ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the links between the production and dissemination of the media’s presentation of crime stories involving victims and the existing social and cultural norms. Before examining the media presentation of victims, it considers the development of academic victimology and the various theoretical strands within the discipline that have helped in the formation of the perception of victims of crime in general. In response to some of the criticism lodged against positive victimology, the radical victimological perspective emerged in the late 1960s and 1970s. Critical victimology looks to include the ‘hidden’ victims of crime in its analysis and to consider and highlight the role of the state in perpetuating inequalities in the ‘production of victims’. CCTV footage showing people being victims of crime can help in providing evidence for court and in police investigations of crime. Indeed, governments have invested heavily in CCTV cameras as part of their crime-prevention programme.
