Criminology has expanded significantly as an academic discipline, but it has been argued that it is becoming increasingly socially and politically irrelevant. This book aims to address this problem by rethinking the theoretical underpinnings and research methods we use, to form a criminology that is critical, engaged and useful.
The left realist approach to criminology has changed considerably over the past twenty years and continues to make an important contribution to the theoretical study of crime, as well as issues such as crime prevention, policing, prisons, and community safety. As one of the pioneers of realist criminology, Roger Matthews presents a coherent overview of its development and continued relevance.
By providing a critique of some of the dominant approaches in criminology, this book sets a new agenda for theoretical and practical engagement and will appeal to all those interested in making sense of contemporary forms of social control and developing types of analysis and intervention which are designed to produce a more effective and just criminal justice system.
Review: Roger Matthews, a pioneer of realist criminology, is one of the most interesting and important criminological theorists in Britain today. In this exciting new work, he sets out the stall for critical realism - a sophisticated appraisal of and provocative challenge to mainstream criminology. It is just the stimulus to fresh debate that the discipline needs.
Realist Criminology is essential reading for all serious students and scholars of criminology. - Lucia Zedner, University of Oxford, UK In this timely and wide-ranging book, one of realist criminology's most respected pioneers argues forcefully for a criminology that is honest, engaged, and socially responsible-a criminology that both takes the human toll of crime seriously and supports interventions that advance public safety, human emancipation and social justice.
This is a vision that should help to shape debates about the tools and aims of the study of crime for many years to come. - Elliott Currie, University of California, Irvine, USA We can learn from critical criminology as we sustain a commitment to working on a realist construction site. This means taking crime seriously, struggling for crime prevention through creating a more just society.
In this book, Roger Matthews re-joins that tradition in a way that is contemporarily responsive to competing traditions. - John Braithwaite, Australian National University, Australia I have great sympathy with Matthews' ambition to renew and extend the realist project ... I share too his clearly passionate commitment to a criminology that combines theoretical curiosity and empirical rigour with a hopeful, worldly orientation to the betterment of penal politics and policy.
Matthew's book performs best as a clear and vivid effort to introduce a new generation of students and scholars to realism and to spell out why it still matters today. - Ian Loader, British Journal of Criminology
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