Dangerousness,Risk and Technologies of Power

Abstract

This paper provides a critical examination of the prevalence of dangerous offender legislation in modern criminal justice systems. The debate about this has been dominated by issues of ethics and effectiveness. Here, though, I want to examine the significance of this legislation and some of the theoretical issues that this raises. This involves discussion of the way in which ‘dangerousness’ as a social construct has changed historically and similarly the mode of its calibration. Ultimately, the dangerousness legislation today involves the use of a largely unnoticed strategy of control — actuarialism; and seems more likely to have an effect on the behaviour of potential victims of crime rather than dangerous offenders themselves.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Advisory Council on the Treatment of Offenders (1963) Preventive Detention, HMSO, London.

Alper

Boren

(1972) Crime: An International Agenda, Lexington Books, Lexington.

Ancel

(1965) Social Defence, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London.

Bottoms

A E

(1977) ‘Reflections on the renaissance of dangerousness’, Howard Journal of Penology and Crime Prevention vol 16, pp 70–96.

Bottoms

A E

(1983) ‘Neglected features of contemporary penal systems’, in The Power to Punish, eds Garland

Young

, Heinemann, London.

Bottoms

A E

Brownsword

(1982) ‘The dangerousness debate after the Floud Report’, British Journal of Criminology vol 22, pp 229–254.

Brown

(1991) An analysis of decision making in district prison boards, PhD Thesis, Victoria University, Wellington.

Burgess

(1928) ‘Factors determining success or failure on parole’, in The Workings of the Indeterminate Sentence Law and Parole in Illinois ed Bruce

, Springfield, Illinois.

Castels

(1991), ‘From dangerousness to risk’, in The Foucault Effect, eds Burchell

et al, Harvester Press, Brighton.

10.

Chan

Ericson

(1981) Decarceration and the Economy of Penal Reform, Centre of Criminology, University of Toronto, Toronto.

11.

Cohen

(1985) Visions of Social Control, Polity Press,Cambridge.

12.

Cohen

Taylor

(1972) Psychological Survival, Penguin, Harmondsworth.

13.

Craze

(1992) The lure of relevance: The politics of crime research, paper presented at 8th Australia and New Zealand Society of Criminology Annual Conference.

14.

Department of Justice (1891) Annual Report to Parliament, Wellington.

15.

Department of Justice (1906) Annual Report to Parliament, Wellington.

16.

Department of Justice (1948) Annual Report to Parliament, Wellington.

17.

Department of Justice (1954) Annual Report to Parliament, Wellington.

18.

Department of Justice (1965) Annual Report to Parliament, Wellington.

19.

Duckitt

(1988) ‘The prediction of violence’, South African Journal of Psychology vol 18, pp 10–16.

20.

Ewald

(1991) ‘Insurance and risk’, in The Foucault Effect, eds Burchell

et al, Harvester Press, Brighton.

21.

Farrington

Tarling

(1988) ‘Criminological prediction: An introduction’, in Prediction in Criminology, eds Farrington

Tarling

, State University of New York Press, Albany.

22.

Feeley

Simon

(1992) ‘The new penology: Notes on the emerging strategy of corrections and its implications’, Criminology vol 30, pp 449–474.

23.

Ferri

(1906) The Positive School of Criminology, Charles Kerr & Co, Chicago.

24.

Floud

Young

(1981) Dangerousness and Criminal Justice, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

25.

Foucault

(1977) Discipline and Punish, Allen Lane, London.

26.

Foucault

(1979) The History of Sexuality, vol 1: An Introduction, Allen Lane, London.

27.

Foucault

(1988) ‘The dangerous individual’, in Politics, Philosophy and Culture, pp 125–151, Routledge, London.

28.

Gamble

(1988) The Free Economy and the Strong State, Macmillan, London.

29.

Garland

(1985) Punishment and Welfare, Gower, London.

30.

Garofalo

(1914) Criminology, Little Brown, Boston.

31.

Giddens

(1990) The Consequences of Modernity, Polity Press, Cambridge.

32.

Glueck

(1930) 500 Criminal Careers, Harvard University Press, New York.

33.

Gottfredson

(1988) ‘Violence prediction methods: Statistical and clinical strategies’, Violence and Victims vol 3, pp 303–324.

34.

Grunhut

(1948) Penal Reform, Clarendon Press, Oxford.

35.

Hall Williams

(1967) The English Penal System in Transition, Butterworth, London.

36.

Hammond

Chayen

(1963) Persistent Criminals, HMSO, London.

37.

Hassin

(1980) ‘Early release committees for prisoners versus the computer’, Criminology vol 18, p 385–397.

38.

Haxby

(1978) Probation: A Changing Service, Constable, London.

39.

King

(1989) ‘Social crime prevention à la Thatcher’, Howard Journal of Criminal Justice vol 28, pp 385–397.

40.

Kozol

(1972) ‘The diagnosis and treatment of dangerousness’, Crime and Delinquency vol 18, pp 371–392.

41.

