Rethinking Criminology: The Realist Debate.

Edited by JOCK YOUNG and ROGER MATTHEWS. (London: Sage, 1992. 160 pp. 10.95[pounds] pb.)

These companion anthologies constitute a serious attempt by the editors, leading |radical (or |left') realists' Roger Matthews and Jock Young, to respond to and/or accommodate some of the criticisms that have been levelled at the realists' preoccupation with the causes and effects of |street crime'. The rationale for two volumes is that Rethinking is concerned with theory and methodology, Issues with substantive topics. However, the distinction which most impresses We reader is that between those contributions which emanate from the realist camp, and those which offer critical readings of various aspects of realist thought. Magnanimously, Matthews and Young allocate eight of the total 13 chapters to the latter category.

Both volumes open with a scene-setting chapter by the editors. In Rethinking, they affirm the worth of realism's |square of crime' (of offender, victim, state, and society), arguing that any analysis which cannot explain the …