Criminal obsessions: why harm matters more than crime

Citation

Dorling, D., Gordon, D., Hillyard, P., Pantazis, C., Pemberton, S., & Tombs, S. (2008). Criminal obsessions: Why harm matters more than crime.

This work examines the problems that arise from equating crime (what societies decide is legal and what is not legal) with public safety. The authors suggest that crime is too narrow and too heavily influenced by politics to be a good measure of public safety. They instead propose what they call a "social harm perspective" that focuses on a broader array of safety issues, like workplace safety, environmental pollutants, and discrimination.