Roundtable alert! The Impact of Natural Resources & Energy Development on Rural Crime

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The International Society for the Study of Rural Crime – @RuCrimSociety – invites you to this virtual roundtable! The focus will be on “The Impact of Natural Resources & Energy Development on Rural Crime”.

About this event

The extraction of natural resources and the development of large-scale energy projects has had destructive environmental and social impacts on some rural communities throughout the globe.

This roundtable brings together four leading experts who have researched the impacts of population increases and industrial development on rural communities, including the relationships between these booms and social impacts including antisocial behavior and crime.

The four panelists discuss the outcomes of their current research and the potential for the future as we enter the early stages of an energy crisis.

They respond to two key questions:

  1. What are the impacts of natural resource and energy development on rural crime?
  2. What can be done about this issue?

Ample opportunity will be provided for attendees to engage with the panel.

 

Featuring

 

Moderator – Dr Matt Thomas

Professor, California State University, Chico

Dr Thomas received a BA from St. Joseph’s University, and an MA and PhD from the University of Maryland, College Park. He teaches political science, criminal justice, and public administration in the department’s undergraduate and graduate programs. He is the coordinator of the MA in Political Science program, and is the internship coordinator for the MPA program. His research focuses on both urban politics, including work on New Orleans (Reforming New Orleans: The Contentious Politics of Change in the Big Easy with Peter Burns, Cornell Press), and on criminal justice topics, including work on police strength, concealed weapons on campus, and the impacts of AB 109 and Prop 47 on California’s criminal justice realignment agenda. Matt received the university’s Outstanding Service Award in 2016-17.

Panelist – Dr Jeffrey B. Jacquet

Associate Professor, Ohio State University (Ohio, United States)

Dr Jacquet is an Associate Professor of Rural Sociology in the School of Environment and Natural Resources at The Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio, USA. One of the first to study the community-level implications of hydraulic fracturing, Dr Jacquet has gone on to examine the social ramifications of a range of renewable- and non-renewable-energy systems at institutions including the University of Wyoming, Cornell University, and South Dakota State University. At Ohio State, Jacquet leads students through coursework, research, and mentorship to examine the areas of energy, environment, and rural societies. He is the lead editor of a new collected volume titled Energy Impacts: A Multidisciplinary Exploration of North American Energy Development published in 2021 by the University Press of Colorado.

Panelist – Dr Christopher O’Connor

Associate Professor, University of Ontario Institute of Technology (Ontario, Canada)

Dr O’Connor is an Associate Professor of Criminology at Ontario Tech University. He received his PhD in Sociology from the University of Calgary where he studied school-to-work transitions and perceptions of crime in the energy boomtown of Fort McMurray, Alberta. His research examines energy resource boomtowns, people’s use and perceptions of emerging technology, policing, and young people’s participation in crime, perceptions of the environment, and school-to-work transitions. Dr O’Connor has recently completed a SSHRC Insight Development Grant examining the risks and opportunities of hydraulic fracturing and related renewable and non-renewable energy technologies. He is currently co-director on a SSHRC-funded Partnership Development grant examining facial recognition use by the police which involves working with a range of multi-disciplinary stakeholders to examine the viability of the technology for police use.

Panelist – Professor Thomasine Heitkamp

Emeritus Faculty and LCSW, University of North Dakota (North Dakota, USA)

Professor Heitkamp served as a faculty member at the University of North Dakota for 39 years, achieving the highest rank of Chester Fritz Distinguished Professor. She is currently an Emeritus faculty and a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in North Dakota. She also serves as a Behavioral Health Research Specialists for the University of North Dakota – Office of Research and Economic Development. Professor Heitkamp served as Co-PI for a National Institute of Justice-funded three-year study to examine the impact of oil development on inter-personal violence in the Bakken Oil fields of North Dakota and Montana. She has served as the PI on several large grant-funded projects including her service as PI and Co-Director of the Mountain Plains Mental Health Technology Transfer Center and Addiction Technology Transfer Center (ATTC). She has published in a host of peer-reviewed journals with a focus on workforce development serving tribal and rural communities.

