The Routledge International Handbook of Penal Abolition provides an authoritative and comprehensive look at the latest developments in the 21st-century penal abolitionism movement, both reflecting on key critical thought and setting the agenda for local and global abolitionist ideas and interventions over the coming decade. Penal abolitionists question the legitimacy of criminal law, policing, courts, prisons and more broadly the idea of punishment, to argue that rather than effectively handling or solving social problems, interpersonal disputes, conflicts and harms, they actually increase individual and societal problems. The Routledge International Handbook of Penal Abolition is organized around six key themes: Social movements and abolition organizing Critical resistance to the penal state Voices from imprisoned and marginalized communities Diversity of abolitionist thought International perspectives on abolitionism Building new justice practices as a response to social and individual wrongdoing. A global-centred and world-encompassing project, this book provides the reader with an alternative and critical perspective from which to reflect and raises the visibility of abolitionist ideas and strategies in a time when there is considerable discussion of how we will move forward in response to what has given rise to the criminalizing system: white supremacy, racial capitalism and human wrongdoing. It is essential reading for all those engaged with punishment and penology, criminology, sociology, corrections and critical prisons studies. It will appeal to any reader who seeks an innovative response to the calamitous failures of the modern criminalizing system.

At the outset of the twenty-first century, more than 9 million people are held in custody in over 200 countries around the world.--from the essay "Prisons and Jails" by Ron KingThe first comparative study of this increasingly integral social subject, International Handbook of Penology and Criminal Justice provides a comprehensive and balanced revie

Penal Abolitionism and Transformative Justice in Brazil discusses how penal abolitionism provides fundamental theoretical bases and practical references for the construction of a transformative justice in Brazil, supporting the claim that justice is a socially constructed conception and that victims do not unanimously stand for punishment. The book explores how the active participation of the protagonists of a conflict in a face-to-face negotiation of symbolic reparation, can produce a sense of justice without the need to punish or impose suffering on anyone. Mapping the ways that restorative justice in Brazil has distanced itself from the potential of transformative justice, to the extent that it fails to politicize the conflict and give voice to victims, the book shows how it has resulted in becoming just a new version of penal alternatives with correctionalist content. Moving away from traditional criminal justice language and also from conservative approaches to restorative justice, the author argues that the communicative potential of the transformative kind of redress can be dissociated from the unproved assumption that legal punishment is essential or even likely to achieve justice or deterrence. The arguments are grounded in the Brazilian reality, where life is marked by deep social inequalities and a high level of police violence. By providing a review of the literature on restorative justice, transformative justice, and abolitionism, the book contextualizes the abolitionist debate in Brazil and its history in the 19th century. Penal Abolitionism and Transformative Justice in Brazil is important reading for students and scholars who study punishment and penal abolitionism, to think about what it is possible to do in societies so deeply marked by social injustice and a history of oppression.

Focusing on prisons, this title is a useful reference for practitioners working in prisons and other parts of the criminal justice system. It explores a range of historical and contemporary issues relating to prisons, imprisonment and prison management.

The Routledge International Handbook on Decolonizing Justice focuses on the growing worldwide movement aimed at decolonizing state policies and practices, and various disciplinary knowledges including criminology, social work and law. The collection of original chapters brings together cutting-edge, politically engaged work from a diverse group of writers who take as a starting point an analysis founded in a decolonizing, decolonial and/or Indigenous standpoint. Centering the perspectives of Black, First Nations and other racialized and minoritized peoples, the book makes an internationally significant contribution to the literature. The chapters include analyses of specific decolonization policies and interventions instigated by communities to enhance jurisdictional self-determination; theoretical approaches to decolonization; the importance of research and research ethics as a key foundation of the decolonization process; crucial contemporary issues including deaths in custody, state crime, reparations, and transitional justice; and critical analysis of key institutions of control, including police, courts, corrections, child protection systems and other forms of carcerality. The handbook is divided into five sections which reflect the breadth of the decolonizing literature: • Why decolonization? From the personal to the global • State terror and violence • Abolishing the carceral • Transforming and decolonizing justice • Disrupting epistemic violence This book offers a comprehensive and timely resource for activists, students, academics, and those with an interest in Indigenous studies, decolonial and post-colonial studies, criminal legal institutions and criminology. It provides critical commentary and analyses of the major issues for enhancing social justice internationally. The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

