David P. Farrington - Böcker

The Handbook of Crime Correlates, Second Edition summarizes more than a century of worldwide research on traits and social conditions associated with criminality and antisocial behavior. Findings are provided in tabular form, enabling readers to determine at a glance the nature of each association. Within each table, results are listed by country, type of crime (or other forms of antisocial behavior), and whether each variable is positively, negatively, or insignificantly associated with offending behavior. Criminal behavior is broken down according to major categories, including violent crime, property crime, drug offenses, sex offenses, delinquency, and recidivism.

This book provides a resource for practitioners and academics who are interested in criminal and antisocial behavior. It is relevant to the fields of criminology/criminal justice, sociology, and psychology. No other publication provides as much information about how a wide range of variables-e.g., gender, religion, personality traits, weapons access, alcohol and drug use, social status, geography, and seasonality-correlate with offending behavior.

Includes 600+ tables regarding variables related to criminal behavior Consolidates 100+ years of academic research on criminal behavior Findings are identified by country and world regions for easy comparison Lists criminal-related behaviors according to major categories Identifies universal crime correlates

Developmental and life-course criminology are both concerned with the study of changes in offending and problem behaviors over time. Developmental studies in criminology focus on psychological factors that influence the onset and persistence of criminal behavior, while life-course studies analyze how changes in social arrangements, like marriage, education or social networks, can lead to changes in offending. Though each perspective is clearly concerned with patterns of offending and problem behavior over time, the literature on each is spread across various disciplines, including criminology & criminal justice, psychology, and sociology. The Oxford Handbook on Developmental and Life-Course Criminology offers the first comprehensive survey of these two approaches together. Edited by three noted authorities in the field, the volume provides in-depth critical reviews of the development of offending, developmental and life-course theories, development correlates and risk/protective factors, life transitions and turning points, and effective developmental interventions from the world's leading scholars. In the first two sections, the contributors provide overviews of specific criminal career parameters, including age-crime curve, prevalence/frequency of offending, and co-offending, and review the main theoretical frameworks in the developmental and life-course criminology areas. They further summarize some of the empirical literature on known developmental correlates and risk/protective factors associated with longitudinal patterns of offending in the next section. The fourth section focuses on life transitions and turning points as they may relate to persistence in-or desistance from-criminal activity into adulthood, while the final section examines the genesis of antisocial, delinquent, and criminal activity, its maintenance, and its cessation. A state of the art overview on the topic, this Handbook aims to be the most authoritative resource on all issues germane to developmental and life-course criminologists and provides next steps for further research.

Scholars and policymakers increasingly call for evidence-based, prevention-oriented, and community-driven approaches to improve public health and reduce youth crime, substance use, and related problems. However, few functional models exist. In Communities that Care, four leading experts on prevention describe one such system to illustrate how communities effectively engage in prevention activities. Communities That Care (CTC) is a coalition-based prevention system implemented successfully in dozens of communities across the world that promotes healthy development and reduces crime rates for youth. Drawing on literature from criminology, community psychology, and prevention science this book describes the conditions and actions necessary for effective community-based prevention. The authors illustrate how effective community-based prevention can be undertaken by describing how the CTC prevention system has been developed, implemented, evaluated, and disseminated across the U.S. and internationally. Communities that Care shares invaluable lessons about the implementation and evaluation of community-level interventions and establishes a set of best practices for anyone seeking to engage in and/or evaluate effective prevention efforts.

Scholars and policymakers increasingly call for evidence-based, prevention-oriented, and community-driven approaches to improve public health and reduce youth crime, substance use, and related problems. However, few functional models exist. In Communities that Care, four leading experts on prevention describe one such system to illustrate how communities effectively engage in prevention activities. Communities That Care (CTC) is a coalition-based prevention system implemented successfully in dozens of communities across the world that promotes healthy development and reduces crime rates for youth. Drawing on literature from criminology, community psychology, and prevention science this book describes the conditions and actions necessary for effective community-based prevention. The authors illustrate how effective community-based prevention can be undertaken by describing how the CTC prevention system has been developed, implemented, evaluated, and disseminated across the U.S. and internationally. Communities that Care shares invaluable lessons about the implementation and evaluation of community-level interventions and establishes a set of best practices for anyone seeking to engage in and/or evaluate effective prevention efforts.

