Book review: Grant Pink and Rob White (eds), Environmental Crime and Collaborative State Intervention
| Date | 01 August 2018 |
| Published date | 01 August 2018 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1362480618787175 |
| Subject Matter | Book reviews |
494 Theoretical Criminology 22(3)
Janssen, and animals in war, by Ryan Hediger, are two such examples. Conservation,
taken up by Krithika Srinivasan and Rajesh Kasturirangan, is another site of formalized,
legitimized violence against animals that is included in this section. Their piece discusses
violence condoned through conservationist efforts geared toward animals defined as
“invasive alien species”—in contrast to, and for the welfare of, “native species”. Ragnhild
Sollund’s chapter points us to yet another location and cluster of legal and illegal harms:
the plight, particularly theriocide, of trafficked animals seized by officials.
In Part 7, Mary Gupta, Lisa Lunghofer and Kenneth Shapiro concentrate on prevent-
ing further violence against animals by those known to be animal abuse offenders. In
their chapter, they discuss existing interventions with adults and children, matters central
to developing more effective interventions and suggestions for bridging the prevention/
intervention divide.
In the introduction of the Handbook, a paradox—central to the book and animal abuse
studies—is presented, and correspondingly, offers a means to a conclusion here: “[u]nderly-
ing the enhanced concern and compassion for animals is a long tradition of deliberate abuse”
(p. 3). Where there is abuse, there is also compassion. In other words, while it is horrifying
that this book exists, it is reassuring that it does. However hard it is to think about the horrors
that animals face at the expense of human behavior, animal abuse is, to borrow from Levi-
Strauss’s adage, “good to think with”. Only then can it be rendered unthinkable.
While the volume includes countless harms, there are, unfortunately, other forms of
harm, sites of abuse and species that suffer cruelty. If only one book could cover them all.
Some omissions are practical, due to “limitation of space or because there is little or no
current research on them. Prominent among these are the abuse of animals used in reli-
gious practices and in certain forms of entertainment, such as circuses and movies” (p. 7).
One of the Handbook’s strengths is that it provides a clear framework for those inter-
ested in moving animal abuse studies forward, including researchers with topics not
explicitly discussed in the volume. The perspective and empirical foundation that this
Handbook offers can be used to inform any number of concerns pertaining to the well-
being of the animals themselves.
ORCID iD
Corina Medley https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0822-3589
Grant Pink and Rob White (eds), Environmental Crime and Collaborative State Intervention, Palgrave
Macmillan: Basingstoke, Hants, 2016; 249 pp.: 9781137562562, US$105 (hbk)
Reviewed by: David Rodríguez Goyes , Universidad Antonio Nariño, Colombia
Although green criminology emerged in the 1990s, commentators still refer to it as a
‘new subgenre within criminology’. Perhaps this is because green criminology continues
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