Panelist – Dr Rick Ruddell

Professor, University of Regina (Saskatchewan , Canada)

Dr Ruddell serves as the Law Foundation of Saskatchewan Chair in Police Research at the University of Regina, Canada. Prior to this appointment he served as Director of Operational Research with the Correctional Service of Canada, and held faculty positions at Eastern Kentucky University and the California State University, Chico. Prior to his academic career, he served with the Saskatchewan Ministry of Corrections, Public Safety and Policing as a supervisor and manager. Dr Ruddell’s research has focused upon policing, criminal justice policy, and juvenile justice, and he has published over 150 articles and technical reports. He has written extensively about the impact of natural resource booms on rural communities and published Oil, Gas, and Crime: The Dark Side of the Boomtown (Palgrave Macmillan) in 2017.

 

Rural Law and Policy Series

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The University of Nebraska College of Law is hosting a “Rural Law and Policy” series of presentations from January to April 2021.

Click here for the flier.

Click here to register.

 

Call for contributions to Vol.2 No.1 of ‘Rurality, Crime and Society’

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The International Society for the Study of Rural Crime (ISSRC) and the Centre for Rural Criminology jointly publish Rurality, Crime and Society twice annually. Responsibility for editing alterates bewteen the organisations. A big round of applause to Dr Jenny Wise for editing the two issues of Volume 1 in 2020, and an equally big welcome to Dr Louise Nicholas who is editing Volume 2 in 2021.

We welcome features on research projects; industry information, developments or partnerships; and/or researchers (or teams of researchers) engaging in rural crime research. Additionally, we are keen to highlight news items, employment opportunities, recent/forthcoming books/articles, upcoming events, and anything else you can think of relevance to rural crime and society. We have a regular profile feature focusing on a rural criminologist and a graduate student, please get in touch if you would like more information.

Typical research submissions are 2,000-3,000 words in length, however this is negotiable. Please contact Louise to discuss further. When using citations please follow APA formatting.

Please send through your submissions or any questions to l.e.nicholas@lboro.ac.uk before the close of business on Friday 5th March 2021.

‘POLICING RURAL COMMUNITIES’ ROUNDTABLE – 2O OCTOBER 2020

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The International Society for the Study of Rural Crime – @RuCrimSociety – invites you to an online roundtable “Policing Rural Communities”.

Date and Time

Tue, 20 October 2020

5:20 PM for 5:30 PM – 7:00 PM AEDT

Check your local time here

REGISTER via EventBrite here

 

About this Event

Rural crime and criminal justice practices and responses face different challenges from those experienced in urban contexts.

This practitioner-focused roundtable investigates challenges and innovations in international contexts on issues surrounding rural policing.

This roundtable will provide an opportunity for participants to hear first-hand from four leaders in rural policing about work being done in both hemispheres to police rural crime.

We ask our panellists two key things:

  1. What are the key challenges for rural policing?
  2. What innovations are being deployed internationally to address these challenges?

Ample opportunity will be provided for attendees to engage with the panel.

 

Roundtable Chair

The event will be hosted and moderated by Dr Jessica Peterson from the University of Nebraska at Kearney.

 

 

 

 

The Panel

Detective Inspector Cameron Whiteside
State Rural Crime Coordinator, New South Wales Police Force (Australia)

Detective Inspector Cameron Whiteside’s 31 year (24 years as a Detective) started in 1989 when he joined the New South Wales Police Force. He currently serves as the inaugural State Rural Crime Coordinator for the Rural Crime Prevention Team that covers approximately 95% of New South Wales. The Team supports Police Districts and Police Area Commands in the prevention and response to rural crime.

 

Inspector Alan Dron
National Rural Crime Co-ordinator, Police Scotland

Inspector Alan Dron has over 28 years in the police service, including the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency. He currently serves as the Rural Crime Co-ordinator for Police Scotland and ensures smooth operations of the Scottish Partnership Against Rural Crime (SPARC) from his base at the Gartcosh Scottish Crime Campus. SPARC consists of key partnerships and organisations that work together to advance crime prevention and enforcement strategies in diverse rural communities.