After decades of rigorous study in the United States and across the Western world, a great deal is known about the early risk factors for offending. High impulsiveness, low attainment, criminal parents, parental conflict, and growing up in a deprived, high-crime neighborhood are among the most important factors. There is also a growing body of high quality scientific evidence on the effectiveness of early prevention programs designed to prevent children from embarking on a life of crime. Drawing on the latest evidence, Saving Children from a Life of Crime is the first book to assess the early causes of offending and what works best to prevent it. Preschool intellectual enrichment, child skills training, parent management training, and home visiting programs are among the most effective early prevention programs. Criminologists David Farrington and Brandon Welsh also outline a policy strategy--early prevention--that uses this current research knowledge and brings into sharper focus what America's national crime fighting priority ought to be. At a time when unacceptable crime levels in America, rising criminal justice costs, and a punitive crime policy have spurred a growing interest in the early prevention of delinquency, Farrington and Welsh here lay the groundwork for change with a comprehensive national prevention strategy to save children from a life of crime.

The United Kingdom has more than 4.2 million public closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras--one for every fourteen citizens. Across the United States, hundreds of video surveillance systems are being installed in town centers, public transportation facilities, and schools at a cost exceeding $100 million annually. And now other Western countries have begun to experiment with CCTV to prevent crime in public places. In light of this expansion and the associated public expenditure, as well as pressing concerns about privacy rights, there is an acute need for an evidence-based approach to inform policy and practice. Drawing on the highest-quality research, criminologists Brandon C. Welsh and David P. Farrington assess the effectiveness and social costs of not only CCTV, but also of other important surveillance methods to prevent crime in public space, such as improved street lighting, security guards, place managers, and defensible space. Importantly, the book goes beyond the question of "Does it work?" and examines the specific conditions and contexts under which these surveillance methods may have an effect on crime as well as the mechanisms that bring about a reduction in crime. At a time when cities need cost-effective methods to fight crime and the public gradually awakens to the burdens of sacrificing their privacy and civil rights for security, Welsh and Farrington provide this timely and reliable guide to the most effective and non-invasive uses of surveillance to make public places safer from crime.

After decades of rigorous study in the United States and across the Western world, a great deal is known about the early risk factors for offending. High impulsiveness, low attainment, criminal parents, parental conflict, and growing up in a deprived, high-crime neighborhood are among the most important factors. There is also a growing body of high quality scientific evidence on the effectiveness of early prevention programs designed to prevent children from embarking on a life of crime. Drawing on the latest evidence, Saving Children from a Life of Crime is the first book to assess the early causes of offending and what works best to prevent it. Preschool intellectual enrichment, child skills training, parent management training, and home visiting programs are among the most effective early prevention programs. Criminologists David Farrington and Brandon Welsh also outline a policy strategy - early prevention - that uses this current research knowledge and brings into sharper focus what America's national crime fighting priority ought to be. At a time when unacceptable crime levels in America, rising criminal justice costs, and a punitive crime policy have spurred a growing interest in the early prevention of delinquency, Farrington and Welsh here lay the groundwork for change with a comprehensive national prevention strategy to save children from a life of crime.

How can a society prevent-not deter, not punish-but prevent crime? Criminal justice prevention, commonly called crime control, aims to prevent crime after an initial offence has been commited through anything from an arrest to a death penalty sentence. These traditional means have been frequently examined and their efficacy just as frequently questioned. Promising new forms of crime prevention have emerged and expanded as important components of an overall strategy to reduce crime. Crime prevention today has developed along three lines: interventions to improve the life chances of children and prevent them from embarking on a life of crime; programs and policies designed to ameliorate the social conditions and institutions that influence offending; and the modification or manipulation of the physical environment, products, or systems to reduce everyday opportunities for crime. Each strategy aims at preventing crime or criminal offending in the first instance - before the act has been committed. Each, importantly, takes place outside of the formal criminal justice system, representing an alternative, perhaps even socially progressive way to reduce crime. The Oxford Handbook of Crime Prevention is a comprehensive, up-to-date, and authoritative review of research on crime prevention. Bringing together top scholars in criminology, public policy, psychology, and sociology, this Handbook includes critical reviews of the main theories that form the basis of crime prevention, evidence-based assessments of the effectiveness of the most important interventions, and cross-cutting essays that examine implementation, evaluation methodology, and public policy. Covering the three major crime prevention strategies active today-developmental, community, and situational-this definitive volume addresses seriously and critically the ways in which the United States and the Western world have attempted, and should continue to strive for the prevention of crime.

