1. On completion of this module, you will be able to engage with and explore competing understandings of the judicial, legal and policing systems that have evolved over the last c.200 years and their legacy. Knowledge and Understanding

2. On completion of this module, you will be able to identify shifts and trends in criminal justice history and place these in a wider historical and criminological context.
Learning
Enquiry

3. On completion of this module, you will be able to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of competing debates in criminal justice history e.g. the founding of the ‘modern’ police force, the role of punishment for example.
Analysis
Reflection
Application

4. On completion of this module, you will be able to critically discuss criminal justice history in a good style of written and spoken English.
Communication

1. Essay 60% 1,500 words
2. Group presentation 40% 1,000 words

Assessment one is an individual essay assessing the student’s achievement of Learning Outcomes 2, 3 and 4. The essay is set mid-module in week 25.

Assessment two is a group presentation assessing the student’s achievement of Learning Outcomes 1 and 4. The presentations take place at the end of the module in week 33.

Crime and Punishment in the Modern Era aims to provide students with a critical knowledge and understanding of the development of the criminal justice process in England and Wales. The module intends to increase students’ awareness of continuity and change in patterns and perceptions of crime and the responses to it by the legal system and other agencies over the period 1750-1950. Students will study historical perspectives on the history of crime and punishment – Whig, Marxist, Revisionist etc. They will have a chance to undertake critical evaluation of the sources of crime history, the influence of key historical actors, learn about change and continuity in the criminal justice system over the period covered.

Topics to be covered include:
• The development of policing
• Prosecution, the law & the courts
• Continuities and change in punishment
• The measurement & meaning of violence
• Social unrest and popular protest in historical perspective
• Professional & ‘white-collar’ crime
• Gender & crime in historical perspective
• The ‘invention’ of juvenile delinquency

MARKETING INFORMATION

This first-year module introduces you to the ways in which today’s penal system has evolved over time. The module begins at a point that is now over two hundred and fifty years ago. Why would a modern criminology module start here? First, if we were designing a criminal justice system that meets the needs of today’s society, it would probably not look like the one we have. That is because the institutions of criminal justice – the police, prisons, and the courts and so on have all been shaped and influenced by events and ideas from history. The organic growth of the police force, for example, from a private service employed and run for the benefit of the social elite, to a professional uniformed public service is complex. We can only understand why the police force works the way it does (prioritizing the maintenance of public order, being organized by counties rather than being ‘The British Police Force’, being largely unarmed, and so on) by looking at the changes that have occurred over time. Studying the roots of the penal system helps us to realize that the system we have today is not the only (and therefore maybe not the best) way that it could be organized. The past has left its legacy. For example, why are men and women sentenced in different ways? What is it about the persistence of 18th, 19th and 20th century constructions of femininity that means we still feel their impact today?
Second, if we accept that things have at some point been different in the past, several questions arise. For example, youth crime is a persistent problem for society, but has it always been one? Do we live in a safer society now than our parents and grandparents did? Do we care more about violence now? We are not going to find the answers to such questions by looking at the situation today. We need to compare today with the past. We also need to question the assumptions that people readily make about the past. This module is designed to introduce you some of these concepts and how criminologists engage with and explore such matters.

For 150 hours, of which 26 will be class contact and 124 hours will be guided independent study. Whole group contact will consist of lectures and workshops.

• Cox, D. (2014). Crime in England, 1688-1815. London, Routledge.
• Cox, P. and Shore, H. (2017). Becoming Delinquent: British and European Youth, 1650–1950. London, Routledge Revivals.
• Godfrey, B. (2013). Crime in England 1880-1945: The rough and the criminal, the policed and the incarcerated. London, Routledge.
• Godfrey, B. and Lawrence, P. (2014). Crime and Justice since 1750. London, Routledge.
• Johnston, H. (2015). Crime in England 1815-1880: Experiencing the criminal justice system. London, Routledge.
• Turner, J., Taylor, P., Corteen, K. & Morley, S. (eds.) (2017) A Companion to the History of Crime and Criminal Justice. Bristol, UK: Policy Press.
• Williams, L. and Godfrey, B. (2018). Criminal Women 1850-1920: Researching the Lives of Britain's Female Offenders. London, Pen and Sword Books.

• The library
• PCs with standard suite of University software providing access to e-mail, the internet, word processing, etc.
• Lecture rooms with access for disabled students, and suitable for group work
• The Blackboard virtual learning environment

Crime and Punishment in the Modern Era: This first-year module introduces you to the ways in which today’s penal system has evolved over time. The module begins at a point that is now over two hundred and fifty years ago. Why would a modern criminology module start here? First, if we were designing a criminal justice system that meets the needs of today’s society, it would probably not look like the one we have. That is because the institutions of criminal justice – the police, prisons, and the courts and so on have all been shaped and influenced by events and ideas from history. The organic growth of the police force, for example, from a private service employed and run for the benefit of the social elite, to a professional uniformed public service is complex. We can only understand why the police force works the way it does (prioritizing the maintenance of public order, being organized by counties rather than being ‘The British Police Force’, being largely unarmed, and so on) by looking at the changes that have occurred over time. Studying the roots of the penal system helps us to realize that the system we have today is not the only (and therefore maybe not the best) way that it could be organized. The past has left its legacy. Module Code: SOCY40516