Criminology, as an inherently interdisciplinary field, has built on anthropology (and other social sciences) in its development. This contribution addresses the question which insights in criminology have most been inspired by anthropology. First, it looks into the ‘criminal anthropology’ of Lombroso; then it embarks on an appreciation of the ethnographic research design within criminology (as first adopted by the Chicago School); and, finally, it assesses the link between anthropology, and cultural and global criminology. I conclude that anthropology has been valuable to our discipline on four levels: methodologically (in the importance of the ethnographic research design), theoretically (in its role in the development of symbolic interactionism and structuralism, for example), geographically (in the global scope of anthropological research), and analytically, in its experience with ‘doing ethnography’ in economically, politically and culturally embedded ways.

International studies show that children of teenage mothers are at elevated risk for offending. This study investigates the effect of early and late parenthood of mothers and fathers on offspring delinquency. The results confirm results from earlier studies and show that early fatherhood does not add to offending risk over and above early motherhood. Factors like family instability, family size and parental delinquency do not account for the association between early motherhood and delinquency. The elevated risk of offending applies to all children of young mothers, not just to the first-born children. Late parenthood is not associated with offspring delinquency.

This article is directed towards two important lines of research in contemporary criminology, more specifically the growing attention for the period of young adulthood and the focus on the concepts of ‘structure’ and ‘agency’. This study examines in a quantitative manner the extent to which both ‘structure’ (operationalized in terms of social-economic status and objective transitions) and ‘agency’ (measured as the perception of personal agency and subjective transitions) are related to delinquency in the period of young adulthood. A representative sample of 1,477 Flemish young adults between the age of 18 and 25 years is used. The results of the analyses offer some empirical proof to integrate the concept of ‘agency’ in future theoretical models for the explanation of individual differences in delinquency and also lead to additional suggestions to further examine the interaction between ‘structure’ and ‘agency’.

Increasingly, instruments for risk assessment have been used for the assessment of future violence. This article provides an overview of the risk assessment instruments that are used in the Netherlands for the prediction of criminal recidivism. The quality of these instruments is regarded by examining studies on the interrater reliability and the predictive validity. The benefits as well as the limitations of risk assessment instruments are discussed. It is concluded that these instruments can be valuable, especially for research on treatment effects in the field of forensic psychiatry. On the other hand, it has to be acknowledged that with risk assessment instruments, the possibility to predict criminal recidivism on individual level is still limited. Psychologist and psychiatrists, presenting a mental health assessment to the court, have to inform the judge correctly about these limitations.

Accounts of radicalization and of social movements are often flawed by a static understanding of participation in radical networks. By analyzing the practices of the Salafi movement and its participants in reviving, establishing and nurturing a moral community of true believers I will explore how participation in this movement is sustained. I will show that by teaching young Muslims a particular lifestyle, exemplifying what it means to be a true believer, the Salafi movement tries to establish a position as the moral guardian of the Muslim community. For Muslim youth in this movement the activities are a means to evoke and nurture the experience of belonging and an essential practice for being part of the community of true believers.