According to Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) ‘Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.’ Connecting the politics of abolition to wider emancipatory struggles for liberation and social justice, this book argues that penal abolitionism should be understood as an important public critical pedagogy and philosophy of hope that can help to reinvigorate democracy and set society on a pathway towards living in a world without prisons. For Abolition draws upon the socialist ethics of dignity, empathy, freedom and paradigm of life to systematically critique imprisonment as a state institution characterised by ‘social death’. A systematic critique of imprisonment which challenges established views and myths. Examines why there still exists so much political and other misguided support for a long failing institution. Reviews ‘A thoroughly engaging and passionate challenge to dominant understandings of crime and punishment … Prisons are revealed as sites of mental and physical brutality, utterly incapable of providing constructive transformative regimes’-- Professor Emma Bell, University of Savoie. ‘A timely and urgent reminder of the need for Abolition … excellently exposes prisons as institutions of domination, repression and power … A must read for all concerned with the state of prisons’-- Dr Kathryn Chadwick, Manchester Metropolitan University. ‘A book that should be cherished by scholars, students, practitioners and activists alike … it is rare to find a text so sensitively and empathically composed’-- Dr Alana Barton, Edge Hill University.

Prison studies has experienced a period of great creativity in recent years, and this collection draws together some of the field's most exciting and innovative contemporary critical writers in order to engage directly with one of the most profound questions in penology - why prison? In addressing this question, the authors connect contemporary penological thought with an enquiry that has received the attention of some of the greatest thinkers on punishment in the past. Through critical exploration of the theories, policies and practices of imprisonment, the authors analyse why prison persists and why prisoner populations are rapidly rising in many countries. Collectively, the chapters provide not only a sophisticated diagnosis and critique of global hyper-incarceration but also suggest principles and strategies that could be adopted to radically reduce our reliance upon imprisonment.

Collectively, The Emerald International Handbook of Activist Criminology explores the contemporary terrain around new and emergent issues and forms of activism, and offers cutting edge conceptualizations of the methodological and practical applications of activist engagement, solidarity, and resistance.

As part of the SAGE Course Companion series, this book provides a comprehensive introduction and overview of the discipline of penology. It provides hints and tips on how to apply this information to maximum effect in coursework and examinations. This is a highly accessible text for those new to prison studies, or for anyone looking for a refresher. It provides structure and background for all prison and punishment modules on undergraduate criminology and criminal justice degrees. Written in a straightforward and clear style, the book gives detailed explanations for all academic terms used. The Penology Course Companion provides: - Easy access to the key themes in punishment and prison studies - Helpful summaries of the approach taken by the main course textbooks - Guidance on the essential study skills required to pass the course - Help with developing critical thinking - Taking it Further sections that suggest how readers can extent their thinking beyond the "received wisdom" - Pointers to success in course exams and written assessment exercises

Controversial Issues in Prisons is a textbook designed to explore eight of the most controversial aspects of imprisonment in England and Wales today. It is primarily a book about the people who are sent to prison and what happens to them when inside. Each chapter examines a different dimension of the prison population and draws upon the sociological imagination to make connections between the personal troubles and vulnerabilities of those incarcerated with wider structural divisions which plague the society we live in. The book investigates controversies surrounding the incarceration of people with mental health problems, women, children, foreign nationals, offenders’ with suicidal ideation, sex offenders, drug takers and the collateral consequences of incarceration on prisoners' families. Each chapter on these eight substantive topics shares a common structure and answers the following key questions: How have people conceptualised this penal controversy? What does the official data tell us and what are its limitations? What is its historical context? What are the contemporary policies of the Prison Service? Are they legitimate and, if not, what are the alternatives? Ultimately the authors argue that in combination these controversial issues raise fundamental concerns about the legitimacy of the confinement project and the kind of society in which it is deemed essential. The book concludes with a discussion of why it remains important to make penal controversies visible, challenge penological illiteracy and provide alternative means of responding to human wrongdoing rooted in the principles of human rights and social justice.