Subjects:

Criminology

Contents:

1. Comparative penal climates and political cultures

2. Crime, media and public opinion: English and Norwegian profiles

3. A discourse analytic approach to comparative penal culture

4. Media constraints: elite discourse and the formation of political opinions

5. Contextualising tragedy

6. English penal policy climates and political culture

7. Penal policy climates and political culture in England and Norway

8. Public opinion versus public judgement about crime

9. Effecting penal climate change

This title examines the role of political culture and penal populism in the response to the emotive subject of child-on-child homicide.

Green explores the reasons underlying the vastly differing responses of the English and Norwegian criminal justice systems to the cases of James Bulger and Silje Redergard respectively. Whilst James Bulger's killers were subject to extreme press and public hostility, held in secure detention for nine months and tried in an adverserial court, Redergard's killers were shielded from public antagonism and carefully reintegrated into the local community.

This book argues that English adverserial political culture creates far more incentives to politicize high-profile crimes than Norwegian consensus political culture. Drawing on a wealth of empirical research, Green suggests that the tendency for politicians to justify punitive responses to crime by invoking harsh political attitudes is based upon a flawed understanding of public opinion.

In a compelling study, Green proposes a more deliberative response to crime is possible by making English culture less adverserial and by making informed public judgement more assessable.