Your World of Legal Intelligence
 United Kingdom | +44 (0) 20 7284 8080

Book Review: Islam, crime and criminal justice

Document Cited in Related
Vincent
AuthorPenny Green
DOI10.1177/146247450500700111
Published date01 January 2005
Date01 January 2005
Subject MatterArticles
06 048135 (to/d) 23/11/04 3:09 pm Page 102
PUNISHMENT AND SOCIETY 7(1)
unduly neglected and too lightly – and illegitimately – dismissed by its practitioners as
navel-gazing.
Ian Loader
Keele University, UK
Islam, crime and criminal justice, Basia Spalek (ed.). Collumpton: Willan Publishing,
2002. 160 pp. £25. ISBN 1903240891 (hbk).
Given the contemporary political framework within which Islam has been
(re)constructed (by architects both external and internal) an examination of Islam in
relation to crime and criminal justice is both timely and important. Basia Spalek has
produced an interesting and challenging (if sometimes uneven) collection which marks
the criminological introduction to any future discussion on Islam and criminal justice
concerns in the UK. Importantly for criminal justice studies it introduces religion as an
analytical tool.
The volume aims to examine ‘one marginalized, yet popular, religion and generate
questions about how following the Islamic faith influences people’s experiences of crime
and the criminal justice system’ (p. 6). It is a domestic volume and has a very local feel,
set as it is primarily in Bradford and Birmingham and focusing largely on the Pakistani,
Bangladeshi and Indian Muslim communities living there. Two of the more engaging
chapters (by Marie Macey and Basia Spalek) are based on empirical investigations of
Muslim offending and the victimization of Muslim women. These reveal disturbing
patterns of young male criminality (though how significant Islam is in driving those
patterns is more difficult to measure when set against imported practices of rural ethnic
culture and masculinity) and degrees of victimization which seem to result largely from
internal practices of ‘community policing’.
Macey documents the damaging and demoralizing impact of the criminal and neo-
criminal behaviour of young Pakistani Muslim men on their own communities. Physical
violence against gay men, lesbians, prostitutes and Muslim women (including murder),
public disorder, and the...

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT