Victimology – eigen cursus
1 Origin & concepts
The origin
Victimology
• = The scientific study of the extent, nature, and causes of (criminal) victimization, its
consequences for the individuals involved, and societal responses, particularly those of
the police, criminal justice system, as well as voluntary and welfare services (VWS).
Often considered a subdiscipline: Psychiatry, law, social work. However,
criminologists have the greatest influence. An essential component of offender studies
within criminology, it has thus become an integral part of criminological sciences.
Who is most likely to become victim? Those who expose themself most to violence will result
in becoming a victim themself. A criminal himself vb maffia has the most change but other
like vb eldery woman subjectivily thinks she has the biggest risk?
Leopold Szondi: genotropism (1930s).
• Theory: Reciprocal attraction of the same/similar recessive genes influencing human
behavior (instinct). (It genetics that decide, this is a theory, not fact)
Ted Bundy
• Victim Selection:
• A matter of opportunity.
• He claimed that he could identify a potential victim by the way she walks
down the street, the way she carries her head, her body language, etc.
• He could see who was vulnerable
• Research confirms that victims exhibit certain typical body language,
especially in the way they walk.
• Psychopaths are more accurate in recognizing potential victims
Who becomes a victim? Genotropism, selection, body language, wrong place wrong time,…
First mention of 'victimology'
• Mendelsohn, 1947: during the presentation of a paper.
• Need to have a discipline, that needs to study victims
• Considered the spiritual father of the victim movement.
• Werthem (1949) also advocates for a "crime victim-centered" science.
• Focused particularly on murder.
1
,First systematic investigation into crime victims by von Hentig (1941, 1948).
• "The Criminal and his Victim" (1948). Part 4: "The Victim's contribution to the
genesis of the crime."
• Critique of the one-dimensional perspective within criminology. The focus was only
on the perperator
• The victim is not passive, the victim might plays a part in the establishment of a crime.
To understand crime, we need to look at all parts of it.
"The law considers certain results and the final moves which lead to them. Here it makes a
clear-cut distinction between the one who does and the one who suffers. Looking into the
genesis of the situation, in a considerable number of cases, we meet a victim who consents
tacitly, cooperates, conspires, or provokes. The victim is one of the causative elements".
Number of theoretical studies: on victim types, the relationship between victim and offender,
and the role victims play in certain criminal phenomena.
Victim precipitated crime: it’s looking at victims of crime. it’s not victim blaming, but
they try to understand what happend pryer to the act. Especially in the 1970s, victim
precipitation was increasingly seen as victim-blaming. It’s a thin balance.
• Martin Wolfgang: "victim precipitated criminal homicide" (1957).
• 588 murder cases between 1948-1952 in Philadelphia
• 26% VP cases where the victim was the first to engage in violence.
• Menachem Amir: "Victim precipitated forcible rape" (1967).
• Active 'contribution': accepting a drink from a stranger, riding with a stranger.
• Passive 'contribution': not reacting strongly enough to sexual advances.
• Examples: alcohol, "reputation," place of residence, meeting place,...
• NO excuse for the offender.
VP research has contributed to two major criminological theories:
• Lifestyle theory (Hindelang et al., 1978)
• Routine activities theory (Cohen & Felson, 1979)
• Why does crime occur: opportunity (absence of capable
guardian), motivated actor and attractive victim
At the core of these pioneers: victims of crimes.
• 1950s-1960s
• Also during the 1970s-1980s due to the emergence of professional
assistance for crime victims.
1979: establishment of the World Society of Victimology
2
,The evolution
Gradual broadening during the 1970s of the research focus.
• Similarities with war victims, prisoners in camps, and certain types of aggression and
discrimination (Nazism, Apartheid).
• Criminologists explore other crimes/phenomena: white-collar crime, environmental
crime,...
• Who is the victim here, and what about perception?
• Vb PFAS = regulated pollution
What do we do when the government makes a crime, is this a crime? Who is the victim? What
happens here? Should we broaden the scope?
Division among victimologists: restrict to victims of crimes or include other victims?
• Refer to the definition of victimology by the World Society of Victimology
(WSV).
• Prominent debate in the 1970s-1980s, but largely disappeared by the late
1990s-2000s (see UN Declaration).
Also, within the WSV, discussions about the research object of victimology.
Difference between scientific victimologists and humanistic aid providers.
Should we include people of conge as victims of crime? Should we include the protester of
apartheid as victims? Should we include people in poverty as victims?
UN Declaration of Basic Principles of Justice for Victims of Crime and Abuse of Power
(1985)
• Unanimously adopted in the General Assembly.
• Objective: set minimum standards for states to meet in providing assistance to victims.