How can a society prevent-not deter, not punish-but prevent crime? Criminal justice prevention, commonly called crime control, aims to prevent crime after an initial offence has been commited through anything from an arrest to a death penalty sentence. These traditional means have been frequently examined and their efficacy just as frequently questioned. Promising new forms of crime prevention have emerged and expanded as important components of an overall strategy to reduce crime. Crime prevention today has developed along three lines: interventions to improve the life chances of children and prevent them from embarking on a life of crime; programs and policies designed to ameliorate the social conditions and institutions that influence offending; and the modification or manipulation of the physical environment, products, or systems to reduce everyday opportunities for crime. Each strategy aims at preventing crime or criminal offending in the first instance - before the act has been committed. Each, importantly, takes place outside of the formal criminal justice system, representing an alternative, perhaps even socially progressive way to reduce crime. The Oxford Handbook of Crime Prevention is a comprehensive, up-to-date, and authoritative review of research on crime prevention. Bringing together top scholars in criminology, public policy, psychology, and sociology, this Handbook includes critical reviews of the main theories that form the basis of crime prevention, evidence-based assessments of the effectiveness of the most important interventions, and cross-cutting essays that examine implementation, evaluation methodology, and public policy. Covering the three major crime prevention strategies active today-developmental, community, and situational-this definitive volume addresses seriously and critically the ways in which the United States and the Western world have attempted, and should continue to strive for the of crime.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.Explaining Criminal Careers presents a simple but influential theory of crime, conviction and reconviction. The assumptions of the theory are derived directly from a detailed analysis of cohort samples extracted from the Home Office Offenders Index - a unique database which contains records of all criminal (standard list) convictions in England and Wales since 1963. In particular, the theory explains the well-known Age/Crime curve.Based on the idea that there are only three types of offenders, who commit crimes at either high or low (constant) rates and have either a high or low (constant) risk of reoffending, this simple theory makes exact quantitative predictions about criminal careers and age-crime curves. Purely from the birth-rate over the second part of the 20th century, the theory accurately predicts (to within 2%) the prison population contingent on a given sentencing policy. The theory also suggests that increasing the probability of conviction after each offence is the most effective way of reducing crime, although there is a role for treatment programmes for some offenders. The authors indicate that crime is influenced by the operation of the Criminal Justice System and that offenders do not 'grow out' of crime as commonly supposed; they are persuaded to stop or decide to stop after (repeated) convictions, with a certain fraction of offenders desisting after each conviction. Simply imprisoning offenders will not reduce crime either by individual deterrence or by incapacitation.With comprehensive explanations of the formulae used and complete mathematical appendices allowing for individual interpretations and further development of the theory, Explaining Criminal Careers represents an innovative and meticulous investigation into criminal activity and the influences behind it. With clear policy implications and a wealth of original and significant discussions, this book marks a ground-breaking chapter in the criminological debate surrounding criminal careers.

What makes a juvenile delinquent develop into an adult criminal? What defines-cognitively, developmentally, legally-the transition from juvenile to adult and what determines whether patterns of criminal behavior persist? In most US states and Western nations, legal adulthood begins at age 18. This volume focuses on the period surrounding that abrupt transition (roughly ages 15-29) and addresses what happens to offending careers during it.Edited by two leading authorities in the fields of psychology and criminology, Transitions from Juvenile Delinquency to Adult Crime examines why the period of transition is important and how it can be better understood and addressed both inside and outside of the justice system. Bringing together over thirty leading scholars from multiple disciplines in both North America and Europe, this volume asks critical questions about criminal careers and causation, and whether current legal definitions of adulthood accurately reflect actual maturation and development. The volume also addresses the current efficacy of the justice system in addressing juvenile crime and recidivism, why and how juveniles ought to be treated differently from adults, if special legal provisions should be established for young adults, and the effectiveness of crime prevention programs implemented during early childhood and adolescence.With serious scholarly analysis and practical policy proposals, Transitions from Juvenile Delinquency to Adult Crime addresses what can be done to ensure that today's juvenile delinquents do not become tomorrow's adult criminals.