 

Tori Heaney
Farm Crime Advisor, Farm Crime Coordination Unit, Victoria Police (Australia)

Tori, who owns her family farm in rural Victoria, has degrees in Criminology and Business as well as a Graduate Certificate in Intelligence Analysis. She currently provides high-level analysis, advice, and research direction for the Farm Crime Coordination Unit of Victoria Police. Victoria Police has a collection of more than 60 Farm Crime Liaison Officers (FCLO) across the state with expertise in investigating livestock theft and farm related crime.

 

Christian Mouhanna
Director, Centre de recherches sociologiques sur le droit et les institutions pénales (Centre for Sociological Research on Law and Criminal Justice Institutions)

Christian Mouhanna is a permanent researcher at the CNRS (French National Centre for Scientific Research) and Director of CESDIP (Centre for Sociological Research on Law and Criminal Justice Institutions), a major venue for the study of criminal justice and deviance in France. He worked for more than 20 years on the French Police Forces, including the French Gendarmerie, the courts and security policies.

The roundtable is free to attend.

However, if you are able to make a donation, funds will be directed to the ISSRC awards program for higher degree research students, early career researchers, and practitioners.

REGISTER via EventBrite here

Interested in joining the ISSRC? Visit www.issrc.net/membership

Rural access to justice during COVID

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At the end of August 2020, the Deakin University Law School hosted an online lunchtime event entitled Access to Justice during COVID: The rural and regional experience.

“Description: The pandemic has no doubt had an impact on everyone, however it has had a significant impact on those living in rural and regional towns. Access to justice is an issue for many members of our community with barriers such the tyranny of distance, lack of public transport and a lack of awareness of services that may be able to assist. With the restrictions due to the pandemic this has further compounded these access to justice issues.”

The presenter was Sejal Amin, Principal Lawyer at the Goulburn Valley Community Legal Centre in Shepparton, Victoria:

“Sejal Amin was admitted to practice as a lawyer in 2009 and has worked predominantly in the non-for-profit/government sector. She has previously worked at Victoria Legal Aid, Victoria Police and the Office of the Freedom of Information Commissioner. She moved from Melbourne to Country Victoria; Shepparton in 2015 and joined the team at the Goulburn Valley Community Legal Centre (GVCLC) to manage a three year pilot Therapeutic Justice Program (TJP). Following the completion of this pilot program in 2018, she decided to stay and settle in Shepparton. She has been working with GVCLC for 5 years and enjoys working in the country.”

 

The video of the event can be accessed here.

 

 

 

American Society of Criminology – a review of the 2019 annual meeting

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The 2019 meeting of the American Society of Criminology – the 75th meeting – took place in San Francisco between 13 and 16 November. For those who have not attended a meeting previously, this is a big event. Almost 5000 people attend, and the conference program is 472 pages long.

Rural criminology continues to grow. A search of the program using the keyword “rural” resulted in 81 entries: a clear demonstration of how much rural criminology has indeed grown.

Some selected conference highlights

A number of themed panels were arranged, providing an opportunity for rural criminologists to share their research with one another, but importantly, too, to share with other colleagues from across the broader criminology field.

Joe Donnermeyer

A session on qualitative rural research, chaired by Rashi Shukla from the University of Central Oklahoma, contained presentations from Rash and her colleague Melissa Inglis from East Central University; Jessica Peterson from Indiana University; an Alison Cox from the University of Northern Iowa. Each presentation shed interesting light on the some of the challenges of rural field work research – filling the car with petrol, taking a cut lunch, being very organised and other practical considerations for example.

A roundtable on these challenges was also convened by our own ISSRC president Joe Donnermeyer with Rashi Shukla and another roundtable on the future of rural criminology led to an informal exchange of ideas which will no doubt lead to ongoing and productive collaborations.

 

Joe Donnermeyer also arranged a themed panel on farm crime victimisation, with presentations from Alistair Harkness (Federation University in Victoria, Australia), Vania Ceccato (Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden) and Matt Bowden and Artur Pytlarz (Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland).

