ABSTRACT
The social ways of thinking about crime discussed in Chapter 5 were very influential in shaping contemporary criminology and appeared predominantly in the first six decades of the twentieth century. In this chapter we will look at accounts of crime that came into prominence during the latter part of the twentieth century. Many of these can be seen in some way as a response to earlier theories – challenging them, debating them, extending them. Indeed, during this time there was a constant tendency to find new ways of thinking about crime – but often these new ways turned out to be little more than old ways updated, and often their newness was attacked very rapidly and they fell into decline as quickly as they appeared. But some of the theories had a more enduring impact. This chapter will briefly review these late twentieth-century theories before turning in Chapter 7 to some of the most recent trends.
