Xth International Symposium on Victimology (Symposium Proceedings)
edited by Arlène Gaudreault and Irwin Waller
Montreal, Quebec: Association québécoise Plaidoyer-Victimes. 2001
In August 2000, the Tenth International Symposium on Victimology was organized in Montreal under the auspices of the World Society of Victimology. This book contains the keynote speeches and reports by the conference rapporteurs. In all, there are 18 contributions.
The book opens with a very interesting overview of 30 years of victimological research by Hans Joachim Schneider, which he wrote especially for the symposium. Other interesting chapters include Graham Farrell's chapter on victim-oriented policing, John Dussich's analysis of offenders and victims of abuse of power, and Ezzat Fattah's critique of victimology. Farrell presents data on the prevalence of repeat victimization and the failure of U.S. police forces to develop and implement victim policy. He argues that repeat victimization is appealing to the police and that it presents a potential spearhead for developing victim-oriented policy and practices within police organizations. Dussich, contends that while abuses of power have killed and injured far more people than has crime or war, there is very little empirical research on the subject.
Overall, the book contains very few chapters that are based on research. The symposium proceedings seem to confirm Fattah's conclusion that victimology has abandoned its scientific roots in favour of social and political activism (chapter 7 of this book). The overwhelming majority of the book reflects policy or the author's opinion. Unlike other years (i.e., Australia, 1994; The Netherlands, 1997), this edition of the symposium proceedings does not include a selection of the best papers that were presented at the symposium and this may explain, at least in part, the relative absence of research papers. The remaining chapters cover a variety of topics including asylum seekers, the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, trafficking in women, and child abuse.
JO-ANNE WEMMERS
École de criminologie
Université de Montréal |
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