ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book illustrates the scope of environmental crime, and it then explains how the local environmental problems are also transnational in their effects. The concept of crime relates to that which is a breach of law, yet eco-global harms, such as those committed by states and corporations, often eclipse the scope and reach of criminal law. While the early animal welfare movements that were connected to feminist movement in the UK emerged, criminologists studied human deviance. Ellefsen argues that the repression and persecution of the activists became so intense because of economic costs for individual animal industries that resulted from the achievements of animal advocates. The present-day actions of humans against nature and other species may not be fundamentally different from the way humans have always taken advantage of their superior position vis-à-vis nature and other species in an historical sense.
