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Pakes, Francis --- "Comparative Criminology" [2012] ELECD 760; in Clark, S. David (ed), "Comparative Law and Society" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2012)

Book Title: Comparative Law and Society

Editor(s): Clark, S. David

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781849803618

Section: Chapter 3

Section Title: Comparative Criminology

Author(s): Pakes, Francis

Number of pages: 16

Extract:

3 Comparative criminology
Francis Pakes* 1




1 INTRODUCTION

Although occasionally seen to be a fringe endeavour within the field of criminology, it is
nevertheless clear that comparative research is an important part of the study of crimi-
nology and criminal justice. The term `comparative criminology' at present is associated
with a certain type of research that implicitly or explicitly seeks to relate experience from
one criminal justice context to another. We can see that through some textbooks (e.g.,
Dammer and Albanese 2010; Pakes 2010a) and the emergence of a separate comparative
criminological methodology (e.g., Pakes 2010b). It is an area with an identifiable body of
knowledge and with its own history and stories of success.
John Howard (1726­90) carried out notable early comparative work in the area of
prisons in the late eighteenth century. He visited many prisons in Great Britain and in
mainland Europe and wrote detailed accounts of what he saw. Having been briefly impris-
oned himself in northern France, this life experience may well have ignited a humanitarian
spark that led to such seminal work. Like many others, Howard's comparative work had
a strong normative component, appalled as he was by his own brief experience of prison
life but also because of the poor conditions that he witnessed in Great Britain. Where
he saw more favourable conditions, such as in gaols in Belgium and the Netherlands, he
used that information in political activity to attempt to replicate such conditions in Great
Britain (Howard ...