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Random Violence is a deft and thought-provoking exploration of the ways we talk about--and why we worry about--new crimes and new forms of victimization. Focusing on so-called random crimes such as freeway shootings, gang violence, hate crimes, stalking, and wilding, Joel Best shows how new crime problems emerge and how some quickly fade from public attention while others spread and become enduring subjects of concern. Best's original and incisive argument illuminates the fact that while these crimes are in actuality neither new, nor epidemic, nor random, the language used to describe them nonetheless shapes both private fears and public policies.



Best scrutinizes the melodramatic quality of the American public's attitudes toward crime, exposing the cultural context for the popularity of "random violence" as a catch-all phrase to describe contemporary crime, and the fallacious belief that violence is steadily rising. He points out that the age, race, and sex of homicide victims reveal that violence is highly patterned.



Best also details the contemporary ideology of victimization, as well as the social arrangements that create and support a victim industry that can label large numbers of victims. He demonstrates why it has become commonplace to "declare war" on social problems, including drugs, crime, poverty, and cancer, and outlines the complementary influence of media, activists, officials, and experts in institutionalizing crime problems. Intrinsic to all these concerns is the way in which policy choices and outcomes are affected by the language used to describe social problems.

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CHOICE Review

Random Violence is primarily about the manner in which an issue or problem becomes a "social problem" and, by inference, about the criminalization process. Best begins by defining what he considers to be new social problems: wilding and freeway violence, stalking and hate crimes, and gangs. He then examines the responses of the media and victims' groups to these problems. He concludes by presenting a model designed to evaluate the process through which problems and issues become social problems. The book is well written and well referenced, and is adequately indexed. Limited use is made of charts that present crime and victimization trends. The author has published both books and journal articles in this area over the past ten years. Recommended for libraries serving departments of criminal justice and sociology. Upper-division undergraduates and above. R. T. Sigler University of Alabama

Notas de autor provistas por Syndetics

Joel Best is Professor of Sociology at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. He is the author of Threatened Children: Rhetoric and Concern about Child-Victims (1990).