Criminal Sociology

"Criminal Sociology" by Enrico Ferri is a study from the late 1800s that examines crime by looking at the person committing the crime as well as the society they live in. The book argues that to truly reduce crime, we must find and fix the reasons why it happens, not just punish people after the fact. The introduction explains that Ferri sees crime as a kind of social disease, and that understanding criminals means understanding people. He criticizes those who only look at numbers, like prison populations, to understand crime, believing that this doesn't tell the whole story. Instead, he wants a deep look at why individuals become criminals, setting up the rest of the book to discuss criminal anthropology, psychology, and sociology.