Includes bibliographical references and index.

Crime, criminal justice, and criminology in the Nordic countries / Tapio Lappi-Seppälä and Michael Tonry -- Punishment and crime in Scandinavia, 1750-2008 / Hanns von Hofer -- Homicide in Finland and Sweden / Janne Kivivuori and Martti Lehti -- Nordic youth justice / Tapio Lappi-Seppälä -- Policing the north / Cecilie Høigård -- Sentencing theory, policy and research in the Nordic countries / Ville Hinkkanen and Tapio Lappi-Seppälä -- Delinquency research in the Nordic countries / Janne Kivivuori and Jon Gunnar Bernburg -- Is there a Nordic prostitution regime? / May-Len Skilbrei and Charlotta Holmström -- Organized crime the Nordic way / Lars Korsell and Paul Larsson -- The emergence of the crime victim: Sweden in a Scandinavian context / Henrik Tham with Anita Rönneling, and Lise-Lotte Rytterbro -- Nordic register data and their untapped potential for criminological knowledge / Torkild Hovde Lyngstad and Torbjørn Skardhamar.

This volume offers a comprehensive look at criminal justice policies, practices, and research in the Nordic countries. It shows why the Scandinavian criminal justice systems are as they are, how they are different fom those in other countries, and how they are changing. Topics range from the history of violence through juvenile delinquency, juvenile justice, and sentencing to controversial contemporary policies on prostitution, victims, and organized crime. Compared to most developed countries, especially the United States, Scandinavian criminal justice systems are, and have long been humane. Punishments are moderate, prisons are small and orderly, and few people are locked up. As elsewhere in Europe, however, Scandinavian countries face social and political challenges. Populations are becoming more diverse, the region has been affected by the global recession, and conservative political parties have gained increased influence and are beginnning to politicize crime policy debates. Scandinavian approaches to to crime and punishment offer important lessons to scholars, citizens, and policy makers in other coutnries. Their present may be our future. More ominously if they sucuumb to the xenophobic and popuilist political pressures that exist everywhere, ours may be theirs.