ABSTRACT
As described in Chapter 2, green crimes are not a series of isolated environmental problems. Instead, green crimes are patterned, and those patterns can be identified in reference to local and global political economies. In this chapter we expand upon the notion that green crimes are produced by humans and the way human societies are organized to carry out production. The idea that productive forces are related to crime is not new to criminology. For example, the main assumption of Marxist criminology is that class structure and formation explains the shape of criminal laws, policing, courts, corrections, and the causes of various types of crime and deviance (Lynch and Michalowski, 2006). The way we produce things not only shapes the definition of crime, but also creates harm and produces chemically-induced violence. Considered from this perspective, production is central to the etiology of green crimes. In addition, the type of production a society engages in helps to explain patterns of green victimization and the types of green offenders and offenses that exist.
