This book brings together ten leading British criminologists to explore the contemporary politics of crime and its control. The volume is produced in honour of Britain's most important criminological scholar - David Downes of the London School of Economics. The essays are grouped around the three major themes that run through David Downes' work - sociological theory, crime and deviance; comparative penal policy; and, the politics of crime. The third theme also provides the overarching unifying thread for the volume.

The contributions are broad ranging and cover such subjects as criminological theory and the new East End of London, the practice of comparative criminology including an analysis of variations in penal cultures within the United States, restorative justice in Colombia, New Labour's politics and policy in relation to dangerous personality-disordered offenders, the legal construction of torture, and the future for a social democratic criminology.