How Rural Criminology Informs Critical Thinkingbetween critical criminology and rural criminology. Hence, by attempting to identify how rural criminology informs critical criminology,

www.crimejusticejournal.comIJCJ&SD20132(3):69‐91 ISSN2202–8005

©TheAuthor(s)2013

HowRuralCriminologyInformsCriticalThinkinginCriminology

JosephDonnermeyerTheOhioStateUniversity,USAQueenslandUniversityofTechnology,AustraliaJohnScottUniversityofNewEngland,AustraliaElaineBarclayUniversityofNewEngland,Australia

Abstract

Over the past quarter century, a growing volumeof rural‐focused criminologicalworkhasemerged. In this article, the literature related to three rural criminological issues areexaminedanddiscussedintermsoftheirlessonsforcriticalcriminology.Researchonruralcommunities and crime is examined as a way to criticize and challenge mainstreamcriminologicaltheoriesandconceptslikesocialdisorganisationandcollectiveefficacy,andtoremind critical criminologists of the importance for developing critical perspectives forplace‐basedorecologicaltheoriesofcrime.Agriculturalcrimestudiesarediscussedintermsof theneedtodevelopacriticalcriminologyofagricultureand food.Finally,criminologicalstudiesof rural ‘others’ is used to show theneed for critical criminologists to givegreateranalytic attention to divisions and marginalities of peoples living in smaller and moreisolatedplacesbasedongender,race,andlifestyles,amongotherfactors.Keywords

Ruralcriminology,agriculturalcrime.Introduction

Over the past quarter century, criminology has witnessed a substantial growth of scholarlydiscourseaboutcrimeanddevianceinruralplacesandamongruralpeoples.MostofthisruralscholarshipwasdevelopedbycriminologistsinAustralia,Canada,GreatBritainandtheUS.Allbut Great Britain are settler societies with geographically vast rural expanses and historieswhen early settlement by Europeans was associated with frontier‐styled crime and violenceamong the settlers themselves, and between them and the Indigenous populations theydecimatedanddisplaced(Ford2010;Hoefle2004).Yet,inallfoursocieties,ruralityhasplayed

JoesphDonnermeyer,JohnScott,ElaineBarclay:HowRuralCriminologyInformsCriticalThinkinginCriminology

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andcontinuestoplayakeyroleindefiningnationalmythologies,oneofwhich,ironically,isthatcrime and disorder aremostly by‐products of urbanisation, and not endemic to rural places,cultures,orpeoples.Today,inthenationalconsciousnessofmostadvancedcapitalistsocieties,rural is associated with concepts that stereotypically speak of social order, safety and littlecrime (Halfacree 1993; Hogg and Carrington 2006; Philo 1997;Weisheit, Falcone andWells2006).Criminology has long held a distinctly urban bias. The same can be said about criticalcriminology(DonnermeyerandDeKeseredy2014).Despite therecentdevelopmentofamorecritical approach to the examination of rural criminological issues (Donnermeyer andDeKeseredy 2014; Hogg and Carrington 2006), ‘rural’ remains uncommon parlance in thescholarlyconsiderationsofmostcriticalcriminologists.This isnowchanging,albeitslowly, inpart due to the rise of green criminology and the recognition that environmental crime andjusticeissuesarefrequentlyrural‐locatedandadverselyaffectasignificantshareofruralareasand rural people (Ruggiero and South 2013; South andBrisman2013;White 2009).Aswell,scholarship which links rural criminological issues to larger cultural, economic and socialchangeandtheirimpactonruralcommunitieshashelpeddispelnotionsthatrurallocalitiesarecrime free (DeKeseredy and Schwartz 2009; Donnermeyer and DeKeseredy 2008; Hogg andCarrington2006;Barclay,Donnermeyer,ScottandHogg2007).In turn, both trends have enlivened what has largely been an atheoretical approach amongcriminologists who examine rural crime issues (Donnermeyer and DeKeseredy 2008). Eventhoughthere ismuchmoreprogresstobemade,perhapsit istimetoconsidertheproverbial‘flip side’ of the coin, which is how rural criminology can help advance critical criminology.Hence, the primary purpose of this article is to examine three areas of rural criminology inwhichasubstantialbodyofempiricalworkhasdeveloped,anddiscusshoweachcaninformacriticalcriminologyinparticular,andthelargerfieldofcriminologyingeneral.We temper our purpose with two caveats, however. First, we recognise that all roads toscholarshiparetwoway.However,theintentofthisarticleistoremainononesideoftheroad:namely, how rural criminology can inform critical criminology (for a view travelling in theoppositedirection,thatis,howcriticalcriminologyinformsruralcriminology,seeDonnermeyerand DeKeseredy’s (2014) application of a left realist perspective and the square of crime tovarious rural criminology topics). Second, there is really nothing new or original inwhatwesuggesteachareacanteachcriticalcriminology.However,wedobelievestudiesofcrimeintheruralcontextprovidevividandusefulremindersforcriminologicalscholarswithacriticalbentto their work about the value of what they do and why various critical perspectives are soimportant to sustaininga criminological imaginationof the rural (CarringtonandHogg2002;Young,2011;Wonder2009).The threesubstantiveareasweselected for thisarticleare:(1) ruralcommunitiesandcrime;(2)agriculturalcrime;and(3) rural ‘otherness’.Wechose these threeareas for twoprincipalreasons. First, we are familiar with the extant rural scholarship in each. Second, and moreimportantly, we believe each serves a distinctive function central to the work of criticalcriminologists (Michalowki 2012; Winlow and Atkinson 2013; Young 2011). These are:criticism,thatis,topointoutshortcomingsandfallaciesinmainstreamcriminologicalconceptsand theories;problem‐solving, that is, toprovideanswersand insights to importantquestionsabout crimeandsociety; andproblemanalysis,which is to construct interpretive frameworksforissuesaboutcrimeanddeviance.Wewillmostlyusethediscussionofruralcommunityandcrime to criticize mainstream criminology, apply the literature on agricultural crime forproblem‐solving,andillustrateproblemanalysisbydiscussingrural‘otherness’.Webeginthispaperwithfourassertionsabouttherelationshipofruralcriminologytocriticalcriminology and to criminology in general. First, as already mentioned, rural criminology is