What makes a juvenile delinquent develop into an adult criminal? What defines-cognitively, developmentally, legally-the transition from juvenile to adult and what determines whether patterns of criminal behavior persist? In most US states and Western nations, legal adulthood begins at age 18. This volume focuses on the period surrounding that abrupt transition (roughly ages 15-29) and addresses what happens to offending careers during it.Edited by two leading authorities in the fields of psychology and criminology, Transitions from Juvenile Delinquency to Adult Crime examines why the period of transition is important and how it can be better understood and addressed both inside and outside of the justice system. Bringing together over thirty leading scholars from multiple disciplines in both North America and Europe, this volume asks critical questions about criminal careers and causation, and whether current legal definitions of adulthood accurately reflect actual maturation and development. The volume also addresses the current efficacy of the justice system in addressing juvenile crime and recidivism, why and how juveniles ought to be treated differently from adults, if special legal provisions should be established for young adults, and the effectiveness of crime prevention programs implemented during early childhood and adolescence.With serious scholarly analysis and practical policy proposals, Transitions from Juvenile Delinquency to Adult Crime addresses what can be done to ensure that today's juvenile delinquents do not become tomorrow's adult criminals.

Ego psychology is the aspect of psychoanalytic theory concerned with how people adapt to the demands and possibilities of their worlds in accordance with their inner requirements. All substantial theories of personality refer to adaptation, but there are several features special to ego psychology. It offers by far the most elaborate picture of the adaptive apparatus and of the varied devices humans have for negotiating among their drives and their life situations. More than any other theory of psychology, it emphasizes the complicated transactions that go on in people's minds, of which many are outside conscious awareness. Norman A. Polansky argues that we must be disciplined enough to commit ourselves to one consistent line of theory if we are to harness reasoning to go beyond what we can directly observe.Few who are, or aspire to be, caseworkers, therapists or counselors come to this book innocent of all the ideas contained herein. Much will seem familiar from previous training and from experiences with people. Moreover, many Freudian terms have been adopted into the working vocabularies of all educated people. Words like instinctual drive, defense mechanism, anxiety, guilt, conflict, unconscious, and the like, are used all the time in estimating each other. One task of Integrated Ego Psychology is defining such terms with precise meanings, as well as showing the logical connections among them.Psychoanalytic theory has envolved for about a century, and some "grand simplicities" have finally emerged. This book, for practitioners, indicates the need for a theory to guide work if we are to help people effectively. The theory must be elaborate enough to cover a very wide range of human activity and it must meet certain other standards as well.

Ego psychology is the aspect of psychoanalytic theory concerned with how people adapt to the demands and possibilities of their worlds in accordance with their inner requirements. All substantial theories of personality refer to adaptation, but there are several features special to ego psychology. It offers by far the most elaborate picture of the adaptive apparatus and of the varied devices humans have for negotiating among their drives and their life situations. More than any other theory of psychology, it emphasizes the complicated transactions that go on in people's minds, of which many are outside conscious awareness. Norman A. Polansky argues that we must be disciplined enough to commit ourselves to one consistent line of theory if we are to harness reasoning to go beyond what we can directly observe.Few who are, or aspire to be, caseworkers, therapists or counselors come to this book innocent of all the ideas contained herein. Much will seem familiar from previous training and from experiences with people. Moreover, many Freudian terms have been adopted into the working vocabularies of all educated people. Words like instinctual drive, defense mechanism, anxiety, guilt, conflict, unconscious, and the like, are used all the time in estimating each other. One task of Integrated Ego Psychology is defining such terms with precise meanings, as well as showing the logical connections among them.Psychoanalytic theory has envolved for about a century, and some "grand simplicities" have finally emerged. This book, for practitioners, indicates the need for a theory to guide work if we are to help people effectively. The theory must be elaborate enough to cover a very wide range of human activity and it must meet certain other standards as well.

Using citation analysis, this study examines the influence and prestige of scholars, journals, and university departments in the fields of criminology and criminal justice. In the tradition of Marvin E. Wolfgang's Evaluating Criminology, the authors apply this quantitative method to evaluate the impact of individuals and their research efforts on two fields and to identify interconnections among scholars and their publications. This examination of the most-cited scholars, works, and topics in major American and international journals from 1986 to 1990 and from 1991 to 1995 provides valuable and unbiased feedback for researchers and practitioners.The nine chapters of this book detail a wide range of findings in both criminology and criminal justice. After an introduction to the methodology, chapters two, three, and four divide recent scholarship into two periods, 1986 to 1990 and 1991 to 1995, in order to consider the most-cited scholars, works, and topics. Chapter five provides a longitudinal analysis of scholars in the discipline since 1945. Chapters six and seven provide a system of prestige-ratings for relevant journals as well as page coverage analysis of the most influential scholars. The continuing controversy over whether the two fields are converging or diverging is the subject of chapter eight, and the work concludes with a prescription for further research.

