Green Criminology European working group (GREEN)
Environmental concerns are at the forefront of economic, political and societal agendas as they pose a grave threat to our everyday lives and to future generations of humans and non-humans alike. Green criminology draws attention to the broad, complex, and multivariate harms, transgressions and risks which damage and kill our environment.
Green criminology enhances our understanding of and responses to environmental harms and crimes by moving beyond conventional understandings of crime and illegality by drawing attention to “harms” and the influences of social inequalities and power imbalances. It addresses the problem of legal protection, enforcement, and environmental justice, and gives voice to a wide range of victims, including ecosystems, plants, and non-human animals.
Green criminologists approach the issue of environmental crime and harm predominantly from biocentric and ecocentric perspectives, regarding humans as just “another species”, operating within complex ecosystems. Therefore, green criminologists study ecological damage from various disciplines.
Since 2012, green criminologists from around the world have been organizing a (bi)yearly seminar that focuses on different aspects of environmental crime, with the aim of pushing green criminological scholarship further by bridging (sub)disciplinary boundaries, but also by bringing together junior and senior scholars as well as practitioners to learn from each other. In recent years, these seminars have been organized in conjunction with the annual ESC (European Society of Criminology) conferences, in order to limit our environmental footprint while traveling to conferences. The Green Criminology European Working Group formalizes these collaborations, enhancing and stimulating research on environmental crime and harm across Europe.
Aims of the working group
- to provide a context in which ESC members and non-members can exchange information and experiences about researching green/environmental crime;
- to provide a context in which ESC members and non-members can exchange information and experiences about teaching about green/environmental crime;
- to foster opportunities for cross-national research and scholarly collaboration between researchers;
- to push green criminological scholarship further by bridging (sub)disciplinary boundaries
- to foster an open and honest discussion about theoretical and methodological developments and challenges in green criminology;
- to bring together junior and senior academics, as well as practitioners and law and policy makers in the field of environmental crime and harm to learn from each other;
- to foster opportunities for collaboration and knowledge exchange between researchers, policy makers, corporations, and civil society organizations.
Activities
To achieve these aims, the Green Criminology European working group engage in activities that include:
- Organizing thematic sessions at the annual ESC-conference;
- Organizing and hosting (online) conferences, seminars and symposia;
- Promoting communication and cooperation between researchers;
- Responding to policy consultations and/or requests for information;
- Collaborating with members of the International Green Criminology Working Group and other national and international networks of relevance.
Becoming a member
If you are a member of the European Society of Criminology working on the topic of environmental crime, we invite you to join our working group. In order to join, please send your name, position, affiliation, and a short description of the research project you are working on to greencriminologyEWG@gmail.com.
Board
Chairs: Marieke Kluin, Jenny Maher and Mònica Pons-Hernández
Board members: Lieselot Bisschop, David Rodrigues Goyes, Joanna Narodowska, Nigel South, Daan van Uhm and Tanya Wyatt.
