- Växjö, Kronobergs Lan, Sweden
Robert Andersson
Linnaeus University, Department of Criminology and Poling, Faculty Member
- Linnaeus University, Institute of Police Education, Faculty Memberadd
- National Polices of Education, Cultural Studies, Cultural Theory, Nationalism, Migration Studies, Crime Policy, and 11 moreSocial Policy, Crime, Cultural Criminology, Critical Criminology, Criminology (Social Sciences), Police and Policing, Popular Culture, Social Work, Education Policy, Urban Sociology, Ideology, and Governmentalityedit
A blessing in disguise : attention deficit hyperactivity disorder diagnosis and Swedish correctional treatment policy in the twenty-first century
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Research Interests: Sociology and Criminology
Denna bok handlar om en svensk stads utveckling under nagra omvalvande artionden runt millennieskiftet. Staden ar Landskrona, men den stadsutveckling som skildras ar en strukturomvandling som sker ...
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Over the last 30 years, crime policy has become a central research area in criminology, and many important studies have been written. The primary focuses of many of these studies have been the so-called punitive turn. But alongside the... more
Over the last 30 years, crime policy has become a central research area in criminology, and many important studies have been written. The primary focuses of many of these studies have been the so-called punitive turn. But alongside the punitive turn, there has also been a preventive turn and much of the preventive work since the late 1980s has taken presence in what is conceptualized as the community level. In Sweden local crime prevention (LCP), placing the municipal at the center of the work has been developing since the late 1990s. The belief in LCP as the kings’ way to success was confirmed in the latest government crime policy program. Through a study of a Swedish municipal, Landskrona, we analyze how a local crime policy takes form and how it is motivated and rationalized. The majority of Swedish studies on LCP primarily focus on evaluation, trying to measure potential effects. The purpose of the paper is to analyze how LCP is set within a political process and then assembled at the municipality level. The objective was to get close to the actual process of formulating and applying a municipal crime policy. Our research highlights that contrary to political belief, a prudent citizen has to be molded and shaped rather than liberated. Since LCP builds on assuming a consensus as to what the crime problem is, LCP becomes as much a moralistic venture as a crime prevention project. Harmonizing the actual crime-experience of the populace with a politicized picture of crime is a pivotal balancing-act for LCP. And due to the importance of culturally mediated understandings of crime, national problematizations seem to take precedence over local ones, and thus, LCP runs the risk of not validating neither the local populace nor local authorities sense of the crime problem.
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Dagens kriminalpolitik och brottspreventiva arbete bygger pa olika former av kontroll. Arbetet baseras pa en orsaksbild dar brott uppstar pa grund av bristande kontroll, vilket ger att brottsforeby ...
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Introduction What counts as criminology and how is criminological knowledge produced and assembled? We argue that criminological knowledge-production in general frame their truth as the truth when it comes to crime. We also hold that an... more
Introduction What counts as criminology and how is criminological knowledge produced and assembled? We argue that criminological knowledge-production in general frame their truth as the truth when it comes to crime. We also hold that an understanding of criminology's present stand demands an analysis of both criminology's institutional history as well as an understanding of current events. This article should be seen as a starting-point for a discussion following this path. In what follows we analyze Swedish criminology as a case of truth-telling. Doing so we discuss three aspects as central in understanding the character of this truth-telling: the historical aspect which holds that criminology must be understood as part of larger historical events; the institutional aspect highlight how criminology and criminological knowledge relates to the circumstances it is produced under and the knowledge aspect which emphasizes how certain regimes of truth govern what counts as sciences. During its formative decades Swedish criminology had to establish a field of knowledge over which control could be established. In the same way as other academic disciplines criminology has national profiles depending on a variety of factors. In this article we will, however, restrict us to Swedish criminology. 1 Further, we limit the analysis to a discussion of the theoretical and methodological changes and continuities that the discipline has undergone during the last half-century. Talking about " criminologists " we include scholars from several different disciplines besides criminology and sociology, most importantly medicine or law. 2 In what follows we discuss what could be called " the state of Swedish criminology ". 3 We do so by pointing to a number of structural factors that help us understand the trajectory of Swedish criminology to the present day.