This book is about evidence-based crime prevention.A project of the Campbell Collaboration Crime and Justice Group, Preventing Crime brings together the leading scientific evidence on what works best for a wide range of interventions organized around four important domains in criminology: at-risk children, offenders, victims, and places.

This latest volume in the Cambridge Criminal Justice Series focuses upon young adults and their treatment in the criminal justice system. The subject is very topical because there is increasing evidence that a rigid distinction between ‘youth’ and ‘adulthood’ is not appropriate in modern societies. For example, important developmental tasks such as finishing one’s education, finding regular work and the foundation of one’s own family are now completed later than in former times; neuropsychological brain functions are still developing beyond age 18; and desistance from criminal offending occurs most rapidly in early adulthood. Despite such evidence, the United Kingdom and other countries have largely neglected policies for young adult offenders in comparison with young people under 18. Although there seems to be no general transnational solution for this problem, there is a clear need for differentiation. This book brings together leading authorities in the field to analyse theoretical, empirical and policy issues relating to this neglected group of people, exploring different approaches to both crime prevention and offender treatment. It will be of interest to researchers, practitioners and policy makers in the fields of criminology, criminal justice, prisons, probation, forensic psychology and psychiatry, sociology, education and social work.

Based on extensive research initiated by the UK Home Office, Reducing Crime offers an objective look at the effectiveness of criminal justice interventions in the reduction of crime. Bringing together information about where, for whom and at what cost these interventions are effective, the book examines alcohol prevention and drug treatment studies; courts, sentencing and police interventions; probation and prison interventions; and situational burglary and housing interventions. In addition to a cost/benefits analysis of each intervention, the book also discusses future research and policy directions.

Documented evidence suggests that community safety is best achievedthrough policies promoting human services rather than relyingtotally on prisons and that promoting intervention in anindividual's own environment (known as 'ecological integrity') isclosely associated with effective intervention. This is the first book to focus on the transfer of knowledge ofworldwide effective offender rehabilitation programs. Prominentresearchers and practitioners in the criminal justice field havecontributed their extensive knowledge of what it takes to implementeffective correctional practices with ecological integrity. * Reviews "real world" challenges of program effectiveness andsurvival * Offers effective, evidence based, innovative alternatives toimprisonment of offenders * Offers a common multi-level systems perspective as a frameworkfor the international case studies featured * The first book to focus on the transfer of knowledge and bestpractice through the concept of "technology transfer"

Criminologists often allude to 'peer influence' in explanations of crime and delinquency, but the meaning of that concept rarely receives careful attention. Companions in Crime organizes the extensive literature on peer influence and group delinquency into a coherent form for the first time. Chapters focus on the role of peers over the life course, the group nature of delinquent behavior, and the applicability of peer influence for explaining the major features of delinquent behavior. The most extensive chapter of the book examines possible mechanisms of peer influence and the evidence in favor of each. The principal thesis of Companions in Crime is that deviant behavior is predominantly social behavior, and criminologists must eventually determine the significance of that fact.

This book presents a comprehensive summary of how well adult crime, antisocial behaviour and antisocial personality disorder can be prevented by interventions applied early in life. It reviews important childhood risk and protective factors for these adult outcomes and the alternative strategies of primary prevention (targeting the whole community) and secondary prevention (targeting persons identified as high risk) are discussed. The book also contains extensive information about prevention programmes in pregnancy and infancy, pre-school programmes, parent education and training programmes, and school programmes (including the prevention of bullying). There is special emphasis on preventing the intergenerational transmission of antisocial behaviour by focusing on family violence, and a special review of whether risk factors and prevention programmes have different effects for females compared to males. Cost-benefit analyses of early prevention programmes are also reviewed, leading to the conclusion that adult antisocial behaviour can be prevented both effectively and cost-efficiently.

Why is crime persistent over generations, within families and within certain individuals? Is crime the manifestation of an inherited latent trait or the result of a failure of socialization and norm-setting processes? Why do youths commit crimes? Delinquency and Crime contains essays by nine leading criminologists that seek to answer these and other questions by describing current theories of crime and the research evidence that supports them. The authors' views on crime causation go beyond traditional criminological theories of strain, cultural deviance, social control, differential association and social learning to present emerging and integrated models of the origins of crime, including antisocial peer socialization, social development, interactional theory, behavior genetics, and community determinants. Each essay explores the practical implication of the authors' theoretical work for crime prevention and control.

