An accessible, comprehensive introduction to the study of crime in Britain, helping the reader to understand and critically evaluate the key issues. explains how we find out about crime and how we have sought different theoretical approaches to understand it explains how crime can be related to social inequality in society, to social deprivation, social class, age, gender and race describes and analyses different kinds of crime, from violent and sexual crimes to organized and corporate crime and the crimes of the state written in an accessible and engaging style but reaches into the deeper debates