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The Swedish social democratic welfare state seems to be the result of some unique historical set of circumstances. A vital condition seems to be that reform instead of revolution became the king’s way to changing society. In practice this... more
The Swedish social democratic welfare state seems to be the result of some unique historical set of circumstances. A vital condition seems to be that reform instead of revolution became the king’s way to changing society. In practice this meant that a certain set of problematizations were put to use which pointed toward the welfare state as a political solution. My interest here is how the welfare state was opened as a political arena. For Vanessa Barker the social democratic welfare state is not the solution to “(…) a more just and equal penal order” (2013, p. 21). On the contrary, due to ethno-nationalism and weak constitutional traditions regarding individual rights, the Swedish welfare state has a tendency toward repressiveness against individuals deemed as “others.”
Research Interests: History, Welfare State, Political Science, Politics, Democracy, and 3 moreWelfare, Vagrancy, and Crime Policy
Over the last 30 years, crime policy has become a central research area in criminology, and many important studies have been written. The primary focuses of many of these studies have been the so-called punitive turn. But alongside the... more
Over the last 30 years, crime policy has become a central research area in criminology, and many important studies have been written. The primary focuses of many of these studies have been the so-called punitive turn. But alongside the punitive turn, there has also been a preventive turn and much of the preventive work since the late 1980s has taken presence in what is conceptualized as the community level. In Sweden local crime prevention (LCP), placing the municipal at the center of the work has been developing since the late 1990s. The belief in LCP as the kings’ way to success was confirmed in the latest government crime policy program. Through a study of a Swedish municipal, Landskrona, we analyze how a local crime policy takes form and how it is motivated and rationalized. The majority of Swedish studies on LCP primarily focus on evaluation, trying to measure potential effects. The purpose of the paper is to analyze how LCP is set within a political process and then assembled at the municipality level. The objective was to get close to the actual process of formulating and applying a municipal crime policy. Our research highlights that contrary to political belief, a prudent citizen has to be molded and shaped rather than liberated. Since LCP builds on assuming a consensus as to what the crime problem is, LCP becomes as much a moralistic venture as a crime prevention project. Harmonizing the actual crime-experience of the populace with a politicized picture of crime is a pivotal balancing-act for LCP. And due to the importance of culturally mediated understandings of crime, national problematizations seem to take precedence over local ones, and thus, LCP runs the risk of not validating neither the local populace nor local authorities sense of the crime problem.
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The downfall of the rehabilitative ideal is considered a decisive episode if we want to understand the changes that have transpired in crime policy the last three to four decades. In Sweden, the downfall followed abruptly on the final... more
The downfall of the rehabilitative ideal is considered a decisive episode if we want to understand the changes that have transpired in crime policy the last three to four decades. In Sweden, the downfall followed abruptly on the final establishing of individual prevention as theoretical bases for crime policy by the enactment of a new penal code in 1965. This paper follows the trajectory of the downfall in Sweden by doing a genealogy thereof. The purpose is to contribute to a more empirically developed understanding of the course of Swedish crime policy during the formative years of the 1970s to the early 1990s. Firstly, the paper addresses the topic by examining the scholarly critique that paved the way for the downfall of the rehabilitative ideal. Secondly, the paper analyses the political handling of the downfall and the consequence this had for policy. Methodological this is done by way of genealogy exploring the historical pedigree of present-day crime policy in Sweden, not as ...
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Denna bok handlar om en svensk stads utveckling under nagra omvalvande artionden runt millennieskiftet. Staden ar Landskrona, men den stadsutveckling som skildras ar en strukturomvandling som sker ...