Artur Pytlarz

 

Matt Bowden

 

Vania Ceccato

Demonstrating the internationality of both the conference and contemporary research, a themed panel canvassed issue around rural crime in China and two sessions additional sessions addressed issues around rural access to justice.

Ralph Weisheit

 

Lisa Pruitt

Two other roundtables – one on technology and rural criminology organised by ISSRC Treasurer Bridget Harris, Queensland University of Technology) and on rural crime prevention organised by ISSRC secretary Alistair Harkness) were other highlights and, again, led to scintillating discussions.

Of course, other rural related papers were dotted throughout the conference. To take but just one example, Tarah Hodgkinson (Griffith University), for instance, presented her research on perceptions of crime and safety in a small rural community in Saskatchewan in a panel with three other urban-focused papers centred on the theme of community perceptions of crime.

Tarah Hodgkinson

Of course, it is not just the formal aspects of as conference such as this which allow for sharing of research and perspective, but the “sidelines” discussions over coffee, drinks and meals also generate an enormous degree of good will and collaborative spirit which bodes extremely well for the months and years ahead.

The Division of Rural Criminology

The Division of Rural Criminology is now well established, and at its annual general meeting many of the Board members were introduced:

Chair: Joseph F. Donnermeyer
Vice-Chair: Walter DeKeseredy
Secretary-Treasurer: David May
Executive Counselors: Kyle Ward and Ralph Weisheit
Student Representative: Ashley Lockwood

A highlight, without doubt, was the awarding of the inaugural rural criminologist of the year plaque to Ralph Weisheit.

L-R: Danielle Stoneberg; Kyle Ward; Joe Donnermeyer; Ralph Weisheit; Walter DeKeseredy; Gabrielle Lory

More information on the Division, including its newsletters and membership details, can be found on the Division’s website.

ASC 2020

The 76th meeting of the ASC will be held in Washington DC between 18 and 21 November 2020. The theme is “Crime and justice theory and research: Thinking outside the box”. Much opportunity for rural criminologists to present their work and continue the expansion of rural crime scholarship into the future.

ASSA Rural Crime and Communities Workshop

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About the workshop

The Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia (ASSA) through the ASSA Workshop Program 2018-19 sponsored the delivery of a multi-disciplinary workshop entitled Understanding Rural Crime and Rural; Communities: Theory, Policy and Practice.

The Workshop was held on the Gippsland Campus of Federation University Australia on Thursday 7 and Friday 8 February 2019. It was convened by Dr Alistair Harkness (Federation University), Dr Naomi Smith (Federation University), Dr Bec Strating (Latrobe University), and Prof Rob White FASSA (University of Tasmania).

21 participants were involved in the Workshop across the two days, from 12 different universities, and from four Australian states. The Workshop was attended by world-leading rural criminologist Emeritus Professor Joseph F. Donnermeyer from Ohio State University.

 

Workshop themes

With an overarching focus on space and place, the workshop explored notions of ‘place’ and ‘context’ in each session, assessing fixed geographic locations, online (and thus borderless) spaces, and broader notions of rurality. The diversity of scholarship represented at the workshop highlights the growing inter-disciplinarity of rural criminology scholarship.

Key themes that emerged from the workshop centred on participation in and access to justice; and on the unique spatiality of the rural and its relationship to urban centres. This includes making distinctions between space and place, and its connection to rural culture and community.

The materiality of rural places also shapes social and community networks, but it is important to understand that ‘the rural’ and rural crime are not homogenous, but rather are diverse and complex. Better understanding and appreciating the complexities of rural crime will enable us to change the narrative regarding rural crime and community; positively influence how it is governed and represented in Australian society.

The workshop highlighted the important research that is still to be conducted examining rural crime in rural communities. Rural crime cannot be treated as an undifferentiated social problem. Local context and culturally specific and appropriate interventions are needed to ensure rural communities survive and thrive.

 

In the news

The Workshop featured on WIN News Gippsland and in the Latrobe Valley Express. A review of the Workshop was published in the newsletter of the American Society of Criminology’s Division of Rural Crime.