Surveillance & crime: Key approaches to criminology

Abstract

Reviews the book, Surveillance & Crime: Key Approaches to Criminology by Roy Coleman and Michael McCahill (2011). The structure of the book makes it ideal for an academic setting.The book starts by examining what the reader knows in terms of 'crime' and 'surveillance', and the superficiality of each concept according to mainstream society. The authors present the reader with the notion that crime and surveillance exist together. It outlines different beliefs as to how surveillance is run. It also establishes of the idea of risk assessment as an emerging strategy to predict who 'may be an offender'. It focuses on globalization of surveillance in a 'post-terrorism era'. The final points remind the reader for that surveillance exists as a means for the powerful to marginalize society and target certain groups within society. The book presents a critical examination of the role of surveillance in modem society. While students with little to no background in the social sciences will find the book accessible, students who have been exposed to critical theories of sociology may be able to extract more meaning and may be able to contextualize the arguments presented by the authors more effectively. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved)