Abstract
This is the first issue of our term as Criminology and Criminal Justice’s new editorial team – all three co-Editors-in-Chief and our wider Editorial board are members of the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research (SCCJR), which is itself a collaboration between four Scottish Universities (the Universities of Edinburgh, Glasgow, Stirling and Strathclyde). We are privileged to be able to take over following the outstanding efforts of the outgoing Editorial Team at the University of Leeds and have inherited a journal in very good shape indeed.
In a relatively short period of time, Criminology and Criminal Justice has become a distinguished journal with an international reputation for high quality submissions, timely turn-around for reviews and a commitment to rigour, originality and interdisciplinarity. Since its inception in 2000 (and first issue, published in 2001), the journal has played a key part in both stimulating and critically engaging in criminal justice debates in the UK and beyond.
Criminology and Criminal Justice is the official journal of the British Society of Criminology, a professional body that has been home to some of those producing the most important, critical and innovative scholarship in the discipline. British criminology has never been just British however, and even when analysing criminal justice developments within the UK, seeks to be part of and engage a global terrain.
We look forward to continue building Criminology and Criminal Justice with our own vision of a criminological journal that speaks to the critical crime and justice issues of our times through publishing research that is path-breaking, visionary and useful. Our ethos is to ensure a ‘peer review to publication’ process that fosters a climate of support and collegiality, equality and diversity. At the same time, we are committed to ensuring that the journal showcases the best research from across the many disciplines which have informed criminological thinking – sociology, law, social policy, anthropology, politics, history cultural and media studies and more. Our objectives are to further develop growth in the number of manuscript submissions, stimulate and support submissions from under-represented regions of the world, and reflect and participate in shaping the most exciting advances of the discipline by promoting new ideas and emerging scholarship. Last, but by no means least, we are committed to involving a range of authors and readers including academics, students, practitioners and policy makers so that we can demonstrate the importance of criminological scholarship to wider society.
The journal has a new International Advisory Board composed of members with a diverse range of substantive research interests, and theoretical and methodological expertise. Our new IAB also is regionally diverse, drawing together criminological expertise from Australia, Europe, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, Hong Kong, the USA and the countries of the former Soviet Union and we will actively be looking to recruit new Board members from under represented regions of the world.
Criminology and Criminal Justice welcomes articles from scholars working on questions of crime and justice across the world, and we welcome submissions from postdoctoral researchers and those at an early stage of their career all the way through to leading, senior scholars in the discipline.
We very much hope that you will join us in achieving our vision for Criminology and Criminal Justice, and invite you to send us your ideas and article submissions.