running a series on Fear of Crime in the media at the moment, which seems to consist of articles mostly arguing that a better understanding of how 'fear of crime' is propagated can help us to progress more constructively as a society. Also, there is a preview of a documentary on the subject which is really interesting and features commentary from Rod Morgan about the progression of Law and Order issues in politics, which might tie in quite well with some of the issues we've been discussing while reading 'Governing Through Crime'.

Here's the link:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/series/crime-and-fear