Bringing together leading experts from across Europe, this book examines the nature of incivility and the way in which it is often countered by punitive social control.

Nina PerSak is a research professor at the Faculty of Law, Ghent University, Belgium. She holds a doctorate in law from University of Ljubljana and an LL.M. (Law) and M.Phil. (Social and Developmental Psychology) from University of Cambridge. Her research interests lie in the fields of criminology, criminal law, criminal legal philosophy (in particular criminalisation theory), human rights, victimology, sociology of law and social psychology. She is the author of Criminalising Harmful Conduct: The Harm Principle, its Limits and Continental Counterparts (Springer, 2007) and editor of Legitimacy and Trust in Criminal Law, Policy and Justice: Norms, Procedures, Outcomes (Ashgate, 2014).

1. The rude, the bad and the ugly: penalising incivilities in Europe (Nina PerSak)

Part I: Regulation of disorder and uncivil behaviour

2. Criminalising through the back door: normative grounds and social accounts of the incivilities' regulation (Nina PerSak)

3. The top-down instruments for governing crime and disorder: what lessons can be drawn from the Italian experience (2007-2011)? (Marco Calaresu)

4. Punitive decriminalisation? The repression of political dissent through administrative law and nuisance ordinances in Spain (Manuel Maroto)

5. Tackling homelessness through criminalisation: the case of Hungary (Léna Podoletz)

Part II: Social control and representations of incivilities

6. Normalisation of behaviour in public space: the construction and control of 'public nuisance' in Belgium (Stefaan Pleysier)

7. Understanding uncivil behaviour through urban space and culture (Anna Di Ronco)

8. Media representations of incivilities in the British and Flemish press (Nina PerSak)

9. Over-policed? Tackling incivilities and the intersections with migration control (Joanne van der Leun)

Part III: Concluding thoughts

10. Dimensions, concerns and effects of addressing uncivil behaviour through punitive law (Nina PerSak)