Kramer

(1982) ‘From “habitual offenders” to “career criminals”: The historical construction and development of criminal categories”, Law and Human Behaviour vol 6, pp 273–293.

42.

Mannheim

(1936) ‘The German Prevention of Crime Act 1933’, Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology vol 26, pp 517–537.

43.

Mannheim

Wilkins

(1955) Prediction Methods in Relation to Borstal Training, HMSO, London.

44.

Matthews

(1979) ‘Decarceration and the fiscal crisis’, in Capitalism and the Rule of Law, eds Fine

et al, Hutchinson, London.

45.

Meehl

(1954) Clinical versus Statistical Prediction: A Theoretical Analysis and Review of the Evidence, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.

46.

Miller

Morris

(1988) ‘Predictions of dangerousness: an argument for limited use’, Violence and Victims vol 3, p 263–283.

47.

Morris

(1951) The Habitual Criminal, Publications of the London School of Economics, London.

48.

Morris

Miller

(1985) ‘Predictions of dangerousness’, in Crime and Justice: An International Review of Research 6, eds Tonry

Morris

, pp 1–50.

49.

O'Malley

(1991) ‘Legal networks and domestic security’, Studies in Law and Politics 11.

50.

O'Malley

(1992) ‘Risk, power, and crime prevention’, Economy and Society vol 21, pp 252–275.

51.

Pasquino

(1991) ‘Criminology: the birth of a special knowledge’, in The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, eds

Burchell

Harvester, Brighton.

52.

Pratt

(1992) Punishment in a Perfect Society, Victoria University Press, Wellington.

53.

Prime Ministerial Safer Communities Council (1993), Wellington.

54.

Proposals to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act and the Criminal Code (1993), Ottawa.

55.

Radzinowicz

(1968) ‘The dangerous offender’, The Police Journal vol 9, pp 411–467.

56.

Radzinowicz

Hood

(1980) ‘Habitual criminals’, Michigan Law Review vol 78, pp 1305–1380.

57.

Radzinowicz

Hood

(1985) A History of English Criminal Law, vol 5, Butterworth, London.

58.

Reichman

(1986) ‘Managing crime risks: Towards an insurance based model of social control’, Law, Deviance and Social Control vol 8, pp 151–172.

59.

Reiner

(1985) The Politics of the Police, Wheatsheaf Books, Brighton.

60.

Report from the Departmental Committee on Prisons (1895), Cmnd No 7702, 56, Parliamentary Papers.

61.

Rusche

Kirchheimer

(1939) Punishment and Social Structure, Russell & Russell, New York.

62.

Saleilles

(1911) The Individualisation of Punishment, Little Brown & Co, Boston.

63.

Saphira

(1992) Stopping Child Abuse: How Do We Bring Up New Zealand Children?, Penguin, Auckland.

64.

Scottish Council on Crime (1975), Crime and the Prevention of Crime, HMSO, London.

65.

Simon

(1971) Prediction Methods in Criminology, HMSO, London.

66.

Simon

(1988) ‘The ideological effects of actuarial practises’, Law and Society Review vol 22, pp 771–800.

67.

Solicitor General of Canada (1993), Proposed New Law to Protect Public from Dangerous Offenders, Ottawa.

68.

Sparks

R F

(1971) Local Prisons: The Crisis in the English Penal System, Heinemann, London.

69.

Sparks

(1992) Television and the Drama of Crime, Open University Press, Milton Keynes.

70.

Steadman

Cocozza

(1974) Careers of the Criminally Insane: Excessive Social Control of Deviance, D C Heath, Lexington.

71.

Sullivan

(1986) Rape Crisis Handbook, Rape Crisis Centre, Wellington.

72.

Sutherland

(1950) ‘The diffusion of the sexual psychopath laws’, American Journal of Sociology vol 56, pp 142–148.

73.

Tarde

(1912) Penal Philosophy, Heinemann, London.

74.

Victoria Sentencing Committee (1988), Report, Melbourne.

75.

von Hirsch

(1972) ‘Prediction of criminal conduct and preventive confinement of convicted persons’, Buffalo Law Review vol 21, pp 717–758.

76.

Walker

(1969) Sentencing in a Rational Society, Penguin, Harmondsworth.

77.

Walker

(1980) Punishment, Danger and Stigma, Basil Blackwell, Oxford.

78.

Wearing

Berreen

(1993) Disability, Crime and Classification in late 19th century and early 20th Century New South Wales, paper presented at the 9th Annual Conference of the Australian and New Zealand Society of Criminology.

79.

Webb

(1981) A History of Custodial and Related Penalties in New Zealand, Government Printer, Wellington.

80.

West

(1963) The Habitual Prisoner, Macmillan, London.

81.

Wiener

(1990) Reconstructing the Criminal, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

82.

Wilkins

(1988) ‘The politics of prediction’, in Prediction in Criminology, eds Farrington

Tarling

, State University of New York Press, Albany.

83.

Wolff

(1993) Crime Policy against Juveniles and Crime Control during the Nazi-Period in Germany, paper presented at the 11th International Congress on Criminology, Budapest.