Anthropological Criminology 2.0: Ethnographies of Global Crime And

THEME SECTION Anthropological criminology 2.0: Ethnographies of global crime and criminalization Guest edited by David Sausdal and Henrik Vigh Introduction Anthropological criminology 2.0 David Sausdal and Henrik Vigh Abstract: Th is introduction seeks to outline a contemporary anthropological approach to crime and criminalization, an “anthropological criminology 2.0.” Th is anthropological criminology distances the subfi eld from its social Darwinist connotations and instead etches itself clearly onto a social and political anthropological tradition. In doing so, the introduction moves from Malinowski’s initial functionalist and localist approach to present-day political and global orientations. It off ers fi ve distinct propositions for anthropological criminology to engage with in the future, which we believe are essential for future anthropological studies of crime and criminalization. With these as guidelines, we hope to fully revive a much-needed dialogue between criminology and anthropology. As we shall see, anthropological and ethnographic insights are currently in demand as global, yet poorly understood, forms of crime are developing alongside ever cruder and more amplifi ed reactions to them. Keywords: anthropology, crime, criminalization, criminology, ethnography, globalization We [should] pursue two lines of anthro- poses an “anthropological criminology 2.0”1 by pological inquiry . One is the study clarifying the potential of a social anthropolog- of criminalization . Th e other is eth- ical approach to crime and criminalization and nographic attention to illegal predation distancing the subfi eld from the social Darwin- . Taken together, [this] enables us to ist connotations with which it is conventionally provid[e] refl ection[s] on global crime . associated. Demonstrating how another gene- an issue that urgently awaits anthropolo- alogy exists—one that builds on the insights gy’s contribution. (Schneider and Schnei- of Bronisław Malinowski rather than Cesare der 2008: 352) Lombroso—and revisiting and retelling the history of social anthropological engagements Th is Focaal theme section seeks to revise and with crime and criminalization, we move from rejuvenate anthropological criminology. It pro- earlier functionalist and localist approaches to Focaal—Journal of Global and Historical Anthropology 85 (2019): 1–14 © Stichting Focaal and Berghahn Books doi:10.3167/fcl.2019.850101 2 | David Sausdal and Henrik Vigh anthropological criminology’s present-day po- [approximating] seven times the rate of growth litical and global orientations. Finally, we off er of legal trade” (Heine and Th akur 2011: 50). fi ve distinct propositions for anthropological Still, while quantitative analyses have been use- criminology to engage with in the future. ful in identifying its vast dimensions, its under- In doing this, we follow in the wake of the lying sociocultural logics and practices remain renewed attention that anthropological crim- under-researched and partially understood to inology has been receiving. In relation to an the point where it can be claimed that no “valid increased focus on transnational crime and il- empirical overview exists” (Bruinsma 2015: 3). legalized dimensions of globalization, several Or, as the UN concludes, “despite the gravity of anthropologists have begun to approach global the threat it remains insuffi ciently understood” forms of crime and criminalization ethnograph- (UNODC 2010: ii). ically. In the process, they have uncovered a fi eld In this dearth of knowledge lies an invita- that not only urgently awaits our disciplinary tion for anthropological engagement—fi rst, as engagement, as Jane and Peter Schneider (2008) an enticement to shed ethnographic light on a among others have argued (cf. Jeroslow 2011; dramatically developing yet relatively unknown Penglase et al. 2009), but one that is a matter of global phenomenon. Th is is a bidding that suits primary concern for many international policy anthropology particularly well. Unlike tradi- makers and pundits. As the United Nations Of- tional criminologists, who are, by their own ad- fi ce on Drugs Crime stressed in its report Th e mission, too-oft en hindered by methodological Globalization of Crime: A Transnational Orga- nationalism and, perhaps therefore, theoretical nized Crime Th reat Assessment, contemporary ethnocentrism (Aas 2013), anthropologists of- issues of criminal activity, and the policing and ten “follow and stay with the movements” of the prevention thereof, are increasingly attuned to people and phenomena we study (Marcus 1995: problems and processes that are related to global 106)—and increasingly do so across scale. An- dynamics (UNODC 2010). Illegal cross-border thropologists, in other words, aim to