The Study of Criminology in China, Part II

Abstract

As a scholarly discipline, criminology in China is growing in stature, maturity and utility. In the short thirty years since 1979, China has successfully established criminology as a scientifi c fi eld of study with well-defi ned subjects, recognised scholars and copious research/publications. To date, there are very few systematic and comprehensive studies of criminology (in English language) as an emerging and important fi eld of academic discipline in China. As a result, we know very little about its focus and scope; direction and trend; theories and fi ndings; and problems and issues. This is a fi rst attempt to do so. The article (in two parts, published separately) investigates into: 'Literature on law, crime and punishment in China', 'The idea of crime (Fanzui)', 'Traditional thinking of crime and punishment in imperial China', 'Nature, structure and development of criminology', 'Contemporary theories on crime and punishment' and 'Fundamental issues and challenges' facing criminological research in China.Criminology research in the 21st Century should be conducted under the guidance of Marxism, thought of Mao Zedong and theory of Deng Xiaoping. It should start with the actual conditions of our nation and insist on combing theory and reality. It should contribute to construction of socialist economy and serve comprehensive social control and administration. It should contribute to 'permanent order and lasting peace' and people's peaceful living and happy work.

Exploring Spatial Patterns of Property Crime Risks in Changchun, China

“…Quantitative research, in particular, is rare in China because of the limited crime data available to researchers. The government is unwilling to publicize crime data or reveal policing problems, and detailed and reliable crime data are not easy to acquire (Wong, 2008).…”

Criminology’s new frontier in China: opportunities, possibilities and challenges

“…There has been very little indigenous theoretical development in Chinese criminology. The lack of theoretical interest and depth in criminological knowledge is due in part to the long tradition of politicized discipline development where Marx's political economic theory and Mao's theory of contradiction were the standard-bearers of the orthodoxy explanation of crime [30]. The limited theoretical development (and perhaps sociological imagination) in Chinese criminology field is well acknowledged by scholars from outside China.…”

Criminology in and of China: Discipline and Power

“…The limited existing work has tended to offer little in the way of synthesis or grounded historical explication. It often resulted in either untheorized historical narratives or theoretical but historically uninformed conjecture (but see Cao, 2004;Dikötter, 2002aDikötter, , 2002bKang, 1999;Mei & Wang, 2007;K. C. Wong, 2008;Yin, 1997).…”

“…Like Soviet criminology of an earlier period (see Solomon, 1974), crime study became tied to an emergent socialist legal system, and, as we shall see, this has a continuing resonance. Mao's crime-free society of this period was achieved with an all embracing ideology, totalitarian state, and paternalistic government by means of ideological indoctrination, economic planning, social administration for the believers, and political education and labor reform for the refuseniks (K. C. Wong, 2008).…”

“…In June 1982, the first national symposium on "The Study of Juvenile Delinquency" was hosted in Nanning City, Guangxi Province. The Society of Juvenile Delinquency Research of China was formally founded at this symposium, which arguably was the first academic criminology meeting specifically addressing research issues of crime (see K. C. Wong, 2008; also the fascinating account in China Society for Juvenile Delinquency Research [2002], Pioneer's Track-Persistent Exploration-20th Anniversary (1982-2002, Beijing, China: CSJDR).…”