John Scott
Queensland University of Technology, School of Justice, Department Member
- John Scott joined the School of Justice from the University of New England in 2014. His current research interests ar... moreJohn Scott joined the School of Justice from the University of New England in 2014. His current research interests are in the areas of drug supply, sexual and gendered crime, and rural crime. Since completing his PhD in 2001, he has published widely, including 24 books and major research reports and over 90 papers and book chapters, many with leading international journals and publishers. He has also had sustained success in attracting nationally competitive grants and industry funding, including two ARC Discovery Grants, two National Drug Law Enforcement Research Grants, a Rural Industry Research and Development Grant, Criminology Research Grant and an ARC Linkage. In terms of teaching, he won a 2007 National (Carrick) Award, in addition to institutional awards for teaching and curriculum innovation. He also led the establishment of successful awards in criminology, criminology/law and social work during his time at UNE. He has been actively involved in institutional leadership roles, including leader of a Collaborative Research Network (CRN) and extended periods acting as a head of school at QUT and UNE. In terms of broader service roles, he has recently served as a Chief Examiner with the New South Wales Board of Studies and was a member of the Community Relations Commission, New South Wales. He currently edits the Routledge Series Crime and Justice Studies in Asia and the Global South, Co-Edits The Journal for Crime, Justice and Social Democracy and is Vice President of the Asian Criminological Society.
Research Interests
The ecology of crime, especially rural Crime
Social control, with a focus on public health regulations
The social construction and governance of sexual deviance, with a focus on sex work and technology
Masculinity and violence
The supply and regulation of drugsedit
Research Interests:
Contemporary Australian drug policy is characterized by a tension between punitive law and order responses that invoke the myth of sovereign power and responsibilizing strategies that "(re)moralize" individuals, holding them responsible... more
Contemporary Australian drug policy is characterized by a tension between punitive law and order responses that invoke the myth of sovereign power and responsibilizing strategies that "(re)moralize" individuals, holding them responsible for their safety, security, and well-being. This article argues that this blending of neoliberal techniques of governance, such as harm minimization, with neoconservative methods of rule typified in prohibitionist policies, presents a paradoxical policy response to illicit drug use. We explore the development and contemporary practice of a dualistic Australian drug policy that, on the one hand, promotes pragmatic interventions based on harm reduction while, on the other, relies on law and order strategies and traditional penal powers to deter illicit drug use. Drawing on Pat Carlen's concept of imaginary penalities, we argue that this imaginary form of drug control is underpinned largely by symbolic measures that, in attempting to address public demands for safety and security, reproduce a punitive form of governance that fails to achieve its desired outcomes. Using qualitative interview data from a sample of 29 people who used drugs, and 15 professionals working in the drugs field, this article investigates responses to the contemporary governance of illicit drugs in Queensland. Based on the research findings, we argue that the conjoined nature of Australian drugs governance can be understood as imaginary drug control because it constantly recreates the conditions that perpetuate drug-related harm.
Research Interests:
In this article, we seek to chart the place of islands in criminology with respect to both their place-and space-based attributes. We explore the possibilities of island criminology through the case of Pitcairn Island, which in 2004... more
In this article, we seek to chart the place of islands in criminology with respect to both their place-and space-based attributes. We explore the possibilities of island criminology through the case of Pitcairn Island, which in 2004 formed the backdrop for a series of sensational sexual assault trials. The trials thrust the Island, its people, history and customs into the international spotlight, acting as a counter-narrative to the popular mythology of islands as idyllic paradises. This case study provides us with an opportunity to reexamine how fundamental concepts for understanding crime and regulation, such as social integration, community and belonging, and exclusion are practised in the often closed and bounded networks of island ecologies.
Research Interests:
The overrepresentation of Indigenous Australians in the criminal justice system has been thoroughly documented over a number of decades. However, studies tend to adopt homog-enising discourses that fail to acknowledge or deeply examine... more
The overrepresentation of Indigenous Australians in the criminal justice system has been thoroughly documented over a number of decades. However, studies tend to adopt homog-enising discourses that fail to acknowledge or deeply examine the diversity of Indigenous Australian experiences of crime, including across geographic and cultural contexts. This has prompted calls for a more thorough investigation of how experiences of crime differ across Australia's Indigenous communities, including between remote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. This paper forms part of a larger study, examining crime and justice in the Torres Strait Region, situated off the far northern tip of the State of Queensland. Here, we examine and compare reported crime trends in the Torres Straits with those in Queensland's remote Aboriginal communities and Queensland State on the whole. We then draw upon existing anthropological, historical and other literature to explore possible explanations for differences in these crime rates. We find that crime rates are generally lower in the Torres Strait Region and that the different historical experiences of colonisation and policing may provide a partial explanation for this, particularly through the lens of social disorganisation theory.
