Green Criminology in the Nordic countries (completed)

Which social and material factors have caused today's climate crisis? What determines how harmful actions are categorized and whether infliction of harm is defined as crime or legal action? How can we best comprehend and regulate activities that harm people and societies as well as nature and animals?

Emissions of greenhouse gases are often legal, even if they contribute to serious global harms. Legal regulations of polluting activities have not prevented a climate crisis. Such realizations are the basis for some of the questions raised within the field of green criminology.

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About the project

The project "Green criminology in the Nordic countries" works to establish a Nordic academic network for green criminology (eco-global criminology), with the purpose to stimulate research in this emerging field. The project aims to establish academic contacts, develop a network and scholarly environment for green criminological research in the Nordic countries.

Key topics:

  • Ecological crime, environmental harm and crimes against nature
  • Speciesism, animal abuse and species extinction
  • Regulation and prevention of harms against humanity, nature and the environment


Head of the project is professor Guri Larsen.

Aims

To raise funds, and encourage green criminological research, publication of an anthology focusing on central issues within the field, conduct a literature study in these criminological topics and to organize an international conference on the central themes of green criminology.

Background

A primary concern in green criminology is to expand the field of criminological research interests and to also shed light on harms against nature and animals, as well as the global climate crisis - harms that can be understood as crimes against nature, animals and ecological systems.

Green criminology provides perspectives to understand harmful actions in ways that is not limited to the legal definition of crime. All infliction of harm can be viewed as crime, either as a legal category or as a moral category.

Funding

The project is funded by the Nordic Research Council for Criminology.

Results

The anthology Eco-Global Crimes: Contemporary Problems and Future Challenges will be published by Ashgate Publishing in October 2012.

Published June 14, 2010 11:41 AM - Last modified July 7, 2022 11:38 AM

Participants

Detailed list of participants