History of the Group
Background and introduction
The European Group for the Study of Deviance and Social Control (EG hereafter) held its first conference in Italy in 1973 on the theme Deviance and Social Control in Europe: Scope and Prospects for a Radical Criminology. Since then, annual conferences have been held at different venues throughout Europe, as can be seen from the Conference List. Many countries have sponsored more than one conference.
In the early 1970s, several criminologists decided to form a break-away European alternative criminology that was neither dominated by American/Anglo-Saxon academics nor by conservative, positivistic or functionalist orientations within criminology and sociology. Radical and alternative criminology had developed during the 1960s, linked with the struggles, for example, of the Norwegian prisoners' movement, the French mental patients' union, the German radical lawyers' group, and so on. While initially class and certain political hierarchies were the focus, the European Group gradually sought to address overcome other national, linguistic, class, ethnic, sexual, and gender barriers in an effort to develop a critical, emancipatory, and innovative criminology, both in topics of our research and in conduct of conferences, to provide a forum for and recognition of emancipatory science and emancipatory politics as legitimate areas of study and activism. Areas which also have often not been addressed at other gatherings of criminologists. The focus of this forum would be the analysis of the continually changing face of social control.
While a handful of participants have come to the conference from North and South America, Africa, and Australia, the overwhelming majority come from Europe. What many have identified as that which is unique about the European Group is precisely this European context and focus, which is felt to be becoming increasingly important in the subject areas researched by the conference participants: changing forms of social control, in some cases rises in suppression and segregation, issues around immigration, the labor market and border security, as well as the institutions of police and prison, and of human rights in relation to the informal and formal power structures.
One goal of the group has been to highlight social problems in the field of deviance and social control which are under-exposed by criminologists in many other contexts; thus to create a forum not commonly provided at other conferences and an international network for academics, practitionesrs, and activists working towards social justice. The EG has had varying success in these pursuits, but continues to place these aspirations high on the agenda at the annual conferences.
The group took the name that the group still holds today, but the emphasis has been on the various and shifting forms of formal and other types of "social control". A forum was sought for discussions of topics and trends that were not commonly taken up at more official criminological conferences, although many members of the group as well as participants of the annual conferences are well-established members of the criminological academic world.
Organization of the group and its conferences
A Steering Committee consisting of national/regional representatives meets each winter to compose the Call for Papers for the upcoming conference and to make various administrative and policy decisions. At conferences, it works in conjunction with the local organizing committee for the running of the conference and EG matters. The standing EG secretariate is located in Stockholm. These representatives and other contact persons help with publicising the conferences.
Several volumes of Working Papers based on papers from the conferences were published during the 1980s. Several Newsletters and Bulletins have also been distributed throughout the years. The contents of these included Calls for Papers, conference and session reports, National Reports on common themes for all countries (such as prisons, information and control technologies and so on) or on themes of most topicality for that country that year, and thematic articles. It has been decided that the European Group website will replace these Bulletins/Newsletters.
The European Group is an independent association, financed until now by membership fees, conference fees, and by funds donated by various sources in the countries hosting the conferences (when available) as well as generous provision of facilities and services. Many organisations have supported travel and conference costs for Steering Committee members and other participants, as have the individuals' home institutions. The distinction between members and non-members has by and large been eliminated in recent years. Information is sent out to all interested parties and conference participants and conference fees are the same.
The annual conference takes place in early Autumn and is open to interested academics, researchers, and practitioners in criminology and related fields. While some effort has been made over the years to involve participants from local advocacy or activist groups (such as penal reform groups), most participants come from academia. Usually, around 70 to 100 participants attend the annual conferences.
The conference format has some characteristic features. The host country is encouraged to organize a plenary panel to present the issues of most concern in their area, which often serves to "set the stage" for subsequent discussions. An attempt is made to limit plenaries to 1-2 per conference day to allow for more parallel sessions. A post-graduate session is provided for those who wish to discuss their on-going or planned research projects. Working groups for information exchange etc. have formed around topics such as criminological theory, feminist perspectives on criminology, prisons and imprisonment, policing. A short session (often over lunch) is set apart towards the end of the conference for participants from the same country or region to meet and reflect on the conference, on future conference themes, and the orientation of the group. These suggestions etc. are then presented at the Business Meeting at the final session of the conference. Among other things, this enables the Steering Committee to formulate the next year's Call for Papers based on the preferences expressed here.