Research Interests:
Introduction What counts as criminology and how is criminological knowledge produced and assembled? We argue that criminological knowledge-production in general frame their truth as the truth when it comes to crime. We also hold that an... more
Introduction What counts as criminology and how is criminological knowledge produced and assembled? We argue that criminological knowledge-production in general frame their truth as the truth when it comes to crime. We also hold that an understanding of criminology's present stand demands an analysis of both criminology's institutional history as well as an understanding of current events. This article should be seen as a starting-point for a discussion following this path. In what follows we analyze Swedish criminology as a case of truth-telling. Doing so we discuss three aspects as central in understanding the character of this truth-telling: the historical aspect which holds that criminology must be understood as part of larger historical events; the institutional aspect highlight how criminology and criminological knowledge relates to the circumstances it is produced under and the knowledge aspect which emphasizes how certain regimes of truth govern what counts as sciences. During its formative decades Swedish criminology had to establish a field of knowledge over which control could be established. In the same way as other academic disciplines criminology has national profiles depending on a variety of factors. In this article we will, however, restrict us to Swedish criminology. 1 Further, we limit the analysis to a discussion of the theoretical and methodological changes and continuities that the discipline has undergone during the last half-century. Talking about " criminologists " we include scholars from several different disciplines besides criminology and sociology, most importantly medicine or law. 2 In what follows we discuss what could be called " the state of Swedish criminology ". 3 We do so by pointing to a number of structural factors that help us understand the trajectory of Swedish criminology to the present day.
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The Swedish social democratic welfare state seems to be the result of some unique historical set of circumstances. A vital condition seems to be that reform instead of revolution became the king’s way to changing society. In practice this... more
The Swedish social democratic welfare state seems to be the result of some unique historical set of circumstances. A vital condition seems to be that reform instead of revolution became the king’s way to changing society. In practice this meant that a certain set of problematizations were put to use which pointed toward the welfare state as a political solution. My interest here is how the welfare state was opened as a political arena. For Vanessa Barker the social democratic welfare state is not the solution to “(…) a more just and equal penal order” (2013, p. 21). On the contrary, due to ethno-nationalism and weak constitutional traditions regarding individual rights, the Swedish welfare state has a tendency toward repressiveness against individuals deemed as “others.”
Research Interests: History and Crime Policy
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Mellan effektivitet och demokrati. Den svenska polisen, kommunerna och staten under 100 ar : Papper/projektansokan till den nordiska polisforskningskonferensen i Oslo 2009 08 15
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Robert Andersson, Jørgen Bruhn og Anne Gjelsvik: "The Wire og kriminalitetens afkroge"Robert Andersson, Jørgen Bruhn & Anne Gjelsvik: “The Wire and the Corners of Crime”This article argues that the American TV-series The Wire... more
Robert Andersson, Jørgen Bruhn og Anne Gjelsvik: "The Wire og kriminalitetens afkroge"Robert Andersson, Jørgen Bruhn & Anne Gjelsvik: “The Wire and the Corners of Crime”This article argues that the American TV-series The Wire poses complicated political and ideological questions rather than attempting to deliver clear-cut answers or solutions to the problems represented. The Wire is analysed both as an aesthetic phenomenon (narratological and thematic analysis) and as a representation of societal elements (which demands analysis based on sociological, historical and criminological perspectives). After a brief overview of the series, the authors aim to generalise the results of the analysis of a particular part of the five-season series, namely the “Hamsterdam-episode”.