• We should take measures to make sure that victims of crime receive
help/recognition. It’s the minimum what governments can do for victims of
crime, for abuse of power.
Was a compromise.
• Developed countries: victims of crime.
• Developing countries: victims of abuse of power should have the same rights
as the first category.
• Much more provision for the first category than for the second.
See:
11. Where public officials or other agents acting in an official or quasi-official capacity have
violated national criminal laws, the victims should receive (you have to pay) restitution from
the State whose officials or agents were responsible for the harm inflicted.
19. States should consider incorporating into national law norms proscribing abuses of power
and providing remedies to victims of such abuses.
3
, Evolutions (3):
1. From “penal victimologie” to general victimology
Penal victimology
• Victims of crimes takes center stage
• Delimitation of victim
• Bayley 1991: penal victimology
• They have suffered a loss a some significant decrease in well-being unfairly or
undeservedly and in such a manner that they are helpless to prevent the loss
and
• The loss has an identifiable cause and
• The legal or moral context of the loss entitles the sufferer of the loss to social
concern(the law says it’s not right)
• It is called interactionist victimology.
• There is an interaction
General Victimology
• No restrictions, no exclusion of harm such as consumer fraud, pollution, work-
related hazards and illnesses, police violence, discrimination, poverty, and war.
• Focus: harm
• (not who, it can come from everywhere vb war)
• Also referred to as assistance-oriented victimology.
Human Victimology
• We agree with general victimology, it should not be directly linked to crime,
but its to broad we exclude accidents, natural disasters, and "acts of God."
In favour of broadening:
• If victimology works on prevention and alleviation of suffering, then there should be
no restrictions on the type of suffering (poverty, HIV,...).
• Artificial boundaries lead to priorities: one is worse than the other.
• Follow the broadening of the research focus within criminology.
Against broadening:
• Loss of objectivity
• Abuse of power isn’t it more ideological/normative, it’s subjective
• Where do you draw the line?
• Too broad research domain
• Too political
• See research on victims who abuse law and order politicians (Elias 1986).
• Human victimology: qualitative distinction?
• What about work-related incidents.
• Anyone can feel like a victim.
2. From micro to macro victimology
• Victim surveys become very popular in the 1970s.
• Shift from individual studies on victims of specific crimes to research on the
volume of victimization and the socio-demographic characteristics of victims.
4
1 Origin & concepts
The origin
Victimology
• = The scientific study of the extent, nature, and causes of (criminal) victimization, its
consequences for the individuals involved, and societal responses, particularly those of
the police, criminal justice system, as well as voluntary and welfare services (VWS).
Often considered a subdiscipline: Psychiatry, law, social work. However,
criminologists have the greatest influence. An essential component of offender studies
within criminology, it has thus become an integral part of criminological sciences.
Who is most likely to become victim? Those who expose themself most to violence will result
in becoming a victim themself. A criminal himself vb maffia has the most change but other
like vb eldery woman subjectivily thinks she has the biggest risk?
Leopold Szondi: genotropism (1930s).
• Theory: Reciprocal attraction of the same/similar recessive genes influencing human
behavior (instinct). (It genetics that decide, this is a theory, not fact)
Ted Bundy
• Victim Selection:
• A matter of opportunity.
• He claimed that he could identify a potential victim by the way she walks
down the street, the way she carries her head, her body language, etc.
• He could see who was vulnerable
• Research confirms that victims exhibit certain typical body language,
especially in the way they walk.
• Psychopaths are more accurate in recognizing potential victims
Who becomes a victim? Genotropism, selection, body language, wrong place wrong time,…
First mention of 'victimology'
• Mendelsohn, 1947: during the presentation of a paper.
• Need to have a discipline, that needs to study victims
• Considered the spiritual father of the victim movement.
• Werthem (1949) also advocates for a "crime victim-centered" science.
• Focused particularly on murder.
1
,First systematic investigation into crime victims by von Hentig (1941, 1948).
• "The Criminal and his Victim" (1948). Part 4: "The Victim's contribution to the
genesis of the crime."
• Critique of the one-dimensional perspective within criminology. The focus was only
on the perperator
• The victim is not passive, the victim might plays a part in the establishment of a crime.
To understand crime, we need to look at all parts of it.
"The law considers certain results and the final moves which lead to them. Here it makes a
clear-cut distinction between the one who does and the one who suffers. Looking into the
genesis of the situation, in a considerable number of cases, we meet a victim who consents
tacitly, cooperates, conspires, or provokes. The victim is one of the causative elements".
Number of theoretical studies: on victim types, the relationship between victim and offender,
and the role victims play in certain criminal phenomena.
