Book Review: Delinquent Behaviour
| Published date | 01 June 1986 |
| Date | 01 June 1986 |
| DOI | 10.1177/000486908601900209 |
| Author | Kenneth Polk |
| Subject Matter | Book Reviews |
126
BOOK
REVIEWS
(1986) 19
ANZJ
Crim
Delinquent Behaviour (4th edition), Don C Gibbons and Marvin D Krohn,
Prentice-Hall (1986) 285 pp.
In this fourth edition, Don Gibbons and Marvin Krohn bring about significant
additions to what was already an acknowledged leading text on juvenile
delinquency. New sections have been included, most significantly the discussions of
delinquency theory. In this edition, the major theoretical traditions are more clearly
differentiated, with separate chapters for social disorganization/social control,
opportunity and social learning perspectives. As a result, some of the topics that
were used to organize chapters in previous editions, for example, working-class
delinquency, middle-class delinquency or female delinquency, are now included
within more comprehensive theoretical statements.
This book retains competent and comprehensive overviews of the juvenile justice
system, including an early chapter on the juvenile court and related agencies, with
two later chapters treating correctional processes and alternatives to incarceration.
These discussions provide a general summary of the processes at work within the
juvenile corrections system, including an analysis of the nature of training school
organization and the results of rehabilitation and treatment. Included, also, is an
up-to-date review of such issues as diversion, deinstitutionalization and delinquency
prevention.
For an Australian audience, it is important to point out that this is a distinctly
American book. This results in some limitations in usingthis as a text for courses
in Australia, especially in terms of the discussion of juvenile law and the justice
system where there are significant differences between the two countries. Further,
the theoretical biases of American authors, also, are present. Writers such as
Foucault are not mentioned at all, and but the barest mention is given to authors
such as Stanley Cohen, Ian Taylor, Paul Walton or Jock Young, to mention but a
few. There is scarce attention paid, in other words, to the diverse left traditions
which have been especially important in shaping Australian criminology.
Recognizing these limitations, this work is still well worth considering for use in
the Australian context. It provides for student and professional alike a succint
review for the nature of delinquency, the juvenile justice "system", and juvenile
justice processes. As one would expect of these authors, the text is carefully crafted,
and the bibliographies current, scholarly and thorough. It is a useful book, and
certainly should be on the shelf of any serious student of juvenile delinquency.
Melbourne KENNETH
POLK
The Containment of Organized Crime, Herbert Edelhertz, Ronald J Cole and
Bonnie Berk, Lexington Books, Mass (1984) $28 (cloth).
This book describes the Arizona Organized Crime Project of 1980-82. It is not a
work of general interest to Australian and New Zealand criminologists, but for
those specifically concerned with investigation and enforcement directed against
organized crime, it is a useful and practical book.
The senior author, Herbert Edelhertz, is possibly the most important American
policy analyst on the management of white collar crime investigation and
enforcement. Not surprisingly, then, we learn that the Arizona Organized Crime
Project is distinguished from other organized crime control efforts by a special
emphasis on white collar crime.
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