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NEW ZEALAND
Crime under the spotlight at Victoria
From corporate and e-crime to sex crimes, policing and
punishment, major issues in criminology will be discussed and debated
when leading international criminologists gather at Victoria University
of Wellington this week for one of the largest conferences on crime to
be held in the Southern Hemisphere. The Australian and New Zealand
Society of Criminology Conference will be hosted by Victoria
University's Criminology Programme from February 9-11 and will be held
at the University's Kelburn Campus.
Programme Director, Professor Philip Stenning, said
the conference would mark an important anniversary in the study of
criminology in New Zealand. “This year marks 35 years since former
Secretary for Justice, Dr John Robson, was appointed as director of
criminological studies and 30 years since the Institute of Criminology
was established at Victoria. Since that time the discipline has gone
from strength to strength at Victoria and it continues to offer New
Zealand's only criminology major. The conference will be an opportunity
to look back at the success of the Institute and to outline where the
study of criminology is headed, both at Victoria and in the wider
world.” Professor Stenning said this year's conference had attracted 300
attendees from throughout the world. More than 200 criminologists and
other researchers with an interest in crime and justice would be
presenting papers..
“Crime is an issue of key political and community concern that faces the
global community today. But while violent and sexual crime have gained a
lot of media attention, the conference also addresses corporate and
e-crime, the role of drugs, environmental crime, crime prevention and
restorative justice. Speakers will also be examining the links between
crime and gender, sexuality, race and ethnicity as well as policing,
corrections and crimes committed by the State.” The conference will be
addressed by three keynote speakers, addressing three major issues:
justice and the community, rape and policing.
Professor Barbara Hudson, in her address, Justice and
the limits of community, examines the contradiction between criminal
justice literature, which places 'the community' at the heart of crime
prevention and justice, and social and political theory that points to a
breakdown of community. Professor Hudson will particularly raise
problems and possibilities of dealing justly with people, such as
psychopaths, that do not fall within the boundaries of any community,
however defined. Professor Hudson is a Professor of Law at the
University of Central Lancashire in Britain.
Professor Liz Kelly, in her address, A gap or a chasm?
Perspectives on attrition in reported rape cases, examines why, when the
reporting of rape has increased every year for three decades in England
and Wales, that the conviction rate has remained relatively static and
at 6 percent is at the lowest point ever. It is also a trend evident
across Europe. Drawing on the most extensive data on reported rape in
Britain, Professor Kelly shows the chasm actually comprises a series of
smaller gaps that might be bridged. However, her paper says building
such a bridge requires revisiting fundamental issues and questions about
core concepts of "rape", "rape victim", and "rapists". Professor Kelly
is Director of the Child and Woman Abuse Studies Unit at the London
Metropolitan University. Professor Kelly has co-presented at a recent
conference with Victoria University Senior Lecturer in Criminology, Dr
Jan Jordan, whose recent book Word of a Woman? Police, rape and belief,
has questioned the way Police treat rape complainants.
Professor David Bayley, in his paper, Policing in a
New Era, outlines changes in policing that will see the State play less
of a role in the future. While this fundamental change has been
occurring, most people, even those involved in the sector, have not
noticed it occur because policies and education are tied to the State's
previous monopoly on policing. In his paper, Professor Bayley will
examine the internationalisation, devolution and privatisation of
criminal justice and the challenges that each poses. Professor Bayley is
Dean of the School of Criminal Justice at the State University of New
York at Albany.
The conference has been sponsored by the Ministries of
Justice and Social Development, the New Zealand Police, the Departments
of Corrections and Child, Youth & Family, the Wellington City Council
and the New Zealand Police Association.
7 February 2005
http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/ED0502/S00023.htm
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