Asian Criminology and Southern Epistemologies

Abstract

At present most theories about criminology have come from the English-speaking countries of the global north where most journals and universities are located. This global social organisation of knowledge has created a hegemony of thought based largely on the experiences of these ‘first world’ ‘Western’ societies. Hence criminological theories developed in the English countries of the global North have tended to simply assume a transnational generalisability and transferability (Bowling, B. (2011). Transnational criminology and the globalisation of harm production. In M. Bosworth & C. Hoyle (Eds.), What is Criminology? (pp. 361–379). Oxford: Oxford University Press:363). Where criminology has taken root in the global South, and outside English-speaking contexts, it has tended to simply borrow and adapt these metropolitan theories (Connell, Feminist Studies 40(3):518–538, 2014:522). Yet, as Connell reminds us, theory, research agendas and innovations can be generated from the specific experiences of the global South, and Northern thinking can be cross-fertilised by it in a way that enhances the global epistemology (Connell, Feminist Studies 40(3):518–538, 2014). This chapter argues that Asian Criminology is playing a vitally important role in the creation of Southern epistemologies which will aid the democratisation and transnationalisation of criminological theory and research.