The Social World of an English Crown Court

The Social World of an English Crown Court is the first ethnographic study of a Crown Court Centre. It also describes the origins and early history of a pioneering project to support victims and prosecution witnesses appearing before the court–the Witness Support Project. Paul Rock analyses the major divide which exists in the life of the court between professional insiders and public outsiders. He describes how this divide created problems for witnesses and how the project set out to alleviate this. He provides details of how this division is built into court architecture, administration, and social relations, and examines how it stems from the preoccupation of court officials with the control of knowledge, public order, and emotion.