Volume 25, numéro 2, 1992 Nouvelles connaissances et nouvelles questions en criminologie Sous la direction de Alvaro P. Pires

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One of the abiding debates in criminology contrasts social reactions to deviance with explorations of the causes in criminality. In this article, the authors note that the two paradigms consider crime in totally different ways, one as a raw fact, the other as a purely social construction. The authors propose a new paradigm which integrates at the same time contributions of sociology, clinical criminology from the School of Louvain, and feministic perspectives. This proposal differs from those advanced by left and right realists.

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This paper explores the relations between different clinical perspectives in criminology, and the current criminal law. The author identifies the existence of at least two major perspectives. The predominant approach is well-integrated with the existing criminal law. A second, less widespread perspective is incompatible with the autoritarian discourse of existing criminal law. This perspective stresses the need to undertake a paradigm shift in terms of the criminal law.

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Beginning in the 70s, the silence on the question of women in criminology was broken by a feminist series of works that was set upon the questioning and updating of knowledge in the social sciences and in criminology. This article concerns the conception of deviance in feminist studies dealing with the "criminality" and criminalization of women. The author finds that the feminists adopt a firmly empathetical approach toward women offenders, which enables them to depart from the traditional concepts of deviance and the develop analyses that go beyond the known context of questioning in the discipline. The feminist approach also makes it possible to review the positions to be taken regarding the crime policies that should be applied.

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In this paper, the author argues that, "in a given society, a process of increasing carceration occurs in cunjonction with situations perceived as critical for the maintenance of the elites' hegemony in that society (irrespective of "crimes rates"). He revisits the rich tradition inspired by Rusche's original hypothesis, but avoids the economist and instrumentalist temptations of that work. Evidence for the linkage between social structure and punishment is to be found in what he calls "vocabularies of punitive motive". He also shows that this theoretical reconstruction dovetails well with the crucial work of Foucault and other contributions to the sociology of law.

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In this article 'abolitionism' will be discussed as a social movement, a theoretical perspective, and a political strategy. Strategies for penal reform will be dealt with and the implications of the abolitionist perspective for crime control will be discussed. As a theoretical perspective, abolitionism takes on the twofold task of providing a radical critique of the criminal justice system while showing that there are other, more rational ways of dealing with crime. It will be argued that what is needed is a wide variety o social responses rather than a uniform state reaction to the problem of crime. Therefore, a reconceptualization of the notions of crime and punishment is offered in the form of the concept of redress. In policy terms it is claimed that social policy instead of crime policy is needed in dealing with the social problems and conflicts that are currently singled as the problem of crime.