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neitheraneglectednorunderdevelopedareaofinterestamongcriminologyscholarstoday.Justsince the turnof thecentury, anumberofmonographs, readers, journalarticles, conferences,and even the founding of a rural‐dedicated journal have helped provide an identity to acriminological specialisation that only a short time before was virtually neglected.1 Second,despite its recent emergence, however, rural criminology is still not a ‘major player’ in thegeneral field of criminology. Without a doubt, participants in various criminologicalconferences, such as the annual meeting of the Australian and New Zealand Society ofCriminology,areawareofcolleagueswhoaredoingruralwork,butruralcriminology’simpactremainsminor.Third,ruralcriminologyistheoreticallyunder‐developed.Mostpreviousworklacks a clear conceptual focus of any kind, even though there are a few scholars who haveconsciouslyutilizedmainstreamtheories,suchassocialdisorganisationandroutineactivities.Fourth, there has been only limited cross‐fertilisation of ideas, concepts and knowledgebetweencriticalcriminologyandruralcriminology.Hence,byattemptingtoidentifyhowruralcriminologyinformscriticalcriminology,wehopeinturntosharpenthecriticalfocusofruralcriminologyitself.1. Criticising:Theruralcommunityandcrime2

Thereisadoubleironyassociatedwithstudiesoftheruralcommunityandcrime.First,muchoftheresearchexaminingvariationsincrimebythesocial,culturalandeconomiccharacteristicsofruralcommunitiesfrequentlycitesworkfromtheChicagoSchoolofSociology,inparticular,socialdisorganisationtheory.Thisisoneareaofruralcriminologywheretheoryhasguidedtheresearchtoaconsiderabledegree,albeitafunctionalist,non‐criticaltheorywhicharoseoutofattemptsinthefirstdecadesofthetwentiethcenturytounderstandcrimeinalargecitywhichwas rapidly growing at the time due to immigration from various European countries. Thesecond irony is that the empirical literature about the rural community and crime has greatpotentialtocritique–ifnotoutrightdiscard–thelogicbehindsocialdisorganisationtheoryanditslatter‐dayexpressions,especiallytheconceptofcollectiveefficacy(Sampson2012).Socialdisorganisationstartswith the fundamentalassumption thatplaceswithhigh levelsorexpressionsofcohesionandsolidarityhavelowerratesofcrime,whileplaceswhichdisplaylessorder and more disorganisation tend to have higher rates of crime (Kubrin 2009; Sampson2012). The theory is an attempt to show that place affects crime beyond the demographiccomposition of its residents. As Kubrin (2009: 227) sums it up: ‘What social disorganizationtheoryhastoofferthenisaspecificationoftheeffectsofneighbourhoodcharacteristicsonthecapacityandabilityofcommunityresidentsto implementandmaintainpublicnorms’.But,asbothMerton(1949)andGans(1972)askedmanydecadesago,forwhomarethepublicnormstowhichKubrin(2009)refersdysfunctional,andforwhomaretheyfunctional?Forexample,inhis1972AmericanJournalofSociologyarticleonthe‘FunctionsofPoverty’,Ganswrote(1972:276):