Research Interests:
discrete Indigenous communities. Given the strong relationship between policing practices and the environments in which police work, we examine how ‘place’ and ‘space’ – particularly the environmental context of Queensland’s discrete... more
discrete Indigenous communities. Given the strong relationship between
policing practices and the environments in which police work, we examine
how ‘place’ and ‘space’ – particularly the environmental context of
Queensland’s discrete Indigenous communities – can inform policing.
Interviews with fifteen police officers who work in Indigenous communities
across Queensland found that police felt like strangers in Indigenous
communities; they were acutely aware of their status as a (predominantly)
white minority in a (predominantly) non-white space, which had implications
for their policing practices. This also contributed to their perceptions
of discrete Indigenous communities as strange lands – spaces in which
their own (settler) social norms did not necessarily apply, and within which
the work of policing had to be adjusted and reshaped. Overall, police
found it difficult to reconcile their experiences of policing in discrete
Indigenous communities with their experiences of policing elsewhere in
Australia. In many ways, they were not trained nor prepared for policing in
these distinct contexts.
policing practices and the environments in which police work, we examine
how ‘place’ and ‘space’ – particularly the environmental context of
Queensland’s discrete Indigenous communities – can inform policing.
Interviews with fifteen police officers who work in Indigenous communities
across Queensland found that police felt like strangers in Indigenous
communities; they were acutely aware of their status as a (predominantly)
white minority in a (predominantly) non-white space, which had implications
for their policing practices. This also contributed to their perceptions
of discrete Indigenous communities as strange lands – spaces in which
their own (settler) social norms did not necessarily apply, and within which
the work of policing had to be adjusted and reshaped. Overall, police
found it difficult to reconcile their experiences of policing in discrete
Indigenous communities with their experiences of policing elsewhere in
Australia. In many ways, they were not trained nor prepared for policing in
these distinct contexts.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Rural crime has largely been understood through social disorganization theory. The dominance of this perspective has meant that most research into rural crime has tried to resolve perceived strains in communities, rather than analyze how... more
Rural crime has largely been understood through social disorganization theory. The dominance of this perspective has meant that most research into rural crime has tried to resolve perceived strains in communities, rather than analyze how social problems are constituted in rural places. Using Elias and Scotson's (1965) account of established-outsider relations, the paper examines how the organizational capacity of specific social groups is significant in determining the quality of crime-talk and responses to crime in isolated and rural settings. In particular social 'oldness' and notions of what constitutes 'community' are significant in determining what activities and individuals or groups are marked as features of crime-talk in these settings.
Accounts of the governance of prostitution have typically argued that prostitutes are, in one way or another, stigmatised social outcasts. There is a persistent claim that power has operated to dislocate or banish the prostitute from the... more
Accounts of the governance of prostitution have typically argued that prostitutes are, in one way or another, stigmatised social outcasts. There is a persistent claim that power has operated to dislocate or banish the prostitute from the community in order to silence, isolate, hide, restrict, or punish. I argue that another position may be tenable; that is, power has operated to locate prostitution within the social. Power does not operate to 'de-socialise' prostitution, but has in recent times operated increasingly to normalise it. Power does not demarcate prostitutes from the social according to some binary mechanics of difference, but works instead according to a principle of differentiation which seeks to connect, include, circulate and enable specific prostitute populations within the social. In this paper I examine how prostitution has been singled out for public attention as a socio-political problem and governed accordingly. The concept of governmentality is used to think through such issues, providing, as it does, a non-totalising and non-reductionist account of rule. It is argued that a combination of self-regulatory and punitive practices developed during modernity to manage socially problematic prostitute populations.
Australia's national research and knowledge centre on crime and justice
During the last decade 'prostitution' has been characterised as a 'social problem' throughout rural and regional New South Wales. As we show here, the urban-centric nature of popular and official discourses of prostitution have... more
During the last decade 'prostitution' has been characterised as a 'social problem' throughout rural and regional New South Wales. As we show here, the urban-centric nature of popular and official discourses of prostitution have inadvertently allowed for the development of regulatory positions which have negatively impacted sex workers in rural and regional communities and lead to conflict among sectors of the rural sex industry and between the sex industry and community activists. In addition to examining the problematisation of sex work in rural New South Wales, this paper sets out to understand why rural sex work has historically lacked visibility in popular and scholarly discourses. We provide an overview of the distinctive organisational aspects of the sex industry in rural contexts. Evidence for our assertions is largely derived from primary interview data collected from sex industry workers based in rural New South Wales. The paper represents the first attempt in the research literature on prostitution to understand sex work as a rural phenomenon.
