De Nederlandse wapenwetgeving is gericht op de beheersing van het legale en de bestrijding van het illegale wapenbezit. Dit beleid kent een lange voorgeschiedenis. De houding van de overheid was hierin ambivalent, waarbij niet alleen sprake was van beperkingen op particulier wapenbezit. Wapenbezit is van overheidswege zelfs actief bevorderd, waarbij controles aan huis – anders dan tegenwoordig – bedoeld waren om vast te stellen of men wel over voldoende wapens beschikte om de burgerplicht te kunnen vervullen. Er werden echter wel maatregelen genomen om het risico van misbruik zoveel mogelijk beheersbaar te maken, waarvan sommige nog doorwerken tot heden ten dage.

Het afgelopen jaar hebben burgemeesters naar aanleiding van ernstige steekincidenten en vanwege desastreuze gevolgen van de coronacrisis voor de meest kwetsbare buurten gepleit voor een integrale aanpak gericht op deze gebieden. Minister Dekker heeft daarop onder meer voorgesteld om de ouders van deze jongeren aan te pakken. Hij denkt daarbij aan het Britse jeugdstrafrecht, waar ouders een sanctie kan worden opgelegd vanwege wangedrag van hun kind. In dit artikel worden kritische kanttekeningen bij dit voornemen geplaatst.

The first part of this article presents three academic theories on radicalisation: Moghaddam’s staircase model of radicalisation, Galtung’s typology of violence (direct, structural and cultural violence), and Staub’s psycho-educative approach. The core of Staub’s approach is that in conflict periods, people can be psychologically manipulated through their own fears, insecurities and unresolved traumas. Therefore, psycho-education and the empowerment of people are highly necessary to stimulate citizens to function as active bystanders when they are confronted with wrongdoing. In the second part of this article some promising approaches are pres­en‍ted which might increase personal and social resilience. The role of narratives in understanding experiences and changing identities is discussed. Radio La Benevolencija in Rwanda uses the power of storytel­l‍ing to stimulate resilience among the population. In the concluding paragraph a two-pronged strategy on radicalization is presented. This positive criminological perspective aims to promote active bystandership, participation and resilience.

In this article we focus on how tram drivers react when confronted with a situation of aggression in the tram. Their role in these situations has hardly been explored in recent Dutch studies on this topic. In our explorative research, which consisted of observation and interviews in The Hague, our aim is to gain the perspective of tram drivers on aggressive passengers. Through their eyes we describe a range of strategies which they use to restore public order. Our research shows that in order to understand the reaction of tram drivers a) this has to be placed in the sequential development of an aggressive interaction and b) this has to be related to the ways they give meaning to the aggression of passengers and their work context. Our research shows that there are two perspectives among tram drivers: a) a ‘business’ perspective, with an emphasis of tram drivers as employees who avoid risk situations and call for support in situations they cannot control and b) a personal perspective, in which tram drivers tend to follow more personal guidelines, in which masculinity plays a central role. Those who use the later perspective become more involved in violent and physical interactions.

Male inmate subcultures can be described as highly gendered settings where power relationships are based on a hierarchical gender order. Cultural idealized forms of masculinity provide an important foundation for these hierarchical rankings. Notions of hegemonic and subordinate masculinities offer a valuable theoretical framework for explaining the power relations and pecking order among male inmates. Drawing on observations and qualitative semi-structured interviews with prisoners in a medium-size Belgian male prison, this article analyses the various intermale dominance hierarchies among inmates and the discourses in which they are embedded: type of offence, social conduct, individual characteristics of the prisoners and the possession of different forms of capital. This article both stresses and nuances the importance of offence categories by explaining how hierarchical status can be enhanced through social performance and acting in accordance with the prison code. Additionally, it describes how hierarchical arrangements operate in the daily practice of prison life through spatial norms.

It seems common knowledge among criminologists that our societies have to be understood in terms of securitization. This means that security is the defining and organizing concept in (social) policy making. In the Netherlands the process of securitization can be characterized as rather contingent. According to the author, it can be typified as ‘pragmatic securitization’. It is driven by the desire to show decisiveness and being in control of complexity of social order, rather than by ideology. Under the pressure of the economic crisis there is a growing interest in self-organization, civic power and civil society. These themes emerge along the issues of security and control. Is it possible then that security is exchanged by another big social theme?

Recentelijk werden de hoofdverdachten in de ‘Klimop-zaak’ door de Rechtbank Haarlem in eerste aanleg veroordeeld tot uiteenlopende straffen. Strafrechtelijke vervolging van fraude zou er mede toe moeten dienen witteboordencriminaliteit ondubbelzinnig te veroordelen. Welke rol spelen de media bij deze pogingen om een grens te trekken in het grijze gebied tussen innovatief ondernemerschap en verwerpelijke roekeloosheid?

Intervention teams are among the most discussed tools in the current process of securitisation. Their integrated approach takes into account all underlying causes of insecurity and quality of life. For a more effective approach authorities and organisations have to cooperate and let go of their mutual boundaries. But can the participants put aside their differences in perspectives and policies? This article discusses the goal of ‘ontkokering’ (‘decompartalisation’), this was done through a study of the practices of intervention team SIP in Amsterdam. On basis of thirteen interviews and observations the authors argue that there are three main mechanisms or ‘molar barriers’, which conserve the old structures in the integrated approach of the intervention team: ‘methodical robustness’, ‘institutional robustness’ and ‘financial robustness’.

This article offers an analysis of the side effects caused by the increased counterterrorism measures adapted in Dutch law and public policy after 9/11. Taking clues from Foucault's thinking on securitisation and Beck's risk society, it is argued that focus, referent subject and object of security measures and deployment of counterterrorism laws have shifted from the concrete individual to society and risk prevention as a whole (1), that this shift induces function creep (2) and a much quicker deployment of measures, resulting in an increasing suspect population (3). Rather than arguing against the legality and legitimacy of these measures, the authors analyse the epistemological shift in reasoning and unpack the various probabilistic arguments (as opposed to evidence-based arguments) behind the wave of securitisation after 9/11 - resulting in a lack of knowledge about, transparency and accountability of the generated side effects.

The author notes that the growth of restorative justice practices seems to be hampered by the consequences of the effective socialization into the ‘penal equation’ that presents punishment as the necessary consequence of criminal offending. Upbringing in a different conflict-culture may be a fundamental condition for creating more room for restorative justice in the formal sphere of criminal justice. The need for a different socialization is also noted and discussed in the movement for human rights and has resulted in an Action Plan for human rights education of UNESCO in 2005. A satisfactory implementation of this action plan seems to be absent in the Netherlands today and methods of human rights education do not refer at all to the potentials of restorative practices such as peer mediation in schools. On the other hand, authors in restorative justice do not often refer to human rights and how they are promoted. The author claims that it is plausible that making ample room for peer mediation and conferencing in schools can be an effective way, not only to address offending conduct that often implies a breach of basic human rights – the most basic values therein being human dignity and equality – but also to make new generations aware of the meaning of human rights in their daily interactions and the qualities of their own social life.