Examines the relationship between firearms and interpersonal violence, analyzes patterns of gun ownership in the U.S., and looks at the future of gun control legislation

The Citizen's Guide to Gun Control

Zimring, Franklin E.

Hawkins, Gordon

Macmillan Pub. Co.

The one, sure way that imprisonment prevents crime is by restraining offenders from committing crimes while they are locked up. Called "incapacitation" by experts in criminology, this effect has become the dominant justification for imprisonment in the United States, where well over a million persons are currently in jails and prisons and public figures who want to appear tough on crime periodically urge that we throw away the key. How useful is the modern prison in restraining crime, and at what cost? How much do we really know about incapacitation and its effectiveness? This book is the first comprehensive assessment of incapacitation. Zimring and Hawkins show the increasing reliance on restraint to justify imprisonment, analyze the existing theories on incapacitation's effects, assess the current empirical research, report a new study, and explore the links between what is known about incapacitation and what it tells us about our criminal justice policy. An insightful evaluation of a pressing policy issue, Incapacitation is a vital contribution to the current debates on our criminal justice system.

Incapacitation: Penal Confinement and the Restraint of Crime (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

Politics & Social Sciences

Zimring, Franklin

Social Sciences

Oxford University Press

Year after year, in poll after poll, crime tops the list of American anxieties. Indeed, crime is seen by many people as the number one problem in the United States, a threat to the quality of life unparalleled in any other developed country. Now two legal scholars, Franklin E. Zimring and Gordon Hawkins, have conducted intensive research on the question and have reached a startling conclusion--crime is not the problem. America's great problem, they argue, is lethal violence. In Crime is Not the Problem, Zimring and Hawkins revolutionize the way we think about crime and violence--by forcing us to distinguish between crime and violence. The authors reveal that when we compare the United States to other industrialized nations, in most categories of nonviolent crime (burglary, theft, and other property offenses), American crime rates are comparable--even lower, in some cases. Moreover, this general trend holds true when we compare specific cities of roughly the same size (New York and London, Los Angeles and Sydney). As the authors show, crimes like burglary and theft are a part of modern urban life worldwide. Only when it comes to lethal violence does the United States outpace other Western nations, with homicide rates many, many times greater. Equally interesting, the authors find that most killings in America are unconnected to criminal activity (that is, more murders stem from arguments than from break-ins or muggings). But if high property-crime rates don't kill innocent victims in other countries, why are the risks so much greater that victims will be killed or maimed in the United States? And what can be done to bring the death rate from American violence down to tolerable levels? To address these questions, the authors take a hard look at what is believed about the causes of lethal violence. Here, too, the conventional wisdom about the causes of violence is subject to revision. The impact of television and movie violence on rates of homicide is wildly over-rated, as Zimring and Hawkins demonstrate with data from Europe and Japan. By contrast, it is hard to overestimate the importance of guns--used in 70% of all killings--in the distinctively high rates of deadly violence in America. Reducing lethal violence required different tactics than fighting a general war on crime, the authors conclude. They argue that traditional law and order, tough on crime campaigns blur the distinctions between lethal violence and other offenses, they argue. Lawmakers need to craft a sophisticated response that specifically addresses death dealing mayhem. In Crime is Not the Problem, Zimring and Hawkins reshape the debate about crime in the United States, throwing sharp new light on old questions and suggesting new directions for public policy. By making the crucial distinction between lethal violence and crime in general, they clear the ground for a targeted, far more effective response to the real crisis in American society.

Crime is Not the Problem: Lethal Violence in America (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

The one, sure way that imprisonment prevents crime is by restraining offenders from committing crimes while they are locked up. Called "incapacitation" by experts in criminology, this effect has become the dominant justification for imprisonment in the United States, where well over a million persons are currently in jails and prisons and public figures who want to appear tough on crime periodically urge that we throw away the key. How useful is the modern prison in restraining crime, and at what cost? How much do we really know about incapacitation and its effectiveness? This book is the first comprehensive assessment of incapacitation. Zimring and Hawkins show the increasing reliance on restraint to justify imprisonment, analyze the existing theories on incapacitation's effects, assess the current empirical research, report a new study, and explore the links between what is known about incapacitation and what it tells us about our criminal justice policy. An insightful evaluation of a pressing policy issue, Incapacitation is a vital contribution to the current debates on our criminal justice system.

