Professor John Muncie
During my Open University career, from 1976 to 2011, I chaired or produced teaching materials for over 20 undergraduate and postgraduate courses in the fields of criminology, social policy, popular culture and youth studies. I was a founding member and Director of The Open University’s International Centre for Comparative Criminological Research (ICCCR) from 2003 to 2011.
My core research involves establishing the parameters of a comprehensive youth criminology capable of moving beyond narrow discipline boundaries by drawing on cultural studies, media studies, social history, the sociology of education, labour-market studies, the sociology of youth and social policy as well as criminological knowledge. A summation of this work can be found in Youth and Crime published by Sage (1st edition 1999, 2nd edition 2004, 3rd edition 2009, 4th edition 2015).
From 2006 to 2016 I was co-editor of the journal Youth Justice: An International Journal. Other key projects have been the compilation, authoring and editing of the first Dictionary of Criminology to be published in the UK (Sage Publications, 1st edition 2001, 2nd edition 2006, 3rd edition 2013) and the editing of classic and contemporary criminological texts to construct Criminological Perspectives: Essential Readings (Sage Publications, 1st edition 1996, 2nd edition 2002, 3rd edition 2013).
I was a regular delegate and speaker at BSC conferences during the 1990s and 2000s, most memorably (for those that can still remember!) the Liverpool conference held at the Adelphi Hotel in 1999. For 10 years I was a member of the Editorial Board for the British Journal of Criminology and part of the BSC Youth Justice Network Steering Group, established in 2007.
Research interests include critical criminology, comparative youth justice, children’s rights, globalisation, crime, harm and social policy.
I am now Emeritus Professor of Criminology, Department of Social Policy and Criminology, The Open University.