NCJ Number
138060
Date Published
1990
Length
181 pages
Annotation
This collection of six essays on crime and public order in the Rio de la Plata region of South America consists of five pieces dealing with various criminological issues in the history of Argentina and one devoted to Uruguay. The primary concern of each essay is the social order and cultural value system within which criminality was defined and punished.
Abstract
The first essay examines all surviving decisions by colonial courts between 1757 and 1797 for criminal cases in which women were either victims or perpetrators. The author discriminates among social and racial groups in her analysis and her results note a surprising class orientation to the courts' rulings. The second paper discusses the Buenos Aires criminal justice system between 1820 and 1850, a period marked by great political violence and instability. It found that there was a fundamental continuity during this period in the definition and punishment of crime, as courts strived to protect the interests of the propertied classes. The single essay on Uruguay explores rural violence as a social and economic context for masculine violence in the 19th century. A study of the changing public policy toward prostitution in Buenos Aires in the 20th century provides an important analysis of the contemporary political scene. Two studies deal with arrest trends. The first, which draws a comparison between Argentinian and U.S. arrest figures, focuses exclusively on Buenos Aires in the period between 1880 and 1914. The second is a comparative analysis of Buenos Aires and two interior cities, Santa Fe and Tucuman. Chapter references