Mean Streets is a field study of young people who have left home and school and are living on the streets of Toronto and Vancouver. This book includes the personal narratives and explanatory accounts, in their own words, of some of the more than four hundred young people who participated in the summer-long study, which featured intensive personal interviews. The study examines why youth take to the streets, their struggles to survive on the street, their victimization and involvement in crime, their associations with other street youth, especially within 'street families', their contacts with the police, and their efforts to leave the street and rejoin conventional society. Major theories of youth crime are analyzed and reappraised in the context of a new social capital theory of crime.

In this book, Brian Forst takes a fresh perspective on the assessment of criminal justice policy, examining the prospect of assessing policies based on their impact on errors of justice: the error of failing to bring offenders to justice, on the one hand, and the error of imposing costs on innocent people and excessive costs on offenders, on the other. Noting that we have sophisticated systems for managing errors in statistical inference and quality control processes and no parallel system for managing errors of a more socially costly variety - on matters of guilt and innocence - the author lays the foundation for a common sense approach to the management of errors in the criminal justice system, from policing and prosecution to sentencing and corrections. He examines the sources of error in each sector, the harms they impose on society, and frameworks for analyzing and reducing them.

Why do corporations obey the law? When companies violate the law, what kinds of interventions are most apt to correct their behavior and return them to compliant status? In this book Sally Simpson examines whether the shift towards the use of criminal law, with its emphasis on punishment and stigmatization, is an effective strategy for controlling illegal corporate behavior. She concludes that strict criminalization models will not yield sufficiently high levels of compliance. Empirical data suggest that in most cases cooperative models work best with most corporate offenders. Because some corporate managers, however, respond primarily to instrumental concerns, Simpson argues that compliance should also be buttressed by punitive strategies. Her review and application of the relevant empirical literature on corporate crime and compliance combined with her judicious examination of theory and approaches, make a valuable new contribution to the literature on white-collar crime and deterrence and criminal behavior more generally.

This book addresses how and why criminal offenders repeat their actions after being released from prison. It is part of an attempt to explain criminal behavior within the context of a contemporary psychological understanding of behavior, rather than more traditional theories of crime. Over 300 serious male criminal offenders were interviewed and tested after they returned to prison for new crimes. The results indicate that their new offenses may be the result of something like a 'breakdown'. From this, it can be argued that we could monitor released prisoners to predict or even to prevent their return to crime. This report, written for a general audience, has some important implications for release supervision, rehabilitation programs, and the prediction of recidivism.

This book examines several contentious and under-studied criminal career issues using one of the world's most important longitudinal studies, the Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development (CSDD), a longitudinal study of 411 South London boys followed in criminal records to age 40. The analysis reported in the book explores issues related to prevalence, offending frequency, specialization, onset sequences, co-offending, chronicity, career length, and trajectory estimation. The results of the study are considered in the context of developmental/life-course theories, and the authors outline an agenda for criminal career research generally, and within the context of the CSDD specifically.

Schools and Delinquency, first published in 2001, provides a comprehensive review and critique of the current research about the causes of delinquency, substance use, drop-out, and truancy, and the role of the school in preventing these behavior patterns. Examining school-based prevention programs and practices for grades K-12, Denise Gottfredson identifies a broad array of effective strategies improving the school environment, as well as some that specifically target youths at risk of developing problem behaviors. She also explains why several popular school-based prevention strategies are ineffective and should be abandoned. Gottfredson analyzes, within the larger context of the community, the special challenges to effective prevention programming that arise in disorganized settings, identifying ways to overcome these obstacles and to make the most troubled schools safer and more productive environments.

Recriminalizing Delinquency presents a case study of legislation that redefines previous acts of delinquency as crimes, and delinquents as juvenile offenders. It examines one state's response to violent juvenile crime through waiver legislation that transfers jurisdiction over juveniles from juvenile court to criminal court. It focuses on the creation, implementation, and effects of waiver legislation that lowered the eligible age of criminal responsibility to thirteen for murder and fourteen for other violent offenses. In the end, recriminalization is seen as an effort to return a part of the juvenile justice system to the conditions that existed prior to the creation of juvenile courts.