NCJ Number
244987
Journal
British Journal of Criminology Volume: 53 Issue: 5 Dated: September 2013 Pages: 864-885
Date Published
September 2013
Length
22 pages
Annotation
This paper presents a newly developed framework with which to systematize the empirical assessment of such harms and address at least some of the attendant conceptual and technical challenges.
Abstract
Despite the centrality of harm to crime and criminalization and increasing interest in harm as a basis for crime-control policy, the criminological community has yet done little to systematically reflect on criminal harms or their identification, evaluation and comparison. This paper presents a newly developed framework with which to systematize the empirical assessment of such harms and address at least some of the attendant conceptual and technical challenges. It also suggests several roles for the framework in policymaking. The conclusions are twofold: it is possible to reliably evaluate the harms of criminal activities, as the examples suggest, but it is not possiblefor both conceptual and technical reasonsto develop an encompassing estimate of the total harms of these activities. (Published Abstract)