This volume provides an overview of the Caribbean countries, its colonial history, causes, costs and consequences of crime and violence in the Caribbean. The contributors pull from primary research and the available data from multiple sources including national and country specific reports to assess the magnitude, characteristics, and the changing nature of crimes in various Caribbean countries. Discussion is offered on the following crime issue: gender-based violence, homicides, drugs, gangs, money laundering, murder suicided, deportation and the use of Geographic Information System (GIS) to fight crime. In addition, the book provides a discussion of the crime prevention capabilities of selected countries looking at the nature of the crime problem, offers an assessment of the crime prevention capabilities and makes suggestions for policy development.

Security challenges pose significant hardship for citizens of Caribbean nations. Public safety is threatened by high rates of crime - especially violent crime - in much of the region, the plague of the illicit drug trade, transnational organized crime, gangs, the current global proliferation of crimes of terrorism and related violent extremism and radicalization. The situation diminishes morale among the youth, their education and their future, and operates as a major push factor. Yet, surprisingly, there has been a scarcity of scholarly work that addresses these conditions. This interdisciplinary volume succinctly responds to the gap in criminological and security studies on the Caribbean by drawing attention to the understudied nexus of crime, violence, and security that is so pervasive in the region, and the ways in which underdevelopment re/creates environments for insecurity. The book is organized in three parts: Part one encompasses conceptualizations of crime, violence and punishment. Part two takes up country cases on crime and security. Part three addresses issues of regional security, both public and private. This timely volume will be valuable reading for scholars, students, practitioners and policy makers who share a critical interest in the scope, impact, and inter-relationality of crime, violence, and in/security in the region.

This volume examines violence across Latin America and the Caribbean to demonstrate the importance of subnational analysis over national aggregates.

Despite high crime rates among men in the Caribbean, rising rates of violence against women in the region, and a significant number of Caribbean nationals incarcerated abroad due to drug smuggling, existing research has yet to offer explanations that are tailored to the unique Caribbean societies and the individuals in them. This edited volume adds to the existing body of scientific, empirical and theoretical work on crime (victimization), and criminal justice in the Caribbean, with a specific focus on impacts of post-colonialism and gender. To investigate these impacts on a developing Caribbean criminology, the contributions in this volume focus on how impacts of post-colonialism, associated racial stereotypes, and/or gender throughout the Caribbean impact on (a) types of offending, (b) victimization, and (c) criminal justice system responses and policies. Bringing together a broad range of experts, this book sheds light on key criminological topics in the Caribbean, including victimization, risk factors for offending, subcultures of violence and particularly gendered violence, and the role of motherhood within matrifocal societies. It is essential reading for those engaged with Caribbean - or decolonial - Criminology and those engaged with comparative and international studies in crime and justice more generally.

This book develops a comparative study on violence in Jamaica, El Salvador, and Belize based on a theoretical approach, extensive field research, and in-depth empirical research. It combines the Caribbean and Central America into a single comparative research that explores the historical (from the conquista onwards) as well as contemporary causes of violence in these societies. The volume focuses on forms of violence such as gang violence, police violence, every day forms of violence, vigilantism, and organized crime. The analysis provides a theoretical perspective that bridges political economy as well as cultural approaches in violence research. As such, it will be of interest to readers studying development, violence, political, Central American, and Caribbean studies.

The impact of crime and violence on the social, economic and political development of countries in Latin America and the Caribbean is well documented. The paper begins with definitions and categorisation of crime, violence and poverty including a brief discussion of some of the key challenges with measurement. An analysis of crime trends for the period 1996 to 2006 and the incidence of poverty in the countries under review for a similar period is presented. The following section explores the literature which discusses the links between poverty, crime and violence and includes a discussion on the risk factors for crime and violence including the impact of inequality and relative deprivation on levels of crime and violence. The publication also presents findings of a very preliminary study based on a self administered questionnaire and it concludes with recommendations for further research.

Offers timely discussion by attorneys, government officials, policy analysts, and academics from the United States and Latin America of the responses of the state, civil society, and the international community to threats of violence and crime.