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12 Soc. & Legal Stud. 5 (2003)

handle is hein.journals/solestu12 and id is 1 raw text is: NEW MODES OF GOVERNANCE AND THE COMMODIFICATION OF CRIMINOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE REECE WALTERS University of Stirling, UK ABSTRACT This article explores the influence of new modes of governance on the production of criminological knowledge. In doing so, it examines the rise of discourses on risk and critiques the ways in which academic environments are changing under new manager- ialist philosophies. The article further explores the increasing 'commodification of criminological knowledge' and analyses its effect on contemporary criminological scholarship. Finally, this article examines the contours of critical criminological scholarship and advocates for a criminology of resistance. INTRODUCTION HAT ARE the dangers of a 'market-led criminology'? How are new modes of governance in contemporary society, which focus on risk management, privatization, cost-effectiveness and individual responsibility influencing the production of criminological knowledge? What is the future for the critical voice within these changing economic and political landscapes? Why ask questions about the production of crimino- logical knowledge? Is this a topic worthy of debate? Surely criminology with its increasing student numbers, its new degrees and journals and its flour- ishing commercial opportunities are signs of a discipline in a healthy state? Nowadays 'success' is often determined by acceptance, relevance or prolif- eration. The litmus test for assessing quality must be content, and not volume, popularity, political versatility or pragmatic relevance. Toffler (1965) critiqued the 'culture boom' in the United States during the post-war years, described as the cultural revolution or renaissance (Grana, 1964). As Americans began SOCIAL & LEGAL STUDIES 0964 6639 (200303) 12:1 Copyright © 2003 SAGE Publications, London, Thousand Oaks, CA and New Delhi, www.sagepublications.com Vol. 12(1), 5-26; 030842