Dragan Milovanovic

Constitutive Criminology offers an affirmative, holistic approach to the study of crime. Taking as its starting point that individuals not only shape the world but are shaped by it, this book argues that the behaviours of those who offend and victimize others cannot be understood in isolation from the society of which they are a part. Instead of setting out to identify factors that cause offending, constitutive criminology examines the co-production of crime by human subjects and by the social and organizational structures that humans develop. The implications are, first, that crime must be deconstructed as a recurrent discursive process and, secondly, that conscious attempts must be made at reconstruction wi.

This dissertation focuses on the development and functions of law in a capitalist mode of production. A Weberian perspective is compared with the various Marxist perspectives on law--instrumental and structural Marxism. Differences and similarities are pointed out. ;In the last few years much concern has been expressed about exactly what Weber had to say about the development of law and what functions it served. Similarly, many Marxist criminologists, particularly since the late 1970s have searched through the extensive writings of Marx to determine precisely what his views were. Unfortunately, Marx, unlike Weber, did not develop a systematic theory of law; rather, scattered passages exist throughout his writings, and interested theorists have had to decipher precisely what he said. ;Some key issues that are dealt with are: law in economy in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries--the question of cause; the nexus between rationality in the economic and legal spheres; form and content of law--liberty and coercion; functions of law--facilitative, repressive, and ideological. ;This dissertation will show that contrary to simplistic statements concerning Weber's and Marx's incompatibilities, some analysis of law by both is similar. Weber would in fact agree with some of the structuralist Marxist analysis. We point out, however, the differences that do exist

This article takes a Deleuzian view toward diversity, law and justice. It makes use of the insights developed in his two books on cinema comparing an “organic regime” to a “crystalline regime.” The former will be seen as the image of thought and regime of signs of traditional criminal justice practices (due process model, crime control model, family model, actuarial justice, restorative justice); the latter, the basis of a transformative justice (social justice) and the regime of signs that are its constitutive elements. Deleuze’s views on semiotics can be fruitfully contrasted with Lacan’s. I want to indicate how Jacques Lacan’s psychoanalytic semiotics, on the descriptive level, quite accurately describes the connection of desire based on lack with capital logic, whereas, Deleuze provides an alternative ontology (desire based on production) and develops suggestions for privileging a becoming rather than a being. His is a call for ongoing transformations. I want to indicate how diversity, transformation and tolerance can have better developments in a Deleuzian model of the crystalline regime. This entails alternative discursive subject positions and regimes of signs within which constructions of reality by diverse peoples find wider expression. Accordingly, this is about better approximations to social justice

The approaching millennium invites reflection upon past, present, and future constructions of human community. An important component of community is the mechanism by which communities develop and enforce normative conduct. Of particular interest is how conduct is identified as legal or illegal in modern societies. Focusing on the concepts of legality and illegality, this volume investigates various positions with an underlying theoretical framework that encompasses a semiotic and discourse analysis.

This collection of essays and reviews represents the most significant and comprehensive writing on Shakespeare's A Comedy of Errors. Miola's edited work also features a comprehensive critical history, coupled with a full bibliography and photographs of major productions of the play from around the world. In the collection, there are five previously unpublished essays. The topics covered in these new essays are women in the play, the play's debt to contemporary theater, its critical and performance histories in Germany and Japan, the metrical variety of the play, and the distinctly modern perspective on the play as containing dark and disturbing elements. To compliment these new essays, the collection features significant scholarship and commentary on The Comedy of Errors that is published in obscure and difficulty accessible journals, newspapers, and other sources. This collection brings together these essays for the first time.

The postmodernist view, with its emphasis on the nature of discursive practices in constructing subjectivity and reality, has found many applications. This book develops a critically informed psychoanalytic semiotic view derived from Lacan, and applies it to the study of law. It also integrates some of the central concepts of chaos theory in describing how the legal text is constructed and how it may be read. Postmodern feminist analyses focusing on a possible ecriture feminine provide key insights, and the notion of an empowered democracy is offered as a potentially generating milieu for a revolutionary replacement discourse.