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Theories of criminality and theories of victimization have traditionally been discussed as though they bore no relationship to one another. Yet, a complete explanation for crime must examine both the decision to engage in crime by an offender and the everyday actions of ordinary citizens that increase vulnerability to criminals. The integration of these approaches yields testable models that have greater predictive power than could be obtained by looking only at models of offenders or models of victim behavior. A more general perspective that accounts for both the decision to engage in crime and the selection of particular crime targets is developed and tested.

Tabla de contenidos provista por Syndetics

• Tables and Figures
• Preface
• 1 Introduction to the Study of Crime
• What Is It To Be Integrated?
• Linking Theory to Data
• The Current Study
• 2 Theories of Criminality
• Theoretical Legacies
• The Criminal as a Unifying Concept
• Two Major Problems, Some Exceptions, and New Directions
• Crime and Community
• Some Hypotheses
• Summary and Conclusions
• 3 Theories of Victimization and Criminal Opportunities
• Historical Foundations for Current Victimization Theories
• The Lifestyle-Exposure Theory of Victimization
• The Routine Activity Theory
• Alternative Theorectical Models
• Contextual Effects in Models of Victimization
• Major Concepts in Victimization Theories
• Problems with Previous Evaluations of Victimization Theories
• Summary and Research Hypothesis
• 4 An Integrated Perspective
• Compatibility of Theories of Criminality and Victimization
• A Heuristic Model
• Summary
• 5 Data Sources for Evaluating Criminological Theories
• UCR Data and Census Reports
• National Crime Surveys
• Seattle Telephone Survey
• Measures of Major Concepts
• Analytic Procedures
• Summary and Conclusions
• Measures of Concepts and Descriptive Statistics
• 6 The Empirical Distribution of Crime and Victimization
• Victim-Offender Relationship
• Physical Location of Crime
• Time of Occurrence of Crime
• Social Characteristics of Offenders and Victims
• Summary and Conclusions
• 7 Predicting Crime Rates
• Crime Rates and Theoretically Derived Variables
• Variation in the Predicators of Crime Rates
• The Value of Theoretical Integration
• Conclusions and Implications
• 8 Predicting Individuals' Risks of Victimization
• Explaining the Victimization Experience
• Conclusions and Implications
• 9 Crime and Context
• Types of Contextual Effects
• The Importance of Contextual Effects
• Main and Mediational Effects of Contextual Factors
• Interactions between Contextual and Individual Factors
• Conclusions and Implications
• 10 Summary and Implications
• Summary Results
• Implications for Macro-Level Theories of Criminality
• Implications for Theories of Victimization
• Implications for a General Theory of Crime
• Implications of Data Limitations for Testing Theories
• Implications for Crime Control Policy
• Criminal Propensities and the Social Context
• Conclusions
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Author Index
• Subject Index

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CHOICE Review

Traditional theories in criminology are, for the most part, premised upon the positivistic approach to the study of crime. Under positivism, the individual offender is the prime subject of inquiry; and although other variables may be given recognition, individual offender characteristics form the prime bases of investigation. Miethe and Meier, however, take the reader into a broader field of study. In ten chapters plus endnotes, an in-depth bibliography, and an index, these authors explore "the feasibility of integrating models of crime that involve offender and victim variables." Their thesis is that, in exploring theories of criminology, we have to take into account not only what antecedent conditions motivate individual offenders. More to the point, we must also bring together other such equally important variables as the victim, the facilitating environment, and the opportunity structure in which certain types of crimes flourish; and we must take a long neglected look at the criminal act itself. The authors identify four elements that they allege are present among major crime theories: low socioeconomic status, residential mobility, ethnic heterogeneity, and household/family structure. From the positivist premise, Miethe and Meier both expand upon and add to our knowledge base in criminology by injecting "context" into the theoretical mix. Graduate; faculty. J. C. Watkins Jr.; University of Alabama

Notas de autor provistas por Syndetics

Terance D. Miethe is Associate Professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Robert F. Meier is Professor in the Department of Sociology at Iowa State University.