In discussing the functions of poverty, I shall identify functions for groups andaggregates; specifically, interest groups, socioeconomic classes, and otherpopulationaggregates,forexample,thosewithsharedvaluesorsimilarstatuses.This definitional approach is basedon the assumption that almost every socialsystem‐and of course every society‐is composed of groups or aggregates withdifferentinterestsandvalues,sothat,asMertonputit(1949,p.51) ‘itemsmaybe functional forsome individualsandsubgroupsanddysfunctional forothers.’Indeed,frequentlyonegroup'sfunctionsareanothergroup'sdysfunctions.

Despitethetheory’semphasisoninternalpropertiesofplacelikecohesionandorder,muchofthe research, both rural and urban, deals only with antecedent factors which stand in as‘proxies’,suchastheproportionofresidentswhohavemovedinand/ormovedoutrecently,therace/ethnicheterogeneityofthepopulation,andeconomicmeasuressuchasemploymentrates


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andpoverty levels (Bursik1988).Hence, it is assumed that ahigher thanaverageamountorrate of populationmobility creates disorder or disorganisation. The same can be said aboutrace/ethnicheterogeneity,employmentrates,poverty,andsoon.Theantecedentvariablesarequite popular because in part they are derived from census information and other easilyaccessedsecondarydatasources,andarereadilyamenabletostatisticalmanipulation.Likewise,only a small part of the empirical literature based on social disorganisation theory usesanythingotherthanofficialstatisticsforthedependentvariable,suchascrimesreportedtothepolice or arrest rates, because of easier accessibility and isomorphism tomathematical/statisticalmanipulation(KaylenandPridemore2011;WarnerandPierce1993).Recentattemptsadheremorecloselytotheoriginalideabehindthetheory,whichistomeasureinformalsocialcontrolasaconditionoflocalisedsocialstructure.Sometimesthisisreferredtoas the ‘systemic’ version of social disorganisation theory. Hence, the work of Bursik (1988,1999), Sampson (2012) and others have morphed social disorganisation into a series ofconcepts, the most popular of which is ‘collective efficacy’, but include other well‐knownvariants, such as civility or civic community/society, density of acquaintanceship and socialcapital.Admittedly,eachhas itsowndistinctivemeaningbut togetherthey formatightly‐knitclusterofconceptswithsimilarconnotations.Amongthefirstexplicitadoptionofsocialdisorganisationtheorytothestudyofcommunitiesand rural crime was an article published in Rural Sociology in 1993 on how off‐shore oildevelopment impacts rural parishes (equivalent to a county) in Louisiana, a state in thesouthernregionoftheUnitedStates(US)(Seydlitz,Laska,Spain,TricheandBishop1993).Theauthorsdescribesocialdisorganisationtheory inawaysimilar toKubrin’s(2009)summativestatement:

The theory proposes that massive immigration, which accompanies rapidindustrialization, increases population density, which elevates suspicion,anonymity and competition for resources; reduces concern for neighbours andsurveillance; contributes to poorer social relationships and poorer child care;increasesthe independenceof individuals;and impedes informalsocialcontrol.(Seydlitzetal.1993:97)

Theauthorsalsoutilisedwhat theycalled ‘relativedeprivation’ theory,which theydefinedasconsidering the localised effects of economic inequality in order to supplement socialdisorganisationtheory,inpartbecausetheywerenotcompletelyconfidentthatthetheorywasappropriateforthe‘boomtown’phenomena.Theauthorsconcludedthatsuicideandhomicideratesgoupduringperiodsofincreasedoff‐shoredrillinginparishesmorehighlydependentontheoilindustry,butthattherateofsuicideandhomicideisnodifferentbetweenparishesmoreoil dependent and thosewhich are less dependent on oil. In otherwords,while their resultswerenotinconsistentwithsocialdisorganisationtheory, itwasnotparticularlyhelpfuleither.For example, they note other researchwhich found that energyworkers coming into a ruralcommunityfromtheoutsidewerenotsociallyisolated,andfoundnoconnectionbetweentheirarrivalandariseincrime.TheSeydlitzetal. (1993)articlewas thebeginningofasteadyparadeofpublishedstudiesofruralcommunitiesandcrimeutilizingsocialdisorganisationtheoryoracloselyrelatedvariant(Barnett and Mencken 2002; Bouffard and Muftić 2006; Cancino 2005; Ceccato and Dolmen2011;DellerandDeller2010;Donnermeyer,JobesandBarclay2009;Jobes1999;JobesBarclay,WeinandandDonnermeyer2004;Jobes,DonnermeyerandBarclay2005;Kaylen2010;Kaylenand Pridemore 2011, 2012, 2013; Lee 2006, 2008; Lee and Bartkowski 2004A, 2004b; Lee,MaumeandOusey2003;LeeandOusey2001;LeeandThomas2010;Li 2012;MenckenandBarnett 1999; Osgood and Chambers 2000; Ousey and Lee 2010; Resig and Cancino 2004;SpanoandNagy2005;Tunnell2006;Wells andWeisheit2004,2012).Toagreat extent, this