Attention is paid to certain other aspects of conference going. While the conference language is English, first-language English speakers are strongly encouraged to take the international character of the conference into consideration in their presentations, thus increasing everyone's access to the discussions. Similarly, the sessions must be chaired and conducted in such a manner so as to encourage input from both more and less experienced speakers. It is felt that critical responses to presentations and critical exchange are more likely to have an effect when given in an open and supportive atmosphere.
It has been said that critical criminology must expand its base so as even to include to a greater extent critical legal studies, reflective sociology of law, and feminist work, and to take consideration to social and cultural changes. The European Group is striving to become a forum for students, researchers, and other academics as well as for practitioners, and in such a way to anchor the discussions in reality. At the first meeting, in 1973, the participants joined 15 000 Italians who were demonstrating their support for the resistance work among Chilean labourers. This lent a political tone to the European Group and contributed to its emphasis on uniting various analytical and action levels.
A review of 30 years of Annual Conferences
Themes throughout the three decades of the group have included the expansion of the European prison system, analyses of changing forms and varying outcomes of social control, trends in criminalization and decriminalization, the politics of internal and international security, the gender perspectives on social control and of sexuality, the role of the State and the exercise of state power, feminist perspectives on justice, the contribution of the rights (civil and human) perspective to criminal justice and so on.
1970s
In the early and mid-1970s, the group studied issues central to radical, critical, and "new" criminologies, as seen on the conference list: crimes of the powerful, the relationship between economics and legal control, demasking the political nature of criminal law and legal force, the role of prisoners' (Norway) and patients' (French) movements in penal and psychiatric reform, police violence/repression. Towards the late seventies, the concept of power and its manifestations were analyzed theoretically and identified in specific contexts: terrorism and State Violence (FRG 1978) as well as fluctuating forms of discipline in our societies as reflected in the number of papers presented at the Danish conference in 1979 that were strongly influenced by the work of Michel Foucault.
1980s
In Belgium 1980, the role of criminologists themselves was discussed, as well as the control of information and research within the field of deviant behaviour and social control. Questions were asked as to what types of research projects received funding, which groups of researchers were granted and which were denied access to data, and to what degree was commissioned researched rewarded to the detriment of "free" research. Some speakers implied that the role of the criminologist is in part to work for non-repressive criminal policies and in part to observe critically without necessarily presenting proposals for alternative criminal policies. Others meant that non-repressive policies can best be achieved through direct participation in the formation of these policies and by working for improvements within various components of the criminal justice system. The lively debates between "leftist realists" and those who support variations of abolitionism (from questioning the actual workings, functioning, and legitimacy of the criminal justice system to the demand for the dismantling of prisons) concern in part the issue of the role of the criminologist.
During the 1980s, one central question discussed at the conferences was the interplay between state policies for social control, their effect on target groups, and these groups' counteractions or reactions. In Italy 1982, focus was on the interplay between state policies for controlling youth and the reactions/counterstrategies by these groups. The discussion continued the following year in Finland where the focus was on various social movements (Basque youth movement, Northern Irish republican popular justice, Dutch protest groups like "provos", "kabouters", squatters (based on René van Swaaningen's report)). An impelling exposé was made of impedning Finnish laws against "any encouragement of homosexuality" (even in media) and the effects of this on gay and lesbian comunities.
Some years, the conference theme and venue have been intertwined. At the 1981 meeting in Northern Ireland, "The Politics of Internal Security" was studied against the background of the ongoing hunger strike among Republican prisoners protesting the presence of British troops and British policies in Ulster. In Wales in 1984, "The State of Information: Social Conflict, Social Control and the New Technologies" was discussed in part in light of how new types of social control were being used against striking coal miners. In Hamburg in 1985, "The Expansion of European Prison Systems" presented a clear picture of general trends in Europe: harsher sentences for some groups and for some crimes, longer pre-trail detentions, increased use of life imprisonment, additive sentences for already imprisoned persons, and use of short prison sentences for increasing numbers of offenders. It was shown that in many cases, women prisoners were affected to an even harsher degree than men.
