Towards a Criminology of Empire: Some Foundational Questions and Provocations

• In Event: EHC-WG Panel 4: Theoretical and Pedagogical Innovations in Historical Criminology

Abstract

In this paper (and forthcoming book Towards a Criminology of Empire) I utilize and critically adapt the canon of classical social theory alongside the theoretical and empirical resources of contemporary historical-sociological scholarship as the major basis to explore a series of key questions that the rise, reproduction and fall of empires pose for the discipline of criminology. Although a body of substantive historical and sociological work exists on empire, a systematic attempt to develop a comparative and historical criminology of empire has not yet been attempted. Developing the basis of such a comparative sociological criminology of empire will be my major contribution in the forthcoming monograph to this burgeoning field of study into the histories of ‘crime, violence and empire’. In particular, it is suggested that the most productive way into moving ‘towards a criminology of empire’ is to begin by establishing the key canonical questions that such a historical criminology must address. Given the time constraints of a panel presentation, the paper focuses specifically on delineating what I contend are the five foundational questions that a historically-ambitious sociological criminology of empire and colonialism must address.

Author

• Gordon Hughes, Cardiff University