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body of work was uniform because almost all focused on the traditionally cited and easilyquantifiable antecedents of social disorganisation, or tested mediating influences of a rurallocality’s social and cultural context on crime as the latter is measured by official policestatistics(crimesknowntothepoliceand/orarrestandconvictiondata).Of significance is that Mencken and Barnett (1999) and Kaylen and Pridemore (2011)discoveredno‘spatialautocorrelation’effectsinananalysisofcrimeinruralcountiesoftheUS,using various measures derived from social disorganisation theory. In more pedestriannomenclature,whattheyfoundwasthattheirunitofanalysis,apoliticalsubdivisionintheUSknownasacounty(ofwhichtherearemorethan3,000),wasviableformeasuringplace‐basedsocialandeconomicindicatorsthatmightbeassociatedwithcrime.Iftheyhadfoundotherwise,mostoftheruralcommunityandcrimeresearchmighthavetobethrownoutbecausesomuchofitreliesoncountyorcountyequivalentlevelmeasures(asindicatorsofneighbourhood‐likecharacteristics)tospinboththeirequationsandtheirinterpretationsofthestatisticalresults.In another study, Osgood and Chamber (2000) sought to explain variations in rural youthviolenceemployingthetenetsofsocialdisorganisationtheory.Theynotedadistinctivefeatureofnonmetropolitancountiesfrommetropolitancounties,namely, thatpovertyandpopulationmobilitywerenegativelycorrelated,whereas thedirectionof the relationshipwaspositive inthe urban setting. Hence, these two commonly accepted features of social disorganisationtheory,whichweresupposedtomeasuredisorder,didnotgohand‐in‐handintheruralcontext,whichwaswhyOsgoodandChambers(2000)didnotfindanassociationbetweenpovertyandarrestsratesforviolentcrimesbyruralyouth.Otherrural‐focusedresearchhasfoundthissamedistinctivepattern(BouffardandMuftić2006;Jobesetal.2004;KaylenandPridemore2013),indicatingalimitationtothegeneralisabilityofsocialdisorganisationtheory.WellsandWeisheit(2012)completedacomparativestatisticalanalysisofviolentandpropertycrimeratesfornearly3,000counties intheUnitedStates,usingsetsof independentvariablestraditionally adopted for testing social disorganisation theory (as measured by populationinstability,racialheterogeneity,povertyandfamilyinstability),plusciviccommunitytheory(asmeasured by owner‐occupied housing, church membership, voting rates). The socialdisorganisation variables were better predictors than the civic community factors across allfourtypesofUScountiesintheiranalysis,whichincludedmetropolitancounties(countieswitha city of >50,000) and three kinds of non‐metropolitan counties based on the size of theirlargestcityortown,butnonewithaplacelargerthan50,000persons.However,theamountofvariance explained declined by the population size of the counties for blocks of variablesassociatedwithboththeories.Simplyput, the results fromWells andWeisheit (2012) andmost of theother research citedaboveindicatesthatthetheoryislessthangeneralisablebeyondtheconcentriccirclesofcitiesand suburbs (Jobes et al. 2004). This is significantbecause although it is commonly assumedthatalargeurbanlocalityexhibitsgreaterdiversityinitsdemographiccharacteristics,itcanbearguedwithequalforcethatthereisgreaterdiversitybetweenruralplacesthanbetweenurbanneighbourhoods.Sincesocialdisorganisationtheory isa theorybasedonplace, its inabilitytoworkwellintheruralcontextbringsconsiderablequestionmarkstoitsoperatingassumptions.Oneofthemostcomprehensiveexaminationsandthoroughcritiquesofsocialdisorganisationtheorycomes from therecent ruralworkofKaylenandPridemore(2011,2012,2013).Theiranalysisisapoint‐by‐pointresponsetotheearlierpublishedarticlebyOsgoodandChambers(2000),becauseitsappearanceinCriminology(whichOsgoodsubsequentlyedited)makesitthemostfrequentlycitedarticleontherelationshipofruralcommunitycharacteristicsandcrime.Theytriedusingalternativedependentvariables(suchashospitaladmissionsforassault)andswitchedover their analysis fromUS sources of data to theBritishCrime Survey (mimickingprevious research by Sampson and Groves (1989)) to measure a full model of social


