Book chapter
Inequalities and crime: the centrality of complex or intersecting inequalities
Handbook on Crime and Inequality, pp.468-483
Elgar Handbooks on Inequality, Edward Elgar Publishing
2025
DOI: 10.4337/9781800883604.00033
Abstract
The study of inequalities undergirds much of the past and present research on crime. However, at times, we may take the great impact of inequalities for granted and miss opportunities to problematize the strong link between inequalities and crime. This chapter is a slightly altered version of the 2018 Presidential Address to the American Society of Criminology, which argues for the centrality of economic, race, ethnic, gender, and other inequalities to the study of crime. The thesis is that more explicit consensus about the centrality of the link between inequalities and crime will permit criminology to speak to the major social and political issues of our time and will strengthen the field. The chapter highlights some fruitful avenues of research on inequalities and crime. It then argues that the concept of complex or intersecting inequalities can provide connective tissue between sometimes disparate and disconnected research on economic, race, ethnic, and gender inequalities. The chapter then draws on recent theorizing and evaluations by scholars in other areas of social science to identify key issues that must be addressed when employing a complex or intersecting inequalities approach. In its conclusion, the chapter maintains that centering explanations of crime on complex or inequalities can uncover important insights and span research areas.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Inequalities and crime: the centrality of complex or intersecting inequalities
- Creators
- Karen Heimer
- Resource Type
- Book chapter
- Publication Details
- Handbook on Crime and Inequality, pp.468-483
- Publisher
- Edward Elgar Publishing; Cheltenham, UK
- Series
- Elgar Handbooks on Inequality
- DOI
- 10.4337/9781800883604.00033
- Number of pages
- 16
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 2025
- Academic Unit
- Law Faculty; Gender, Women's and Sexuality Studies; Sociology and Criminology
- Record Identifier
- 9984787443802771
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