This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the author for internal non-commercial research and education use, including for instruction at the authors institution and sharing with... more
This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the author for internal non-commercial research and education use, including for instruction at the authors institution and sharing with colleagues. Other uses, including reproduction and distribution, or selling or licensing copies, or posting to personal, institutional or third party websites are prohibited. In most cases authors are permitted to post their version of the article (e.g. in Word or Tex form) to their personal website or institutional repository. Authors requiring further information regarding Elsevier's archiving and manuscript policies are encouraged to visit: http://www.elsevier.com/authorsrights
Using Elias and Scotson's (1994) account of established-outsider relations, this article examines how the organizational capacity of specific social groups is significant in determining the quality of crime-talk in isolated and rural... more
Using Elias and Scotson's (1994) account of established-outsider relations, this article examines how the organizational capacity of specific social groups is significant in determining the quality of crime-talk in isolated and rural settings. In particular, social 'oldness' and notions of what constitutes 'community' are significant in determining what activities and individuals are salient within crime-talk. Individual and group interviews , conducted in a West Australian mining town, revealed how crime-talk is an artefact of specific social figurations and the relative ability of groups to act as cohesive and integrated networks. We argue that anxieties regarding crime are a product of specific social figurations and the shifting power ratios of groups within such figurations.
The assumption that the size, anonymity and weakened social controls of urban living generates social confl ict, disorganization and higher rates of crime and violence has been an article of faith in much criminological and social... more
The assumption that the size, anonymity and weakened social controls of urban living generates social confl ict, disorganization and higher rates of crime and violence has been an article of faith in much criminological and social scientifi c inquiry since the nineteenth century (i.e.. The paper challenges this article of criminological faith and questions the utility of urban centric criminological theorizing about the causes of violence in rural settings. Drawing on descriptive data that show that rural men present a relatively high risk of infl icting harm upon themselves and others, this paper explores the larger socio-criminological question as to why this might be. The question is examined in relation to the processes of community formation that shape the everyday architecture of rural life. We explore how that architecture has historically valorized violent expressions of masculinity grounded in a relationship between men's bodies and the rural landscapes they inhabit — but how the legitimacy of these violent expressions are being challenged by sweeping social, economic and political changes. One psycho-social response to these sweeping social changes to rural life, we conclude, is a resort to violence as a largely strategic practice deployed to recreate an imagined rural gender order.
Over the last two decades, two new trajectories have taken hold in criminology—the study of masculinity and crime, after a century of neglect, and the geography of crime. This article brings both those fields together to analyse the... more
Over the last two decades, two new trajectories have taken hold in criminology—the study of masculinity and crime, after a century of neglect, and the geography of crime. This article brings both those fields together to analyse the impact of globalization in the resources sector on frontier cultures of violence. This paper approaches this issue through a case study of frontier masculinities and violence in communities at the forefront of generating resource extraction for global economies. This paper argues that the high rates of violence among men living in work camps in these socio-spatial contexts cannot simply be understood as individualized expressions of psycho-pathological deficit or social disorganization. Explanations for these patterns of violence must also consider a number of key subterranean convergences between globalizing processes and the social dynamics of male-on-male violence in such settings.
Rural crime has largely been understood through social disorganization theory. The dominance of this perspective has meant that most research into rural crime has tried to resolve perceived strains in communities, rather than analyze how... more
Rural crime has largely been understood through social disorganization theory. The dominance of this perspective has meant that most research into rural crime has tried to resolve perceived strains in communities, rather than analyze how social problems are constituted in rural places. Using Elias and Scotson's (1994) account of established-outsider relations, the paper examines how the organizational capacity of specific social groups is significant in determining the quality of crime-talk and responses to crime in isolated and rural settings. In particular social 'oldness' and notions of what constitutes 'com-munity' are significant in determining what activities and individuals or groups are marked as features of crime-talk in these settings. Crown
The assumption that the size, anonymity and weakened social controls of urban living generates social confl ict, disorganization and higher rates of crime and violence has been an article of faith in much criminological and social... more
The assumption that the size, anonymity and weakened social controls of urban living generates social confl ict, disorganization and higher rates of crime and violence has been an article of faith in much criminological and social scientifi c inquiry since the nineteenth century (i.e.. The paper challenges this article of criminological faith and questions the utility of urban centric criminological theorizing about the causes of violence in rural settings. Drawing on descriptive data that show that rural men present a relatively high risk of infl icting harm upon themselves and others, this paper explores the larger socio-criminological question as to why this might be. The question is examined in relation to the processes of community formation that shape the everyday architecture of rural life. We explore how that architecture has historically valorized violent expressions of masculinity grounded in a relationship between men's bodies and the rural landscapes they inhabit — but how the legitimacy of these violent expressions are being challenged by sweeping social, economic and political changes. One psycho-social response to these sweeping social changes to rural life, we conclude, is a resort to violence as a largely strategic practice deployed to recreate an imagined rural gender order.