Role of the Police

This volume discusses aspects of small scale societies, including the study of the mental processes, as well as indigenous economics and law.

Part 1 describes varied patterns of community cohesiveness and dispute resolution in the Philippines, including the development of a community-based system of informal and out-of-court dispute processing. Chapter 2 introduces the general topic of self-help and peacemaking practices in the Province of Lanao del Norte in Mindanao, and describes a number of peacemaking organizations. Chapter 3 describes one field trip to the southern Philippines, and some of the cultural elements that tend to promote community security, including barangay, or neighborhood organization, the absence of police, idle time, low technology, and the necessity of multiple personal follow-ups to finalize most transactions. Chapter 4 summarizes aspects of the conflict between Muslim and Christian peoples who live side by side in towns and cities of Mindanao. Chapter 4 looks at terrorist activities and how they affect the daily life of Filipinos in the north-western region of Mindanao. Chapter 6 details what is meant by vigilante activity in the Philippines and examines a number of such enterprises in the 1980's, with lingering presence in more recent years. Chapter 7 examines the almost omnipresent issue of bribery and extortion. Chapter 8 looks at youth, juvenile delinquency, street children, and some of the processes for managing Filipino delinquency. Chapter 9 explains aspects of the folkways in the Province of Lanao del Norte, where near-anarchy reigns, as shown by a lack of enthusiasm for the rule of law. Chaotic driving and queuing customs, among others, are discussed in light of their possible links to further styles of social deviance.

Annotation Draws on data from a study of police behaviour in the field, interviews with criminal justice professionals and social service providers, and participant observations of female offender programs. Offering critical analysis of the theoretical assumptions, this book unveils a reality that looks different from what statistics on domestic violence imply.

This book is intended to provide critical readings for criminology courses. The authors all see crime as both a social and a political process. That is, what comes to be defined as criminal, how society responds to crime and why individuals become entangled in the criminal justice system are often the result of individual and systemic social inequalities. That is crime and the CJS both produce and reproduce class, race and gender inequalities in society. The chapters in this book take up a number of empirical, theoretical and substantive issues in criminology and mostly focus on Canada. These include wrongful convictions (which are most likely to ensnare people who are on the margin of society), how the police and other representatives of the CJS operate within an institutional and cultural context that, by and large, sees racialized Canadians as most likely to be criminal, that youth crime is really a criminalization of young people who are poor and Indigenous, as well as connecting terrorism to the dynamics of neoliberal capitalism, among others.

Superman, Batman, Daredevil, and Wonder Woman are iconic cultural figures that embody values of order, fairness, justice, and retribution. Comic Book Crime digs deep into these and other celebrated characters, providing a comprehensive understanding of crime and justice in contemporary American comic books. This is a world where justice is delivered, where heroes save ordinary citizens from certain doom, where evil is easily identified and thwarted by powers far greater than mere mortals could possess. Nickie Phillips and Staci Strobl explore these representations and show that comic books, as a historically important American cultural medium, participate in both reflecting and shaping an American ideological identity that is often focused on ideas of the apocalypse, utopia, retribution, and nationalism. Through an analysis of approximately 200 comic books sold from 2002 to 2010, as well as several years of immersion in comic book fan culture, Phillips and Strobl reveal the kinds of themes and plots popular comics feature in a post-9/11 context. They discuss heroes’ calculations of “deathworthiness,” or who should be killed in meting out justice, and how these judgments have as much to do with the hero’s character as they do with the actions of the villains. This fascinating volume also analyzes how class, race, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation are used to construct difference for both the heroes and the villains in ways that are both conservative and progressive. Engaging, sharp, and insightful, Comic Book Crime is a fresh take on the very meaning of truth, justice, and the American way.