International Journal on Criminology Volume 1, Number 1, Fall 2013 | Page 13

International Journal on Criminology
Cario, Robert. Introduction to the criminal sciences (Introduction aux sciences
criminelles, Sixth Editon, 2008, 260) affirms that “criminology can be defined as a
multidisciplinary science whose objective is the global and integrated analysis of the
social phenomenon caused by criminal actions, in their origins and their dynamics, in
their individual and social dimensions, from the viewpoint of the perpetrator as well as
that of the victim, for goals of prevention and treatment”.
One might believe that this avalanche would have been enough to stem the sociolatry
whose denial of reality constituted at once its charm, its difference and its
fundamentalism, particularly in France… and only in France…
For, as discussed with the professors Villerbu, Herzog Evans, and Cario in a recent
tribune, 1 a discipline is above all a political fact whose scientific aim must integrate
recognition in order to re-establish its goals. The autonomy of penal law, the birth of the
criminal sciences, the recognition of the very notion of criminal policies had to be argued
politically, as did the free practice of university teaching of clinical psychology or of
sociology. The fact that contemporary criminal lawyers have chosen to write a treatise on
penal law and criminology 2 clearly shows that the two cannot be thought of as the same
discipline, just as criminology cannot be reduced to the criminal sciences, even if they are
accompanied by sociological considerations and psychological or psychiatric humanism. 3
Although criminology is taught in France, it has no official university recognition, in
that there is no qualification for it. It can only be an add-on whose disciplinary avatars are
weak. It therefore takes refuge at worst in private institutions, at best in university
degrees or interuniversity degrees. The number of these has continued to rise, reaching
130 in 2010. According to the Villerbu Report, this explains the words used by members
of the National Criminology Conference 4 in November 2009 to designate both studies of
criminology and those that benefited from it: “Homeless” and “paperless”. However, the
media constantly continues to promote criminological information that is often partial,
sometimes in both senses of the word. The scoop is prioritized over educational value. 5 It
should also be emphasized that criminological thought forms part of the teaching of over
110 university academics and interests many practical stakeholders, despite the fact that
work in criminology severely lacks visibility.
The French paradox arises from these points: since emerging at the end of the
nineteenth century at the crossroads between four recognized disciplines (medicine, legal,
psychiatry/mental health, law, sociology), criminology remained an accessory to penal
law, which is simply a long-ignored component of private law. Its legitimacy as an
academic and social discipline comes in a context of institutional deficiency. It seems that
systematic or systemic analysis is not appropriate for studying the criminal phenomenon:
criminology tends to rely on texts, doctrine, case-law, 6 or the multiple theories in the
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1
“La criminologie est elle une science,” Cahiers Français, January 2013.
2
G. Stefani and G. Levasseur, Droit pénal général et criminologie (Paris: Dalloz, 1957); J.
Léauté and R. Vouin, Droit pénal et criminologie (Thémis, Paris: PUF, 1956). See also P.
Bouzat and J. Pinatel. Traité de droit pénal et de criminologie (Paris: Dalloz, 1970).
3
4
5
6
When dealing with the relationship of crime (a judicial formulation) to criminal (the person
responsible for the crime), these take the names of criminal psychology, criminal psychiatry,
and criminal sociology.
L. Villerbu, Report by the Minister of Higher Education and Research, on the Feasibility, C reation
and
D evelopment of C riminology S tudies, R esearch and T raining (Rapport Villerbu). Presented at the French National
Criminology Conference, 2010.
No news item would be complete without an interview from a self-proclaimed criminologist.
See B. Bouloc, Pénologie (Paris: Précis Dalloz, 1991).
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