International Journal of Law and Society

Special Issue

Security, Risk and Anticipatory Perspectives on Criminal Justice

  • Submission Deadline: 20 March 2020
  • Status: Submission Closed
  • Lead Guest Editor: Laura Stănilă
About This Special Issue
In the current social context defined by antagonist goals, such as the need of security versus the need of protecting human rights, the need of public formal reaction versus the need of ensuring balance in the juridical field, Criminal Law becomes the main tool for solving all kinds of turbulences that occur in the social life. Criminal Law is becoming a source of violence itself, due to, among others, the increasing number of criminalizing provisions and the use of criminal procedures in early phases of an antisocial conduct. The increased number of inchoate offenses, the lack of evaluation of the social risks in case of a specific human conduct, the tendency to incriminate instead of finding other juridical solutions in order to respond to certain human conducts, the obstinate promotion of a culture of social control are only some of the many arguments sustaining the ”changing face” of the criminal justice. On the other hand, the terrorist threat, the migration phenomenon, the transnational component of crime and the increasing role of artificial intelligence in committing, assessing, prosecuting and punishing crime are important ingredients configuring a high-risk society where criminal justice is permanently on debate.
The reaction of our society against any harmful acts is a necessity dictated by the need to safeguard the social order, the fundamental values protected by the Rule of Law, reaction which must meet the standard of proportionality from the State authorities, aiming to protect in the first place the security of innocent population, and on the second place, that aim to ensure the proportional sanctioning for the harms against social values protected by criminal means.
In this complex social context, we can observe an increased preoccupation for new techniques and instruments to provide social control, and a dramatic trend that leads to the modification of the current criminal and criminal procedure legislation. The criminal policy of the states, both legal and judicial, is shaped by the legislator in order to provide social security and to minimize the risk of criminality of a specific nature (terrorism, organized crime etc.) The concrete way to provide such organized reactions by the special bodies with specific features in the field of criminal repression generates fierce controversy both in the doctrine, society and public perception.

Aims and Scope:

  1. High-risk society
  2. Changing face of criminal justice
  3. Artificial intelligence
  4. Social security
  5. Assessing criminal risk
  6. Criminalization
  7. Penal policy
  8. Criminal justice and human rights
Lead Guest Editor
  • Laura Stănilă

    Faculty of Law, West University Timișoara, Timișoara, Romania

Guest Editors
  • Istvan Laszlo Gal

    Faculty of Law, University of Pecs, Pecs, Hungary

  • Mihai Dunea

    Faculty of Law, University Alexandru Ioan Cuza, Iași, Romania

  • Mihaela Tomiță

    Faculty of Sociology and Psychology, West University, Timișoara, Romania

  • Aleksandar Ivanović

    Department for Law Sciences, International University of Novi Pazar, Novi Pazar, Serbia

  • Elena Tilovska-Kechedji

    Faculty of Law, University St. Kliment Ohridski, Bitola, North Macedonia

  • Zoran Pavlović

    Faculty of Law, University Business Academy, Novi Sad, Serbia