Suchergebnisse

Introduction: Discussions about police discrimination often focus upon the overrepresentation of ethnic minorities in the criminal justice system. The pattern is diverse for different minority groups but stop and search statistics and the profile of the prison population, for example, provide evidence of overrepresentation at just two points of the criminal justice system (Bowling and Phillips, 2002; Webster, 2007). Many more examples could be cited. The other side of the coin is the under-representation of ethnic minorities. The extent to which, for example, racial harassment is under-recorded in police statistics, or whether there are particular cultural factors or constraints that make some minorities less likely to offend and to therefore be underrepresented in official statistics are long-standing questions. When we turn to the numbers of ethnic minorities employed within criminal justice agencies we again find under-representation (Bowling and Phillips, 2002). Both higher and lower levels of minority ethnic representation at different points of and in different places within the criminal justice system therefore need analysis and explanation. These aspects of the over- and underrepresentation of minority ethnic groups within the criminal justice system are now under the direction of the coalition government and the new political context that it has set. A diminished significance of race in politics, which harmonizes with the policies of the last Labour government, especially their 2010 Equality Act, and the new coalition government's express desire to move away from what it sees as the excessive 'bureaucratic accountability' of the 1997–2010 Labour governments are two key notes of its approach to them.

The 2011 riots have already been the most commented upon riots of recent decades. Casting some doubt about generalised and holistic explanations and responses, we seek to locate the events in a matrix of race, policing and politics. This approach enables us to identify shifts in political discourse around the riots from the simple to the complex, as well as significant changes between how the events of 2011 and earlier riots have been 'read'. We seek to unravel some of these strands, to show how race, place and political discourse have been located in the reaction to the riots. In drawing attention to important unevenness, we argue that sociologists need to focus on both continuities and changes since the 1980s.

The 2011 riots have already been the most commented upon riots of recent decades. Casting some doubt about generalised and holistic explanations and responses, we seek to locate the events in a matrix of race, policing and politics. This approach enables us to identify shifts in political discourse around the riots from the simple to the complex, as well as significant changes between how the events of 2011 and earlier riots have been 'read'. We seek to unravel some of these strands, to show how race, place and political discourse have been located in the reaction to the riots. In drawing attention to important unevenness, we argue that sociologists need to focus on both continuities and changes since the 1980s.

Racialization has become one of the central concepts in the study of race and racism. It is widely used in both theoretical and empirical studies of racial situations. There has been a proliferation of texts that use this notion in quite diverse ways. It is used broadly to refer to ways of thinking about race as well as to institutional processes that give expression to forms of ethno-racial categorization. An important issue in the work of writers such as Robert Miles, for example, concerns the ways in which the construction of race is shaped historically and how the usage of that idea forms a basis for exclusionary practices. The concept therefore refers both to cultural or political processes or situations where race is invoked as an explanation, as well as to specific ideological practices in which race is deployed. It is evident, however, that despite the increasing popularity of the concept of racialization there has been relatively little critical analysis exploring its theoretical and empirical usages. It is with this underlying concern in mind that Racialization: Studies in Theory and Practice brings together leading international scholars in the field of race and ethnicity in order to explore both the utility of the concept and its limitations.

Racialization has become one of the central concepts in the study of race and racism. It is widely used in both theoretical and empirical studies of racial situations. There has been a proliferation of texts that use this notion in quite diverse ways. It is used broadly to refer to ways of thinking about race as well as to institutional processes that give expression to forms of ethno-racial categorization. An important issue in the work of writers such as Robert Miles, for example, concerns the ways in which the construction of race is shaped historically and how the usage of that idea forms a basis for exclusionary practices. The concept therefore refers both to cultural or political processes or situations where race is invoked as an explanation, as well as to specific ideological practices in which race is deployed. It is evident, however, that despite the increasing popularity of the concept of racialization there has been relatively little critical analysis exploring its theoretical and empirical usages. It is with this underlying concern in mind that Racialization: Studies in Theory and Practice brings together leading international scholars in the field of race and ethnicity in order to explore both the utility of the concept and its limitations.

In Chapter 8, "Drugs and European governance", Eugene McLaughlin and Karim Murji map the emergence and development of a pan-European governmental project to regulate and co-ordinate the suppression of drug trafficking. The chapter also considers the role of the spread in the use and acceptance of illicit drugs, particularly among young people, as a source of discord within the EU, suggesting that moves toward state and supranational regulation have been accompanied by a significant de-regulation at the individual and personal level.

[About the book] Crime control has risen rapidly up the social and political agendas to become a central feature of western societies. As inequalities in society have increased, so the actual and perceived risks of crime and other social ills have grown rapidly for all sections of society. Crime has become a central issue to governments, and no longer just a technical operation of law enforcement and adjudication. This book is concerned with issues arising from these developments. Top criminologists from Britain, the USA and Australia explore the links between crime and risk through a range of themes, from the depiction of crime in the media to the dilemmas of policing, to the new punitiveness of criminal justice systems and the custodial warehousing of the poor and excluded

This article, which was written in the immediate aftermath of the publication of the report of the Stephen Lawrence inquiry, argues that the critical challenge will be to construct an agenda for pushing forward the key recommendations. The authors begin by briefly highlighting the uneven nature of the report's analysis and recommendations. The following sections detail the immediate reactions of the right wing press and the police. The article concludes with proposals for how to overcome the limitations of official discourses on police reform in the UK.

The Police Federation has become an active and successful pressure group on policing and criminal justice issues in the U.K. This article traces the origins of the Federation through to two bitter and far reaching campaigns in the post‐war period. The first was the Federation's law and order and pay campaign in the 1970s, the second its battle against the Conservative government's reform proposals during 1993. It is argued that these campaigns represented 'moments of truth' when the Federation took it case to the public, appealing above the heads of government and senior officers in pursuit of its goals. A notable, and perhaps unique feature of these campaigns is shifting the 'arena of negotiation' through the use of press advertisements. The core textual and pictorial images and representations of the police and policework deployed during these campaigns are examined through use of the richly suggestive concept of 'storylines'.