Book Review: The Cambridge Institute of Criminology: Its Background and Scope
| Author | David Biles |
| Published date | 01 December 1989 |
| Date | 01 December 1989 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/000486588902200412 |
| Subject Matter | Book Reviews |
284 BOOK REVIEWS (1989)
22
ANZJ
Crim
Allison Morris' book
is
no exception to other books on the subject. The book
contains seven chapters. Chapter 1does what most other books have done -an
exegesis. Chapter 2deals with the volume and type of crimes by males and females.
The third chapter details theories of women's crime. The remaining chapters
concentrate on standard topics of women in the criminal justice system, women as
criminal justice professionals and women
as
victims.
If one
is
anewcomer to the field -
as
astudent
or
aresearcher -the book
is
ahighly valuable work.
One
need not go back to the earlier literature, Allison
Morris has done asuperb job in citing and discussing earlier work. The book has
avery exhaustive bibliography.
Canberra SATYANSHU K
MUKHERJEE
The Cambridge Institute of Criminology: Its Background and Scope, Sir Leon
Radzinowicz,
Her
Majesty's Stationery Office (1988) 190pp, £11.50 (UK).
It may be no more than areflection of the rapidly approaching senility
of
this
reviewer, but it must be said that studies ofthe past can be just
as
thought provoking
as predictions of the future. As astudy of the establishment
of
the Cambridge
Institute of Criminology, this slim volume constitutes an invaluable contribution to
understanding how criminology came to develop in later years. The Cambridge
Institute
was".
of such significance that its very existence exercised apowerful
influence on the way that criminology developed in many other countries, even
Australia and New Zealand.
Thus this book could be seen
as
useful in helping
us
to understand ourselves, but
it
is
essentially aprecisely documented and factual account of how the Institute
came to be established, together with an outline of its achievements in its first
decade
or
more of operation. Even though this
is
apersonal history by the first
Director of the Institute, Professor Sir Leon Radzinowicz, every significant fact
is
buttressed
by
references to files of correspondence
or
official reports, many
of
which are reproduced in the extensive appendices. In fact, an unsympathetic
reviewer could conceivably argue that the numerous and often lengthy footnotes,
which virtually compel the reader to turn to the appendices, impede the flow
of
the
narrative, but they also add authority and adifferent dimension of interest to the
reader who really wants to know how developments occurred.
The
40
short chapters of the book start with an account of the political pressures
for and against the establishment of an Institute of Criminology and the arguments
for it being located either in London
or
in
Cambridge. Even with those fundamental
questions resolved, appropriate funding had to be found, and hence there follows
areview ofthe difficult problems associated with obtaining adequate resources from
government, from benefactors and from foundations. Much of this information has
not been published previously, and it
is
important that it
is
now officially
on
the
record.
The bulk of the book, however, focuses on the very considerable achievements
of the Institute in the fostering of both teaching and research
in
criminology. Thus
chapters are devoted to the development of apost-graduate course, the addition of
doctoral studies, various visiting fellowship programmes, conferences of many
different kinds, the Institute library, the publications programme, and the
organisation, supervision and conduct of research. In every instance, more facts are
to be found
in
the appendices than are given in the text. The book
is
therefore a
handy reference tool.
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