We are pleased to bring you the first issue of Critical Criminology for 2023. As we return to some sense of normalcy in the post-covid era, we take stock of the deepening contradictions in social and political systems across the globe as governments responded to the spread of this deadly disease. For some, the degree of social and physical harm so pronounced among the poor and the vulnerable seemed to come as a revelation, but for readers of and subscribers to this journal, we assume that the class, race/ethnic, and gendered factors had their predictable impacts.

Since that time when the world seemed to stop still and a sense of anomie abounded, we have returned to capitalism’s business as usual with sky rocketing profits in certain industries while a new series of financial crises erupt in others. Once again, our reining global socioeconomic system exhibits its intrinsic failures to provide stability and security to the majority while ensuring a small minority live in obscene, conspicuous luxury amid continuing environmental destruction and climate change catastrophe. “Plus ça change,” you might mutter, as the President of the USA assures its population that the banks are fundamentally sound even if the regulators have gone AWOL and the financial bourgeoisie once again get to keep their multi-million dollar paydays while avoiding the jail house door.

In this liquid world of hypocrisy, corruption, and global usury, the crimes of the powerful are on full display from the US and UK to Turkey, Brazil, Nigeria, Russia, and Israel. Never has a critical criminological perspective been more imperative. In this issue, we think you will find multiple examples of how this approach helps us to see the roots and contours of crime and social harm in all their local, national, and international guises, situated in history and with an ongoing commitment to the development of theory. We hope this array of contributions from our colleagues encourages you, dear reader, to expand our division’s founding principle to scholarly resist the deadening hands of orthodoxy and complacency while using where possible these articles in your classes and for general dissemination.

The following issue consists of submissions that is grouped into five themes: theory, prison, social harm, policing, and miscellaneous work from around the globe. We have also included a text based on a single interview with a social actor who embodies the spirit and values of our division plus several book reviews. Please note that in future issues, we want to encourage readers to think seriously about the possibility of submitting well-executed interviews while we also introduce a new submission genre we call “field notes.” Since we know many of you are continually involved in qualitative research perhaps this avenue for publishing will be appealing. Below is a brief mention of subjects featured in each of the articles in this issue.

The theme of theory brings together work exploring a range of discourses. A criminology of dis/obedience is proposed by one author while others set their theoretical sights on deficit criminology which pathologizes communities, notions of social harm that elides the importance of ontology, and global theory that fails to link environmental concerns to violence against women. Our prison-related submissions focus on the relationship between food and carceral systems and the equally neglected connections between penal institutions and environmental harms as seen through the US government’s environmental protection data base. Social harm contributions, meanwhile, present us with a scholarly tract on the need for a decolonial zemiology to better grapple with capitalist modernity while a second article exposes the detrimental impact of sleep deprivation among migrant workers in England’s north-east. On the theme of policing, two articles take on a horror game franchise and its mythic representations of police drawing on both cultural and gothic criminology in the US and Japanese contexts while a second submission deals with racialized policing in Washington, D.C. under the impacts of gentrification and White encroachment. Finally, the journal ends with three articles from across the globe. The first is set in Tasmania and engages problems of returning citizens and their barriers to integration given new housing policies. A second article compares street gang subcultures in the Canadian prairie lands and those of Cape Town, South Africa, while a third submission explores the linkages between community housing in Ontario, Canada, and social control.

We wish to thank our editorial assistants for their invaluable labor on this issue Zachary Del Rosso, Angela Silletti, and Maeve Higgins and the production team of Senthil Kumar and Ashok Kumar. If you have comments or suggestions, please let us know. We will also be holding an open session at the upcoming annual conference of the American Society of Criminology in November 2023.

In solidarity,

Dave and Jayne.