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.

Surveys recent changes in the law and legal decisions affecting the rights, responsibilities, and status of young people

The Changing Legal World of Adolescence

Free Pr

American Juvenile Justice

American Juvenile Justice is a definitive volume for courses on the criminology and policy analysis of adolescence. The focus is on the principles and policy of a separate and distinct system of juvenile justice. The book opens with an introduction of the creation of adolescence, presenting a justification for the category of the juvenile or a period of partial responsibility before full adulthood. Subsequent sections include empirical investigations of the nature of youth criminality and legal policy toward youth crime. At the heart of the book is an argument for a penal policy that recognizes diminished responsibility and a youth policy that emphasizes the benefits of letting the maturing process continue with minimal interruption. In this updated and expanded second edition, Zimring has included four new chapters with examinations on important topics including, US Supreme Court decisions of life sentences for minors, the elected use of juvenile courts over criminal court, punitive sex offender registration for juveniles, and appropriate tactics for juvenile justice reform.

Politics & Social Sciences

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)

In the past decade, alarming reports of youth violence have appeared with increasing frequency in the news media. Legislators across the United States have responded to this sense of national emergency by changing many of the laws designed to cope with juvenile offenders. But are we really in the midst of a surge in youth violence? More to the point, what causes youth violence and what should we do about it? Franklin Zimring offers the definitive examination of adolescent violence in the United States both as a social phenomenon and a policy problem. This book covers the range of youth violence issues in the 1990s, from crime statistics to demographic projections to new legislation. The result is a thorough debunking of Congressional predictions of "a coming storm of juvenile violence" and the half-baked policy proposals that accompany such warnings. The book sets forth comprehensive and dispassionate analyses of three key areas of youth violence policy: adolescent firearms possession and use, standards for transfer from juvenile to criminal court jurisdiction, and legal sanctions for adolescents who kill. Throughout the book, the core issues of youth violence in the 1990s are examined with an unprecedented degree of analytic rigor. Zimring also offers an appropriate set of responses to youth violence that are consistent with a positive future for the juvenile court and for America's children. Timely and authoritative, American Youth Violence gives students, scholars, and policy makers a much-needed tool with which to fashion a constructive response to one of the nation's most disturbing social ills.

American Youth Violence (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

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 Contradictions of American Capital Punishment

Why does the United States continue to employ the death penalty when fifty other developed democracies have abolished it? Why does capital punishment become more problematic each year? How can the death penalty conflict be resolved? In The Contradictions of American Capital Punishment, Frank Zimring reveals that the seemingly insoluble turmoil surrounding the death penalty reflects a deep and long-standing division in American values, a division that he predicts will soon bring about the end of capital punishment in our country. On the one hand, execution would seem to violate our nation's highest legal principles of fairness and due process. It sets us increasingly apart from our allies and indeed is regarded by European nations as a barbaric and particularly egregious form of American exceptionalism. On the other hand, the death penalty represents a deeply held American belief in violent social justice that sees the hangman as an agent of local control and safeguard of community values. Zimring uncovers the most troubling symptom of this attraction to vigilante justice in the lynch mob. He shows that the great majority of executions in recent decades have occurred in precisely those Southern states where lynchings were most common a hundred years ago. It is this legacy, Zimring suggests, that constitutes both the distinctive appeal of the death penalty in the United States and one of the most compelling reasons for abolishing it. Impeccably researched and engagingly written, Contradictions in American Capital Punishment casts a clear new light on America's long and troubled embrace of the death penalty.

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

Books by Zimring, Franklin E.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Zimring, Franklin E.. 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

The Changing Legal World of Adolescence

American Juvenile Justice

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

American Youth Violence (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)

American Youth Violence (Studies in Crime and Public Policy)

The Contradictions of American Capital Punishment