Towards the end of the 1980s, the question of "rights" was raised. In Spain, the advantages and potential dangers of strengthening a group's position by means of defending its formal rights were discussed. Meetings were also arranged with local groups such as Andalusian day labourers, Spanish women's movement, protest groups active under the Franco dictatorship and at present, and anti-NATO groups. Interest was aimed in 1987 at the overall question of "Justice and Ideology", different perceptions of justice, victimology and "abolitionist" reactions to violence against women (such as substituting civil law remedies for criminal law), and trends in criminalization and decriminalization. In 1988 in Norway a discussion began on feminist views on justice, especially with concern to gendered violence, and feminist research under the heading of "Gender, Sexuality, and Social Control", where papers dealt with issues such as socialization and sports, mental patients' history, women lawbreakers, conceptions of sexuality, pornography, and so on. The unwillingness or inability of law and the discipline of criminology to address many issues relevant to to women as well as the centrality of feminist critique - and ambivalence to the use of the (penal) law - entered the discourse. The desirability and usefulness of the criminal justice/court system in relation to physical and sexual violence against women sparked heated ideological and political controversies. These issues have continued to be of interest in the EG and will in part be discussed at the 2002 conference in Poland.
Many prior conference themes and variations on the notion of dominance-subordination lead to the 1989 conference title of "Beyond Domination: Visions and Resistance", for which Edgehill outside the city of Liverpool was considered an appropriate site. As the attention was turning towards Central Europe and the implications of the rapid changes occurring in what had previously been considered Western and Eastern Europe, the 1990 conference in Haarlem looked in part at the restructuring of legal systems in Europe and in particular at the interrelatedness of labour migration and prison policy/penal reform. A panel consisting of many European penal reform groups discussed setbacks, possible points for international cooperation, and the ramifications for penal reform of the "integration" of Europe. The implications of the rapid changes not least of all for penal policy and marginalization… Increasing attention was turned to the relationships between labour migration and penal policy, multi-ethnic/cultural societies, old and new forms of racism, "otherness""and "diversity" Discussed in Potsdam (1991) were changes in social justice/policies, social welfare and migration, the use of constitutions to enforce and consolidate social rights, what Fortress Europé will mean for Europé's realtionship to third-world countries and their inhabitants.
The European Group has illuminated deviant behaviour and social control from various viewpoints, and there is no uniform dogma. Formal punishment is seen as an instrument of dominance and crime and criminality as reflections of the societal structure. In the group, there is a desire to continue studying how human/civil rights are being eroded through shifting political and state control and how minorities are created when certain life styles or characteristics are coerced on everyone as the "normal". The European Group wants to establish contacts between academically active persons and other persons who work for political and economic democracy and social justice. And a goal is to maintain critical and radical criminology as a legitimate field of research.
1990s
1990s - Schengen agreement on passport and visum freedoms, Fortress Europé, immigration limitations, Amsterdam Fördraget. Visum will be needed for residents of 128 countries before they can enter Schengen countries. Schengen: av 142 articles, 4 concern freedom of movement and 138 control measures. Two gigantic data-based registers and surveillance systems.
The politics of rights was discussed again in Padua in 1992. Judy Fudge questioned whether the making of moral rights claims can be made into a strategy for transformation or might it mainly be supportive of the status quo? (See Social & Legal Studies 1992;1:45-70). Christopher Pollmann continued this discussion with a paper entitled "The recourse to human rights in order to overcome them". Many presentations dealt with "human rights which are very fashionable now", one speaker said, "in the political arena, human rights are emerging as a magic spell". Others pointed out that the criminal law has to infringe on human rights, and that human rights implies that collective demands are turned into individual rights. Other discussions included: what human rights and their relationship to citizenship will mean for asylum seekers and political refugees, women, language, minorities, nomads and others; "dangerous" women and issues of child custody;
Dario Melossi reviewed the development of social control under the title "Weak Leviathan and Strong Democracy" (See special edition of International Journal of Contemporary Sociology 1991). Maeve McMahon discussed the contradiction between theories and politics with regard to decarceration (see McMahon The Persistent Prison? Rethinking Decarceration and Penal Reform, Univ of Toronto Press 1992).
In 1996, in Wales, the tensions and contentions between control and care functions of various public agencies were discussed.
Website Administrator: joanna.gilmore@manchester.ac.uk