ABSTRACT
In an imposing volume entitled Crime in Biological, Social, and Moral Contexts, edited by Ellis and Hoffman and published by Praeger in 1991, Glayde Whitney expounds on the “Possible Genetic Bases of Race Differences in Criminality.” But how “old-fashioned” this classification of human races really is still needs to be established. The first methodological point that Whitney and other scientists of race must, of course, establish is that the typological “races” are distinguished on genetically valid grounds. They freely admit themselves that the categories they use have already been so designated for more than a hundred years, long before the “advances” of “the last few decades in biological research, increased knowledge of molecular biology, molecular genetics, and neuroscience”. Three major racial groups have been recognized in both scientific and popular schemes – black, white, Oriental,” this “recognition” being attributed to physical anthropologists and sociobiologists.
