Books
Global Criminology – Ian Warren and Darren Palmer (Lawbook Co.)
Global Criminology examines the fundamental contradiction between globalisation and national sovereignty as the basis for establishing contemporary international and transnational criminal justice processes.
The principle of territorial sovereignty forms the central premise of this book as most formal initiatives for dealing with transnational and international crime involve attempts to forge co-operation between established sovereign justice institutions in different nations. The prosecution of foreign-nationals reveals the human impacts of this complex and legally technical structure. These prosecutions expose suspects to unfamiliar police investigative procedures, legal processes and potentially harsh forms of criminal punishment, including the death penalty.
Global Criminology discusses the relationship between the International Criminal Court and domestic justice in dealing with grave forms of ‘atrocity crime’, and recent developments in the European Union that invoke the mutual recognition of national court decisions in the absence of a centralised criminal justice structure. In emphasising the need for more sustained comparative research into current national responses to transnational, international and cross-national criminal activity, the text seeks to stimulate further research examining the very meaning of global criminal justice, with a view to promoting consistency, fairness and the protection of crime suspects through the rule of law, rather than the laws of political diplomacy.
Networks and National Security – Chad Whelan (2012) Ashgate
Networks as sets of autonomous organisations working together to achieve individual and shared goals are becoming increasingly important across many areas of public administration. The importance of networks is well known but most analysts would agree that we do not know enough about the dynamics and effectiveness of networks in relation to their internal operations. This is a significant problem as security, intelligence, law enforcement and many other agencies are increasingly required to organise in and through networks to provide national security.
In this comprehensive analysis, Chad Whelan presents a highly innovative, qualitative study of networks in the field of national security. Developing our understanding of ‘organisational networks’ in organisational theory, management and public administration, and ‘security networks’ in criminology and international relations, he presents a multi-disciplinary analysis of network forms of organisation. Whelan puts forward a methodological framework involving five levels of analysis – structural, cultural, policy, technological and relational – with which we can better analyse and understand the dynamics and effectiveness of networks. This framework is applied to public sector networks operating in the field of counter-terrorism in Australia in a way that is highly relevant to researchers and practitioners in many contexts where government departments and agencies, and the private sector, need to work together.