Criminology ─ Explaining Crime and Its Context

Criminology: Explaining Crime and Its Context, 9^th edition, is a highly acclaimed textbook offering a broad perspective on criminological theory. It provides students of criminology and sociology with a thorough exposure to a range of theories, contrasting their logic and assumptions, but also highlighting efforts to integrate and blend these frameworks. In this ninth edition, the authors have incorporated new directions that have gained traction in the field, while remaining faithful to their criminological heritage.

Several key notions are woven throughout, drawing connections between theoretical perspectives, offering concrete examples and discussing the policy implications of theory. Students are immersed in the substance of each theory or perspective, and given practical examples to help them grasp the importance of theory in responding to crime and deviance. Among the themes in this work are the relativity of crime (its changing definition) with abundant examples, historical roots of criminology and the lessons they have provided, and the strength and challenges of applying the scientific method. The authors do not shy away from the controversies surrounding each theoretical perspective as they present its strengths. This revision offers enhanced coverage of biosocial theories of crime, more global examples, and a new chapter on youth violence, improving on the most comprehensive and balanced theory text available for undergraduates.

Stephen E. Brown is a Professor of Criminology & Criminal Justice and Department Head at Western Carolina University. He has served as a Trustee on the board of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, and as editor of the American Society of Criminology’s The Criminologist. He is currently working with several colleagues in assessing pedagogical challenges in teaching social science statistics.

Finn-Aage Esbensen is the E. Desmond Lee Professor of Youth Crime and Violence and Chairperson of the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Missouri, St. Louis. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Criminology (2014) and the Western Society of Criminology (2002). He has received the Gerhard O.W. Mueller Award from the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences and the Paul Tappan and President’s Awards from the Western Society of Criminology.

Gilbert Geis was Professor Emeritus from the University of California, Irvine. Geis had the honor of being a member of Lyndon Johnson’s President’s Commission on Crime, and was a former president of the American Society of Criminology and recipient of its Edwin H. Sutherland Award for outstanding research, among other awards. The National White-Collar Crime Research Consortium named its distinguished scholar award in his honor.