Local Media Framing of Scrap Metal Collection as Crime

Kohm, Steven; Walby, Kevin

doi:10.1007/s10612-020-09527-z

Cited by 3 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…Social constructionism views knowledge about the social and natural worlds as the outcome of a complex set of interactions between individuals, social groups, and institutions (Best, 1987, 1990, 1999; Jenkins, 1994a, 1994b; Kohm, 2020; Surette, 2007, 2015). This approach has been used to analyze the emergence of new social problems and the discovery of so-called “new crimes” (Best, 1999), including road rage (Best and Furedi, 2001), methamphetamine (Jenkins, 1994a), child abuse (Best, 1987, 1990), copy-cat crime (Surette, 2015), online exploitation of children (Kohm, 2020), and scrap metal theft (Kohm and Walby, 2020). Social constructionist analyses often focus on the lifespan of a social problem, analyzing how social knowledge about issues evolves over time through stages such as recognition, diffusion consolidation, and reification (Roberts and Indermaur, 2005: 303).…”

Section: The Social Construction Of Crimementioning

confidence: 99%

“The darkest time in our history”: An analysis of news media constructions of liquor theft in Canada’s settler colonial context

Kohm

Maier

2022

Crime, Media, Culture

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In September 2018, there was a surge of news stories about liquor store theft in Winnipeg, Canada that resulted in public and political calls for action, and ultimately led to the introduction of a range of new security and surveillance measures at government owned liquor stores. This brief news cycle provided opportunities for various social actors, politicians, and authorities to make claims about the nature of crime and society more broadly. This article analyzes recent news media coverage of liquor store theft in Winnipeg, Canada and the social construction of an ostensibly new crime trend in the city: “brazen” liquor store thefts. We employ a qualitative content analysis of news articles about liquor store theft published in local Winnipeg news media between 2018 and 2020 (n = 147). Drawing on the social constructionist paradigm, and Fishman’s conceptualization of “crime waves,” we argue that the framing of liquor theft via news media reflects longstanding cultural tropes and myths about crime, as well as hinting at but never fully confronting, deeply engrained colonial and racialized stereotypes. This paper contributes to our understanding of the ways putative social problems are made intelligible in the media. We demonstrate how “crime waves” are shaped by and shape dominant tropes about crime, safety, and citizenship. We argue that something as mundane as liquor theft reveals much about the historical, colonial and social roots of crime in local and national contexts.

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Section: The Social Construction Of Crimementioning

confidence: 99%

“The darkest time in our history”: An analysis of news media constructions of liquor theft in Canada’s settler colonial context

Kohm

Maier

2022

Crime, Media, Culture

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Editor's Introduction

Brisman

2020

Crit Crim

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The editors' introduction (South and Brisman 2020) to the previous issue of this journal (Volume 28, Issue 3) served as a modest attempt to pay our respects to Professor Roger Matthews, who passed away on April 7, 2020. The first article in the issue was one of Roger's last pieces, "New Times, New Crimes: Notes on the Depillarization of the Criminal Justice System" (Matthews 2020), in which Roger contemplated three "new crimes"cybercrime, environmental crime and terrorism. As a tribute to Roger, the rest of the issue included articles that centered on the second of Roger's "new crimes"-"environmental crimes." In many respects, little has changed since the publication of Volume 28, Issue 3. The planet continues to burn. To quote the columnist, Margaret Renkl (2020), "I held my father's hand as he died, and I held my mother's hand as she died, and now it feels as though I am watching my planet die, too." And thus, it seems appropriate to begin this issue with four articles related to matters of environmental crimes and harms: "

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Doing good, doing wrong, doing time and doing harm: Criminalising the marginal in charity shops

Payson,

Fitton

2024

Crime, Media, Culture

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This paper builds upon theories of carceral spatiality and criminalisation to explore the extension of the carceral state into everyday spaces. In particular, here we consider the UK charity shop, which not only covertly relies on carceral labour from people ‘doing time’, but also abets the carceral state by criminalising everyday lives on the social and economic margins, thereby doing harm. Moreover, this criminalisation means charity shops become part of a broader system of governing in which social issues are treated as criminal problems with carceral solutions. We draw on ethnographic fieldwork in charity shops and news discourse over more than a decade to consider the pivotal yet hidden role of charity shops as instruments of criminalisation. We explore how charity shops as liminal spaces play a significant role in criminalisation through: sensationalising stories of ‘good’ charities and ‘bad’ criminals; policing theft, scams, and salvage; judging moments of what, and who, is criminal; and guarding against breaches of the terms of penal work orders. We argue that unpicking how charity shops criminalise the marginal matters, particularly in a context of both rising social inequality and the popularity of second-hand spaces, and brings into focus overlooked aspects of carceral power.

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Local Media Framing of Scrap Metal Collection as Crime

Cited by 3 publications

References 35 publications

“The darkest time in our history”: An analysis of news media constructions of liquor theft in Canada’s settler colonial context

“The darkest time in our history”: An analysis of news media constructions of liquor theft in Canada’s settler colonial context

Editor's Introduction

Doing good, doing wrong, doing time and doing harm: Criminalising the marginal in charity shops

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