How do criminologists engage with politics and public policy? This book is a sociological account of how criminologists have understood their craft, the positions they have taken on the controversies of their day, and an analysis of the dilemmas that confront those who work in the field today.

Ian Loader is Professor of Criminology and Director of the Centre for Criminology at the University of Oxford. He is author of Civilizing Security, with Neil Walker (Cambridge University Press, 2007), and is currently researching and writing about markets for security commodities.

Richard Sparks is Professor of Criminology at the University of Edinburgh and a Co-Director of the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research (www.sccjr.ac.uk). His current interests include comparative and trans-national aspects of public policy on crime and punishment.

Introduction: Why Public Criminology? 1. The Condition of Contemporary Criminology 2. The Public Social Science Debate 3. Criminology in a Hot Climate 4. Cooling Devices 5. Criminology as a Democratic Under-Labourer.