Carrington, Kerry; Walters, Reece --- "Chief Editors' Introduction" [2013] IntJlCrimJustSocDem 1; (2013) 2(1) International Journal for Crime, Justice and Social Democracy 1

• Chief Editors’ Introduction: Vol 2(1)

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Chief Editors’ Introduction: Vol 2(1)

Professor Kerry Carrington, Professor Reece Walters

Queensland University of Technology

We are delighted to publish the second edition of the International Journal for Crime and Justice. The opening piece by Mark Finnane and Susan Donkin asks provocatively whether counter-terrorist laws introduced in the post 9/11 global context are as innovative and threatening as first feared? The paper takes a longer term view arguing that interpretations of counter-terrorism laws need to be historically grounded, taking into account the way in which other social controls – such as ones instituted over habitual criminals and over those considered dangerous or mentally disordered – have provided a foundation from which to frame counter terrorism laws. Still on the theme on anti-terrorism and law, Nicola McGarrity critically interrogates the cases of 38 men charged with terrorist offences in Australia. This paper explores the difficulties encountered by the Australian jurisdictions in applying sentencing principles to terrorism cases, and in particular the challenges arising from balancing the principles of deterrence against rehabilitation for convicted terrorists.

The impact of social media and internet technologies on policing is another relatively new and innovative field of inquiry in criminology, with wide ranging impacts for criminal justice systems around the world. Murray Lee, Thomas Crofts, Michael Salter, Sanja Milivojevic and Alyce McGovern explore the criminalisation of teen sexting in the context of ‘moral panic’ over the emergence of this new crime where young people’s voices are largely silenced in the public and political debate. While they draw upon examples from Australia, the argument applies to many other jurisdictions where similar concerns about sexting arise. They point to the subterranean convergence between adolescent sexting which is criminalised, and adult sexting which is legitimate, and the perverse consequences of this contradictory form of regulation.

Eco-justice is a relatively new and innovative field of inquiry for criminology. In this volume Rob White adds to the emerging body of international scholarship in this field through a critical analysis of environmental justice and mining. The paper argues that resource extraction has the potential to devastate not only the natural environment but also undermine the cultural and social sustainability of resource towns – turning them into toxic towns. White explores the social injuries associated with the mining industry and how these impact upon the ecological health and wellbeing of local populations, not only now but well into the future given the toxicity of the remnants of certain kinds of resource extraction.

Until recently, violence in rural communities has been a rather neglected area of criminological research which has tended instead to take the urban as the most convenient laboratory to study patterns of crime. Not only are rural communities now enduring the adversities of resource extraction but they also experience overall higher levels of domestic and sexual violence. The paper by Walter DeKeseredy and Marie Rennison in this volume adds to the growing body of critical research in rural criminology. The authors analysed the United States National Crime Victimization Survey data. On the basis of this analysis they argue that there are variations in the rates of male-to-female separation/divorce assault across geographic regions, with rates for woman-abuse higher in rural regions compared to the suburban and urban areas of the United States. This pattern contradicts mainstream criminological theorising and has important practical implications for policy and program development which the authors then highlight.

Child sexual abuse – a crime that remains mostly hidden within the realms of religious institutions - has come to global prominence over the last decade following wide-ranging inquiries across the Anglophone world that have exposed the repeated failure of religious institutions to adequately address the issue. Jodi Death’s paper makes an important and original contribution to exposing how pastoral power operates to sometimes silence and at other times empower survivors of sexual abuse by Church leaders. Her piece draws on interviews with 15 Church leaders who identified as being pro-active in addressing child sexual abuse within religious institutions. The study critically interrogates how the discourses of forgiveness operate within the inner workings of pastoral power. The article concludes that individual Church leaders who understand the role of pastoral power in their praxis can positively influence outcomes for the survivors of child sexual abuse. Alternatively those who do not can contribute to the revictimisation of child sexual abuse survivors.

Many myths abound about the characteristics of those seeking asylum as refugees. Melissa Bull with a number of colleagues from Griffith University critically analyse the characteristics of long-term detainees in Australia’s Immigration detention regime. The paper draws on original research of Commonwealth Ombudsman’s Immigration Reports to demonstrate that long-term detainees are mainly students, tourists and workers who entered Australia with a valid visa and not those who arrived unlawfully by boat. The paper makes an important rational contribution to debates about immigration detention. As such it directs attention to the wider social justice issue about citizenship rights for immigrant populations who, through their detention, are effectively criminalised by what turns out for many to be an over-zealous immigration detention system of controls. Russell Hogg’s article focuses on the crimes of the one percent, those committed by investment bankers during the global financial crisis. It contrasts the relative impunity of financial crooks with the impact of penal populism on criminalising the poor and the marginalised. In a novel twist, the article turns populism on its head to explore its prospects for re-directing popular scrutiny to corporate and white collar criminality.

Since the first edition of this journal, the International Editorial Board has grown to comprise distinguished international scholars from 14 countries and five continents. We acknowledge our gratitude to the board for their commitment in reviewing articles for this journal and often within tight timeframes. Other blind peer reviewers are also gratefully acknowledged. There are three special editions of the Journal forthcoming, the first edited by Juan Tauri on Counter Colonial Criminologies will be published in November this year. The second, edited by Tanya Wyatt, Nigel South and Piers Beirne on New Horizons in Green Criminology, will be published in 2014. A third special edition on Postneoliberalism and Punishment in South America is to be edited by Máximo Sozzo.

Finally we would like to thank the authors, not only for choosing our journal as the vehicle to publish their high quality original scholarship but also for complying with the tight turnaround times for editing and revision expected for an on-line journal. There are, however, many advantages for authors publishing in an open access journal, such as this one now listed in the Ulrich international serial data base, in terms of maximising impact and citation. By bypassing the restrictions and obstacles to free access usually imposed by subscription-based journals, open access journals enhance access, distribution and citation. Already in the first quarter of the publication of the first edition (that is, over just four months) there have been 2602 abstract views and 1767 PDF downloads. Feel free to send the link to this open access journal to your networks.