In Crime is Not the Problem, Franklin Zimring and Gordon Hawkins revolutionize the way we think about crime and violence--by forcing us to distinguish between crime and violence. The authors reveal that compared to other industrialized nations, in most categories of nonviolent crime, American crime rates are comparable--even lower, in some cases. Only when it comes to lethal violence does the United States outpace other Western nations, with homicide rates many, many times greater. London and New York City have nearly the same number of robberies and burglaries each year, but robbers and burglars kill 54 victims in New York for every victim death in London. Why are the risks so much greater that victims will be killed or maimed in the United States? And what can be done to bring the death rate from American violence down to tolerable levels? The authors show how the impact of television and movie violence on rates of homicide is wildly overrated, but emphasize the paramount importance of guns. By making the crucial distinction between lethal violence and crime in general, the authors clear the ground for a targeted, far more effective response to the real crisis in American society. Crime is Not the Problem will reshape the debate about crime control in the United States.

Crime Is Not the Problem: Lethal Violence in America (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

"Getting tough on crime" has been one of the favorite rallying cries of American politicians in the last two decades, and "getting tough" on repeat offenders has been particularly popular. "Three strikes and you're out" laws, which effectively impose a 25-years-to-life sentence at the moment of a third felony conviction, have been passed in 26 states. California's version of the "three strikes" law, enacted in 1994, was broader and more severe than measures considered or passed in any other state. Punishment and Democracy is the first examination of the actual impact this law has had. Franklin Zimring, Sam Kamin, and Gordon Hawkins look at the origins of the law in California, compare it to other crackdown laws, and analyze the data collected on crime rates in Los Angeles, San Diego, and San Francisco in the year before and the two years after the law went into effect. They show that the "three strikes" law was a significant development in criminal justice policy making, not only at the state level, but also at the national level. They conclude with an examination of the trend toward populist initiatives driving penal policy. The importance of the subject and the stature of the authors make this book required reading for policy analysts, criminal justice scholars, elected officials, and indeed any American seeking to know more about "get-tough" criminal sentencing.

Punishment and Democracy: Three Strikes and You're Out in California (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

Kamin, Sam

The prison: Policy and practice (Studies in crime and justice)

University of Chicago

The Pursuit of Criminal Justice: Essays from the Chicago Center (Studies in Crime & Justice)

Univ of Chicago Pr

Pornography in a Free Society

Pornography in a Free Society deals with what has been called the "civil war over smut." The past two decades have been high seasons for pornography commissions. They were appointed in the United States in 1968, in Great Britain in 1977, in Canada in 1985, and in the United States again in 1985. In the United States, the report of the first commission was denounced as a pornographer's charter and that of the second as a reflection of the moral militancy of the Reagan counterrevolution. The authors look at the problems of pornography in a broader perspective than that of partisan political debate. They explain why it has become so controversial and divisive an issue in Western nations in recent decades. They discuss the radical feminist challenge to pornography and the question of pornography and children. Considering likely future developments, the authors argue that the furor over pornography and the appointment of commissions are part of a "ceremony of adjustment" to widespread availability of sexually explicit material and they predict less social concern about pornography as time passes. Franklin E. Zimring is Professor of Law and Director of the Earl Warren Legal Institute. Gordon Hawkins is Senior Fellow, Earl Warren Legal Institute at the University of California, Berkeley. Together they have written Capital Punishment and the American Agenda (1986), and The Citizen's Guide to Gun Control (1987).

Cambridge University Press

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Books by Hawkins, Gordon

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Hawkins, Gordon. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Citizen's Guide to Gun Control

The Citizen's Guide to Gun Control

Incapacitation: Penal Confinement and the Restraint of Crime (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

Crime is Not the Problem: Lethal Violence in America (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

Incapacitation: Penal Confinement and the Restraint of Crime (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

Crime Is Not the Problem: Lethal Violence in America (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

Punishment and Democracy: Three Strikes and You're Out in California (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

The prison: Policy and practice (Studies in crime and justice)

The Pursuit of Criminal Justice: Essays from the Chicago Center (Studies in Crime & Justice)

Pornography in a Free Society