Victim precipitated crime: it’s looking at victims of crime. it’s not victim blaming, but
they try to understand what happend pryer to the act. Especially in the 1970s, victim
precipitation was increasingly seen as victim-blaming. It’s a thin balance.
• Martin Wolfgang: "victim precipitated criminal homicide" (1957).
• 588 murder cases between 1948-1952 in Philadelphia
• 26% VP cases where the victim was the first to engage in violence.
• Menachem Amir: "Victim precipitated forcible rape" (1967).
• Active 'contribution': accepting a drink from a stranger, riding with a stranger.
• Passive 'contribution': not reacting strongly enough to sexual advances.
• Examples: alcohol, "reputation," place of residence, meeting place,...
• NO excuse for the offender.
VP research has contributed to two major criminological theories:
• Lifestyle theory (Hindelang et al., 1978)
• Routine activities theory (Cohen & Felson, 1979)
• Why does crime occur: opportunity (absence of capable
guardian), motivated actor and attractive victim
At the core of these pioneers: victims of crimes.
• 1950s-1960s
• Also during the 1970s-1980s due to the emergence of professional
assistance for crime victims.
1979: establishment of the World Society of Victimology
2
,The evolution
Gradual broadening during the 1970s of the research focus.
• Similarities with war victims, prisoners in camps, and certain types of aggression and
discrimination (Nazism, Apartheid).
• Criminologists explore other crimes/phenomena: white-collar crime, environmental
crime,...
• Who is the victim here, and what about perception?
• Vb PFAS = regulated pollution
What do we do when the government makes a crime, is this a crime? Who is the victim? What
happens here? Should we broaden the scope?
Division among victimologists: restrict to victims of crimes or include other victims?
• Refer to the definition of victimology by the World Society of Victimology
(WSV).
• Prominent debate in the 1970s-1980s, but largely disappeared by the late
1990s-2000s (see UN Declaration).
Also, within the WSV, discussions about the research object of victimology.
Difference between scientific victimologists and humanistic aid providers.
Should we include people of conge as victims of crime? Should we include the protester of
apartheid as victims? Should we include people in poverty as victims?
UN Declaration of Basic Principles of Justice for Victims of Crime and Abuse of Power
(1985)
• Unanimously adopted in the General Assembly.
• Objective: set minimum standards for states to meet in providing assistance to victims.
• We should take measures to make sure that victims of crime receive
help/recognition. It’s the minimum what governments can do for victims of
crime, for abuse of power.
Was a compromise.
• Developed countries: victims of crime.
• Developing countries: victims of abuse of power should have the same rights
as the first category.
• Much more provision for the first category than for the second.
See:
11. Where public officials or other agents acting in an official or quasi-official capacity have
violated national criminal laws, the victims should receive (you have to pay) restitution from
the State whose officials or agents were responsible for the harm inflicted.
19. States should consider incorporating into national law norms proscribing abuses of power
and providing remedies to victims of such abuses.
3
, Evolutions (3):
1. From “penal victimologie” to general victimology
Penal victimology
• Victims of crimes takes center stage
• Delimitation of victim
• Bayley 1991: penal victimology
• They have suffered a loss a some significant decrease in well-being unfairly or
undeservedly and in such a manner that they are helpless to prevent the loss
and
• The loss has an identifiable cause and
• The legal or moral context of the loss entitles the sufferer of the loss to social
concern(the law says it’s not right)
• It is called interactionist victimology.
• There is an interaction
General Victimology
• No restrictions, no exclusion of harm such as consumer fraud, pollution, work-
related hazards and illnesses, police violence, discrimination, poverty, and war.
• Focus: harm
• (not who, it can come from everywhere vb war)
• Also referred to as assistance-oriented victimology.
Human Victimology
• We agree with general victimology, it should not be directly linked to crime,
but its to broad we exclude accidents, natural disasters, and "acts of God."
In favour of broadening:
• If victimology works on prevention and alleviation of suffering, then there should be
no restrictions on the type of suffering (poverty, HIV,...).
• Artificial boundaries lead to priorities: one is worse than the other.
• Follow the broadening of the research focus within criminology.
Against broadening:
• Loss of objectivity
• Abuse of power isn’t it more ideological/normative, it’s subjective
• Where do you draw the line?
• Too broad research domain
• Too political
• See research on victims who abuse law and order politicians (Elias 1986).
• Human victimology: qualitative distinction?
• What about work-related incidents.
• Anyone can feel like a victim.
2. From micro to macro victimology
• Victim surveys become very popular in the 1970s.
• Shift from individual studies on victims of specific crimes to research on the
volume of victimization and the socio-demographic characteristics of victims.
4
