Can Criminology ever be a value-free discipline?

Timo Hohmuth

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Essay from the year 2000 in the subject Law - Criminal process, Criminology, Law Enforcement, grade: 2 (B), University of Newcast...

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Essay from the year 2000 in the subject Law - Criminal process, Criminology, Law Enforcement, grade: 2 (B), University of Newcastle upon Tyne (Law School), language: English, abstract: Criminology is not a typical law discipline. It can be referred to as an interdisciplinary subject dealing a lot with sociology, psychology, statistics, medicine, economics, political science and geography. It is concerned with a body of knowledge about crime as a social phenomenon. A broad definition would be that crime is behaviour that breaks the law. The studies of crime are supposed to include in their scope describing, analysing and explaining the behaviour of state penal law. This seems to make criminology a rather analytical subject. But is it therefore really valuefree and, if not, should or can it ever be? If we speak of values, we mean emotional attitudes in a subjective way of seeing things as well as moral values. This examination shall basically be focused on the influence of emotional attitudes and if criminology can be free from opinions and subjective views. In some way this is the personal reflection of moral values, too. Specifying the question it should be asked if criminology is or can be practised and used in an objective and neutral way.