Clinard and Quinney's Criminal Behavior Systems: A Revised Edition

A. Javier Treviño has done a service to the field by revitalizing Clinard and Quinney's iconic analysis of criminal behavior systems. He uses this construct to illuminate how clusters of behaviors are defined as criminal, become socially organized, and incur differential societal reaction. Classic in status but contemporary in focus, this volume is both an invaluable scholarly resource and ideal for classroom use.

–Francis T. Cullen, Past President, American Society of Criminology

A. Javier Treviño has done a wonderful job revising this classic work on the major types of crime. Both students and scholars will find his reviews of the research on each type of crime invaluable, with these reviews nicely organized around several key dimensions.

–Robert Agnew, Past President, American Society of Criminology

This completely revised edition of a seminal text in the field of criminology and criminal justice is well researched and written. Not only does Professor Treviño integrate current, relevant, and important scholarship, but he uses contemporary events as examples to engage the reader.

–Jeffrey Ian Ross, University of Baltimore

Clinard and Quinney’s Criminal Behavior Systems: A Revised Edition is a welcome update to a criminological classic. Carefully integrating the best ideas and approaches from previous editions, Treviño creates a unique overview of the features, characteristics, and empirical findings that inform contemporary typologies of crime.

–Sally S. Simpson, University of Maryland College Park

An important classic, familiar to virtually all criminologists, Clinard and Quinney’s Criminal Behavior Systems: A Revised Edition begins with a discussion of the construction of types of crime and then formulates and utilizes a useful typology of criminal behavior systems. It classifies crime into seven categories, among them: violent personal crime, occasional property crime, public order crime, occupational crime, corporate crime, organized crime, and political crime. They examine the criminal career of the offender in each category, public and legal attitudes toward these individuals, support systems they may have, attitudes of the offenders, and other features. The discussion of each category of crime is thorough and enlightening, and takes the reader far in understanding the huge problem of crime and establishing intelligent definitions to study it.

The new edition looks at the criminal landscape of the twenty-first century, capturing both the numerous advancements in theory and research in the field of criminology, as well as many societal changes that have taken place in law, mass media, the economy, culture, and the political system that directly affect the book’s coverage of various types of crimes. A global perspective broadens the book’s relevance to include a variety of different societies. Crimes newly examined in this edition include identity theft, domestic violence, arson, hate crimes, cybercrime, campus sexual assault, police brutality, Ponzi schemes, human trafficking, and terrorism. Finally, alternatives to conventional criminal justice are considered, including such approaches as peacemaking, restorative justice, private justice, problem solving, harm reduction, naming and shaming, and internal and external controls.

Like its predecessors, Clinard and Quinney’s Criminal Behavior Systems: A Revised Edition will be essential to criminologists formulating their own theories and research on criminal behavior as well as to students in criminology and sociology courses on how to view and study crime.