NCJ Number
194794
Date Published
2002
Length
30 pages
Annotation
This article explored some of the reasons for British politicians’ importation of United States crime control policies.
Abstract
Over the past 20 years, the United States has been either the direct source or inspiration for numerous crime control policy developments in the United Kingdom. This article focuses on the movement of policies or policy transfer, where ideologies, ideas, practices and policies are transported from one jurisdiction to another in this case from the United States to the United Kingdom. Some of the aspects of imported crime control in the United Kingdom discussed and reviewed include: (1) “zero tolerance”; (2) curfews; (3) “three strikes”; (4) private prisons; (5) electronic monitoring; and (6) drugs czar. In addition, the article examined six ways or reasons why aspects of contemporary crime control had found their way from the United States to the United Kingdom over the years; these include: ideological proximity; electoral success; the language of politics and government; symbolic politics; penal-industrial complex; and neoliberal penal-policy complex. It was clear that there was a lot occurring in common in relation to crime control in the United States and the United Kingdom. This study opens up a relatively unexplored area of criminological inquiry. It is recommended that a more detailed investigation and reading of these linkages, as well as other linkages between other nation states be undertaken. References