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Research Interests: History and Humanities
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In this article I address the question of whether there has been a punitive turn in Swedish crime policy or not. Since the punitive turn is connected to the downfall of the rehabilitative ideal, and to what David Garland has termed penal... more
In this article I address the question of whether there has been a punitive turn in Swedish crime policy or not. Since the punitive turn is connected to the downfall of the rehabilitative ideal, and to what David Garland has termed penal welfar-ism, I make my argument with reference to these phenomena in Sweden. I claim that there were two rationales behind the penal welfare state and the rehabilita-tive ideal in Sweden: a social liberal rationale built on paternalism and interven-tionism, and a social democratic rationale built on Marxist class analysis. My argument is that while penal welfarism is still operating in Sweden, the social liberal rationale has been discarded. This means that the social democratic rationale built on Marxist class analysis is now the single dominating force behind Swedish penal welfarism. The argument for a punitive turn in Sweden therefore has no support. Inledning Med David Garlands bok The Culture of Control kom välfärdsstaten att ställas i fokus för analyser av kriminalpolitik. Enligt Garland har en straffande vändning, the punitive turn, resulterat i att den brittiska och amerikanska välfärdsstaten förpassats till den historiska sophögen. Välfärdsstatens samhällsförbättrande program har i USA och Storbritannien övergetts av de liberala eliterna och i dess ställe har, menar Garland, en kontrollens kultur utvecklats där ökad repression, övervakning och rädsla för brott har renderat överfyllda fängelser. En liknande beskrivning av svenska kriminalpolitiska skeenden har till del vuxit fram inom svensk forskning. Men den svenska bild som ges har en tydligare partipolitisk klangbotten: den svenska kriminalpolitiken har drabbats av en högervåg (Estrada * Title in English: From rehabilitation to punishment? A critical analysis of the punitive turn argument concerning Swedish crime policy
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The purpose of this paper is to problematize neuropsychiatryas public claims maker within a Swedish context. This will be done by applying what I conceptualize as a culture of intervention. Additionally, the paper also will show how... more
The purpose of this paper is to problematize neuropsychiatryas public claims maker within a Swedish context. This will be done by applying what I conceptualize as a culture of intervention. Additionally, the paper also will show how neuropsychiatry's public position interacts with a governance that works as a moral engineering. Governing is in the study understood as structuring the field of possible actions — what can be done or not is that which needs to be controlled. Neuropsychiatry seems to be the " essence " of the conduct of conduct — it is a knowledge-production that produces self-regulated subjects. The object is to analyse the conditions that make certain practises acceptable at a certain moment. I use it as a way of problematizing the generally accepted idea of scientific progress that underwrites the history of the neuropsychiatric diagnoses as an uncovering journey towards completion. The paper looks at how these neuropsychiatric diagnoses have become naturalized and given, an unquestionable regulatory knowledge that explain as well as prescribe what to do. This is further related to how the Swedish welfare state has gone from a social engineering rational to a moral engineering rational that builds on individuals taking responsibility over their own life.
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Introduction What counts as criminology and how is criminological knowledge produced and assembled? We argue that criminological knowledge-production in general frame their truth as the truth when it comes to crime. We also hold that an... more
Introduction What counts as criminology and how is criminological knowledge produced and assembled? We argue that criminological knowledge-production in general frame their truth as the truth when it comes to crime. We also hold that an understanding of criminology's present stand demands an analysis of both criminology's institutional history as well as an understanding of current events. This article should be seen as a starting-point for a discussion following this path. In what follows we analyze Swedish criminology as a case of truth-telling. Doing so we discuss three aspects as central in understanding the character of this truth-telling: the historical aspect which holds that criminology must be understood as part of larger historical events; the institutional aspect highlight how criminology and criminological knowledge relates to the circumstances it is produced under and the knowledge aspect which emphasizes how certain regimes of truth govern what counts as sciences. During its formative decades Swedish criminology had to establish a field of knowledge over which control could be established. In the same way as other academic disciplines criminology has national profiles depending on a variety of factors. In this article we will, however, restrict us to Swedish criminology. 1 Further, we limit the analysis to a discussion of the theoretical and methodological changes and continuities that the discipline has undergone during the last half-century. Talking about " criminologists " we include scholars from several different disciplines besides criminology and sociology, most importantly medicine or law. 2 In what follows we discuss what could be called " the state of Swedish criminology ". 3 We do so by pointing to a number of structural factors that help us understand the trajectory of Swedish criminology to the present day.