Atypical Desistence: Turning Away from Persistent Offending into Ideologically Motivated Crime

• In Event: Crime and its Consequences: Studies Using Nordic Register Data

Abstract

This paper presents a multimethod project on the life-course of individuals who commit ideologically motivated crimes. We propose the theory that persistent offenders adopt ideologies as a way to shift out of a meaningless life of street crime. We theorize that persistent offenders are recruited by ideological groups (e.g. jihadists, white supremacists) who value their criminal past. We test these theories using qualitative interviews and quantitative register data from Sweden.

Author

• Jerzy Sarnecki, Stockholm University