Book Review: Alienation and Anomie Revisted
| Date | 01 June 1984 |
| Author | Roman Tomasic |
| DOI | 10.1177/000486588401700209 |
| Published date | 01 June 1984 |
| Subject Matter | Book Reviews |
120 BOOK REVIEWS (1984) 17
ANZJ
Crim
such a programme. The fact is that issues of Aboriginal health, housing, education,
employment, even criminality, have long ceased to be issues only of health,
housing, education etc.
Rather,
the cynicism and the deviousness of administration
of policies provided under law have transformed each issue into a political contest.
One
fears, therefore,
that
realpolitik, rather
than
respect for the niceties of
international legal obligations", will continue to determine the outcome of
that
contest.
NOTES
1Australia and New Zealand Book Co, Sydney.
2Op Cit, P 152.
3Ibid.
4 But see also Koowarta vBjelke-Petersen 39
ALR
417; 56
ALJR
625, contra as a striking example of
an outcome opposite to the proposition.
JOHN
MCCORQUODALE
Sydney
Alienation and Anomie Revisted. Edited by S Giora and Anthony
Graham,
Tel
Aviv, Ramot Publishing Co (1982) 280 pp.
It has been extremely rare to find criminological debates which seek to apply
serious and extensive analyses of basic sociological concepts to criminological
concerns. A small minority of sociologists of law have, however, begun to
return
to
the
concepts of classical sociological writers.
One
illustration of this minor
movement is provided by
the
contributions to this volume which seek to evaluate
the
concepts of anomie and alienation. Although volumes based upon conference
proceedings often tend to be of quite divergent quality, the contributions found
here
do not suffer in this particular way. The eight papers were presented to a, by
invitation only, seminar on
"Culture
and Criminality" held at the Messina
Centre
of Sociological, Penal
and
Penitentiary Research and Studies. Regrettably,
however, despite the
theme
of the conference and its institutional venue, there
seems to have been no discussion of criminality or even of related concepts of social
control and social order. This may well have been due to the narrowness of
the
backgrounds of those invited to speak. Curiously, all eight contributors are
members of the executive of the Research Committee on Alienation
Theory
and
Research of the International Sociological Association. "Whilst this group has
produced some very important assessments of alienation and anomie research, it
seems a pity that the opportunity was missed to seek to apply their somewhat
abstract and often arid theorizing to contemporary criminological concerns. I have
chosen to highlight this point as I believe that this failure is illustrative of some of
the
basic problems confronting inter-disciplinary research in general and
criminological research in particular. That there should be such barriers to the
"cross-pollination" of ideas is perhaps not surprising in view of the gulf which exists
between the divergent traditions of alienation and anomie research themselves.
In the preface of this collection we are informed
that
this book should be seen as
a
point
of departure and
not
as a conclusive treatment of its subject. If its subject
is
"Crime
and Criminality" it fails to even achieve this modest objective. If,
however, we see this volume as an inventory of ideas about anomie and alienation
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