Мяра на престъпленията

by Nils Christie, Нилс Кристи, Иглика В. Василева (Преводач)

Укорими деяния съществуват, но съществуват ли престъпления? Ако съществуват, кога трябва да се каже: "Стига толкова!"? Понятието за престъпление не е стабилно и представата за това кои деяния са престъпни е различна в различните епохи и общества. Всяко деяние може да се квалифицира като престъпно и така на практика съществува неизчерпаем запас от престъпления. "Мяра на престъпленията" разглежда голямото многообразие в различните страни по въпросите кои са "нежелани деяния", колко от тях се приемат за престъпления и се наказват. Книгата описва различията между Източна и Западна Европа и между САЩ и останалия свят. Авторът разобличава големия брой на затворниците в страните със засилена наказателна политика като заплаха за човешките ценности и цивилизованите общества и предлага академичните и научните среди да изпълнят своето морално задължение, като наблегнат на запознаването на обществеността със съществуващите алтернативи. Нилс Кристи е световнопризнат криминолог, чиито произведения са публикувани в превод на много езици. Тази книга отразява дългогодишния опит на автора в изследването на престъпленията и наказателните системи. Тя е написана по завладяващ и достъпен начин и ще се хареса на всеки, който иска да вникне в съвременните проблеми, свързани с престъпленията и наказанията.

Genres: Nonfiction, Sociology

212 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Nils Christie was a Norwegian criminologist known for his criticism of penal incarceration and drug prohibition. Christie was a member of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters. He was also the president of the Scandinavian Council for Criminology and the director of the Institute for Criminology and Penal Law in Norway. Christie wrote about the massacre of prisoners from Yugoslavia in Norwegian concentration camps during WWII.

Reviews

[Jim v H · Rating 4 out of 5]

De wereld is een Nils Christie fan rijker

[Griffin R · Rating 4 out of 5]

Painfully ignorant regarding abolition on a practical and theoretical level, very possibly willfully so, but the rest is pretty good.

[Sarah Jane Wood · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had to do a critical analysis of this work from my Criminology course this quarter. I was not particularly excited about reading this book, but I ended up getting a lot out of it. Christie is not a native English speaker, so his writing is a little awkward at times. I ended up adjusting to his word choice and sentence structure after a couple of chapters though.

Christie approaches the concept of "crime" from an interesting point of view: crime doesn't really exist. He claims, instead, that only acts exist. Crime has no true or constant definition. Thus, it cannot be accurately measured, nor can different measurements of crime be meaningfully compared.

In the end, Christie insists that peacemaking must be given at least as much emphasis as the control of acts through punishment. As a global community, we must all work toward this end. He explains how the failure to do so will impact us all negatively.

I didn't expect to be interested in this piece of work, but I was ultimately very impressed. It's a short read, certainly worth picking up.

[Nadia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Crime is a fluid concept, a social construct. The acts that could be construed as criminal are unlimited and crime is therefore in ‘endless supply’ (Christie, 2004).

[Aleksandra · Rating 2 out of 5]

Christie sets out to illustrate the fluidity of crime and inefficacy of the modern penal system. Unfortunately, the book mostly consists of poorly written ramblings.