Ross Coomber – författare

"A crucial text for whetting the academic appetite of those studying criminology at university. The comprehensive engagement with key crime and deviance debates and issues make this a perfect springboard for launching into the complex, diverse and exciting realm of researching criminology." - Dr Ruth Penfold-Mounce, University of York "Essential reading for those new to the discipline and an invaluable reference point for those well versed in criminology and the sociology of crime and deviance." - Dr Mark Monaghan, University of Leeds

Key Concepts in Crime and Society offers an authoritative introduction to key issues in the area of crime as it connects to society. By providing critical insight into the key issues within each concept as well as highlighted cross-references to other key concepts, students will be helped to grasp a clear understanding of each of the topics covered and how they relate to broader areas of crime and criminality. The book is divided into three parts:

Understanding Crime and Criminality: introduces topics such as the social construction of crime and deviance, social control, the fear of crime, poverty and exclusion, white collar crime, victims of crime, race/gender and crime. Types of Crime and Criminality: explores examples including human trafficking, sex work, drug crime, environmental crime, cyber crime, war crime, terrorism, and interpersonal violence. Responses to Crime: looks at areas such as crime and the media, policing, moral panics, deterrence, prisons and rehabilitation.

The book provides an up-to-date, critical understanding on a wide range of crime related topics covering the major concepts students are likely to encounter within the fields of sociology, criminology and across the social sciences.

'This is a great resource that reflects the huge expertise of the authors. It will be welcomed by students, researchers and indeed anyone wanting critical but comprehensive coverage of key issues and trends concerning drugs and society - locally and globally, historically and today.' - Nigel South, Professor of Sociology, University of Essex 'Provides informative, balanced and contextualized insights into the relationships between people and drugs. Whatever your background and however knowledgeable you feel you are about contemporary drug issues, I guarantee that you will learn something unexpected and new from this valuable text.' - Joanne Neale, Professor of Public Health, Oxford Brookes University Why do people take drugs? How do we understand moral panics? What is the relationship between drugs and violence? How do people's social positions influence their involvement in drug use? Insightful and illuminating, this book discusses drugs in social contexts. The authors bring together their different theoretical and practical backgrounds, offering a comprehensive and interdisciplinary introduction that opens up a wide scientific understanding moving beyond cultural myths and presuppositions.

This is an invaluable reference source for students on criminology, sociology and social sciences programmes, as well as drug service practitioners such as drug workers, social workers and specialist nurses.

'This is a great resource that reflects the huge expertise of the authors. It will be welcomed by students, researchers and indeed anyone wanting critical but comprehensive coverage of key issues and trends concerning drugs and society - locally and globally, historically and today.' - Nigel South, Professor of Sociology, University of Essex 'Provides informative, balanced and contextualized insights into the relationships between people and drugs. Whatever your background and however knowledgeable you feel you are about contemporary drug issues, I guarantee that you will learn something unexpected and new from this valuable text.' - Joanne Neale, Professor of Public Health, Oxford Brookes University Why do people take drugs? How do we understand moral panics? What is the relationship between drugs and violence? How do people's social positions influence their involvement in drug use? Insightful and illuminating, this book discusses drugs in social contexts. The authors bring together their different theoretical and practical backgrounds, offering a comprehensive and interdisciplinary introduction that opens up a wide scientific understanding moving beyond cultural myths and presuppositions.

This is an invaluable reference source for students on criminology, sociology and social sciences programmes, as well as drug service practitioners such as drug workers, social workers and specialist nurses.

Throughout the 20th and into the 21st centuries, considerable research, policy and media attention has focused on drug use in Britain, wider Europe, the USA and other advanced 'western' societies such as Australia and Canada. However the place of drugs in other cultural contexts has received far less attention. Both academics and policy makers need to broaden their horizons and, in particular, any prospects for the development of a better informed international drug control policy must take a more comparative approach. Studies of drug use in differing contexts and among diverse groups can question many strongly held assumptions about both drugs and drug use. Extreme levels of intoxication with various hallucinogens, substances regularly condemned in the West as essentially harmful and divisive for society, are often utilised in other societies in ritual and religious fashion to in fact enhance cohesiveness and bolster traditional practice.Other forms of drug use, whilst not necessarily essential to the cohesiveness of the society in which they are used, can be shown to be a significant aspect of what constitutes the general fabric of the culture of particular groups or a broader society. What is clear is that not all drug use that is demonised in the West can be shown to necessarily produce the same problems elsewhere. As the chapters in this volume demonstrate, the problems that do emerge are as much about the influence of western politics, economics and definitions as they are about the dangers inherent within the use of any particular drugs. However little is known about the use of drugs in non-western societies and this lack of comparative knowledge hinders a broader understanding of drug use, the way problems are attached to it and the nature of inappropriately applied social and regulatory policies. This book examines drug use (including alcohol) in different cultural contexts, showing how the claim of tradition can persist even while the impetus toward change is pervasive. In some cases, change is strongly resisted; in others its' effects are profound and potentially highly destructive.In a world of globalisation, western investment and leisure tourism can combine with the profiteering of international drug trafficking to transform traditional patterns of intoxicant use; in a world of post-colonialism, the legacies of past impositions are still causing tragedies; and in a world of western-led drug control policies, unproblematic cultural incorporation of drug use into everyday life and sacred ritual is threatened by remote and ill-informed politicians and bureaucracies. This book will be of interest to academics, students and receptive policy audiences, interested in understanding drugs and the issues raised by their use in unfamiliar contexts