This book provides a lively, concise and definitive introduction to the study of the causes of crime. Authoritative yet accessible, it offers a guide to the historical development of criminology as an academic discipline and in doing so:

Chapter 1: Studying Criminal Life Crime and society: an introduction Researching criminal life: the place of theories of crimeChapter 2: Classical Criminology and Contemporary Rational Choice Theory Introduction: the reasoning criminal and the social contract Society, crime and punishment Classical criminology and crime deterrence Neoclassical criminology Critiquing Classical/Neoclassical criminology: does deterrence work? Contemporary rational choice theory Situational crime prevention, opportunity theory and routine activityChapter 3: Biological Criminology Introduction: Classicism, positivism and the development of Biological forms of criminology Physiognomy and phrenology Lombroso and atavism Lombroso's heritage: in search of the criminal type Genes and crime Brain development, injuries and mapping Biochemistry, hormones, diet and crimeChapter 4: Psychological Criminology Introduction: the Classical school and Psychological and Biological theories of crime Freud and personality development Eysenck, dimensions of personality and criminal behaviour Sutherland, differential association theory and social learning Psychological criminology and mentally disordered offendersChapter 5: Strain Theory, Social Disorganisation Theory and Labelling Theory Introducing the sociological study of criminal life Durkheim: social facts, social solidarity and anomie Merton and Agnew: anomie and Strain Theory Park and Burgess: Social Disorganisation Theory and the Broken Windows hypothesis Mead and Blumer: symbolic interactionism and Labelling Theory Lemert, Becker and Erikson: towards the sociology of deviance Restorative justice and Braithwaite's Reintegrative Shaming TheoryChapter 6: Critical Criminology, Part 1: Marxist, Peacemaking and Realist Theories of Crime Determinism and free will in sociological forms of criminology Critical criminology: a conflict theory of society Critical criminology and the duality of structure Karl Marx and Willem Bonger: towards a Marxist theory of crime Marxist criminology: crime as a rational response to the conditions of capitalism Peacemaking criminology Left and Right Realist criminologyChapter 7: Critical Criminology, Part 2: Feminist and Cultural Criminology Critical criminology and Feminist and Cultural theories of crime The feminist critique of 'malestream' criminology Marxism and Feminist criminology The growth of female offending: power/control theory, the liberation opportunity thesis and the economic marginalisation thesis Feminism, masculinity studies and contemporary Critical criminology: highlighting the importance of gender, race and class Cultural criminologyChapter 8: Postmodern Critical Standpoints and the Criminal Life Course Introduction: Critical criminology revisited Positivism and realism, postmodernism and anti-realism Life Course criminologyChapter 9: Reflecting on Theories of Crime, Theories of Human Nature: Crime in the Age of the Enterprising Risky Citizen-subject From modernity to high modernity The neoliberal enterprise form and the criminal justice system Conclusion: reflecting on theories of crime and theories of human nature