prevent activities such as various forms of traffi cking, local, national, or other sociopolitical borders smuggling, property theft , cybercrime, fi nancial and boundaries artifi cially cutting our investiga- crime, environmental crime, and terrorism have tions short. Th e discipline is thus well suited to become governmental worries and causes of so- answer the prevalent yet rarely answered crimi- cietal fears. Th ey are seen, in Manuel Castell’s nological call for an ethnographic criminology (1998) words, as “the perverse connections” of a “that travels” both in methodological and the- growingly global order: an interconnected state oretical terms (Aas 2011). In doing so—that is, of aff airs, where the increasing movements of in traveling with contemporary forms of crime people, goods, capital, and information facili- and criminalization—anthropological criminol- tate not just legal but also illegal fl ows. ogy may not only respond to a request for more Yet, despite the widespread anxiety, little is qualitative knowledge; it may also be able to pro- still known about these matters. Quantitative vide detailed pushback against the alarmist and studies indicate the scale of the problem. In fear-mongering tendencies of contemporary 2009, cross-border or transnational organized politics, which currently seem set on singling crime was, for example, estimated to gener- out migrants in ways that criminalize them. ate $870 billion a year, equaling 1.5 percent of global gross domestic product. To put it in per- spective, this is more than six times the amount Anthropological criminology: of offi cial development assistance at the time From worlds within to the worldwide (UNODC 2011). Looking to the future, pundits have even predicted “illicit trade may reach any- While the subdiscipline of anthropological where from 1 to 3 trillion dollars in value . criminology has diff erent theoretical tenets, it is Introduction | 3 perhaps best known for its relation to the late “healthy” population. Th e two laws were not of- nineteenth-century Italian school of criminol- fi cially revoked until 1975 and were explicitly ogy led by the charismatic Cesare Lombroso. argued for and legitimated in crime prevention Building on early connections between evolu- terms. tionism, phrenology, and physical anthropology, the fi eld of anthropological criminology (or Alternative tenets criminal anthropology, as it was interchange- ably termed at the time) used phrenological However, at the same time as Lombroso was methods and the analyses of “mug shots” to set studying the “internal others” of the Occident, forth the theory of “the born criminal” (Lom- his social anthropological contemporaries had broso 1911). Instead of locating the causes of begun studying law and crime focusing on crime in will and rational choice, Lombroso and “external others” instead (cf. Vigh and Sausdal his colleagues argued criminality was primarily 2018) Obviously, early social anthropology car- a manifestation of biological “atavism.” Crimi- ried with it many of the same problems as Lom- nals were primitive throwbacks in our civilized broso’s positivist school of criminology. It too midst, literally “off track” or “falling short”2 in was based on evolutionist, ethnocentric, and relation to the evolutionary progress of the rest colonial ideas of the world. Yet, while Lombro- of the Western population. Unsurprisingly, the so’s thoughts were politically and scientifi cally people labeled as archaic and deviant Others acknowledged, social anthropology had begun were oft en religious or cultural minorities such distancing itself from the “original sin” of its as indigenous populations or stateless people, early social evolutionist leanings (Kuper 2010). for example, the Sami, Jew, or Roma (cf. Stewart Th e move from abstract “armchair anthropol- 2013). ogy” to long-term ethnography resulted in the Anthropological criminology quickly gained discipline becoming unceasingly focused on ex- ground, not just in academia but also in politi- panding our understanding of what it means to cal and public life, and came to inform a range be human and attuning the academic gaze to the of policies and ideologies from the middle of the contextual social and political factors behind nineteenth century onward. It laid the ground social and cultural diff erences. Work carried for politicized eugenics and was widely cele- out by foundational fi gures such as Malinowski brated as off ering both scientifi cally sound and (1926) and Alfred Radcliff e-Brown (1935) pro- enlightening ways of maintaining and purifying vide, as such, a more reasonable point of depar- national populations by both the conservative ture for an updated and sociopolitically attuned and the progressive, the conformist and

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