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disorganisation, rather thanonly the antecedents.Their remarkableand rigorous scholarshipaddresses both conceptual and methodological shortfalls of the theory. What was theirconclusion? To quote: ‘The most consistent finding, thus far, is a lack of support for thegeneralisability of the theory, as it has been tested, to rural communities’ (Kaylen andPridemore2012:148).Since almost all of the scholarship cited above uses official police data, hence defining andoperationalisingcrimeasthedependentvariableinasimilarway,thecorpusofruralworkdidindeed find a different pattern in the relationship of poverty and other communitycharacteristicswithcrime.Onepossibleexplanationisthatmanyruralcommunities(suchasintheUS)mayhavefewerpoliceresourcesandthepoliceemployedtheremaybelesswillingtorecognise certain forms of violence as criminal (Weisheit, Falcone and Wells 2006). Hence,crimegoesunreported.Perhaps, however, there is a more fundamental criticism of mainstream criminology’sassumptionthatplaceswithlowcrimemustalwaysmanifesthighlevelsofsocialorganisationor collective efficacy, while localities with high crime must inevitably display the opposite.Maybe the real issue is the logic behind the relationship of the independent variables to thedependent variables. It is quite possible thatmany rural communities have a social ormoralorderwhichkeepssomecrimessuchasviolence,bothintimatepartnerviolence(DeKeseredyandSchwartz2009)andother formsofviolenceaswell, in the ‘dark’ (Barclay,DonnermeyerandJobes2004:20;Carrington,HoggandMcIntosh2011;Carrington,McIntosh,HoggandScott2013). Hence, reporting violence is suppressed, which is functional for offenders but not sofunctional forthevictims(Gans1972). Ifnotsuppressed,or incombinationwithsuppression,perhapsparticularkindsofruralcommunities(andbyextension,urbanlocalities)simplyhaveahigh tolerance for specific expressions of violence. Either way, it is social organisation andcollective efficacywhich is creating variations in official ratesof crime, something that is notaccountedforeitherbythemainstreamvariantsofthetheory,orbytheempiricalworkthusfaraccumulated.Ruralcommunity,crimeandcriticalcriminology

Acoupleofdozenquantitativestudiesofcrimeratevariationsinruralcommunitiesusingsocialdisorganisationtheoryoracloselyrelatedvariantallseemtopointtowarditslimitedutility,ifnotoutrightuselessness,ascurrentlyconfigured.Itisunlikelythatthevarianceinofficialcrimeratesexplainedbymodelsderivedfromthesecriminologicaltheoriesandconceptswillincreasemuch, even though the number of peer‐reviewed journal articles and dissertations adoptingtheseframeworkswillcontinuetogrow.Howdotheseresultsinformcriticalcriminologyand,in turn, how would a critical rural criminology inform general criminology, aside from theobvious fallacies associated with using official police data and the tendency for manymainstream criminologists to engage in formsof abstracted empiricismby adopting a theorymerelybecauseitsconceptsarereadilyconvertibletonumbersandstatisticalequations(Young2011)?The first lesson is this: social disorganisation theory and like‐minded theories/concepts viewplace both holistically/one dimensionally and through a simplistic lens of linearities, withindicators of disorder or disorganisation on one end of a narrow‐minded continuum, andorganisation or cohesion on the other end, and a presumption that there is a positiverelationshipwithcrime.Acriticalcriminologicalapproachwouldassumeneitheraholismtothecultural, economic, and social contexts of places nor a consistent relationship between socialdisorganisationandcrime.Itwouldrecognisethatactorsmayoccupyadiversityofstatuses–asvictims,asoffenders,andas law‐abidingcitizens–at thesame timeandwithin thesameplace.There is not a simple dichotomy representing a homogeneous aggregation of law‐abidingcitizensandahomogenousaggregationoflawviolatorswhichcanbemeasuredthroughcensus


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dataandofficialcrimestatistics.Hence,thereisadiversityormultiplicityofcollectiveefficaciesat the sameplace and inwhich each residentmay chose toparticipate, if awareof themandwilling to get involved. While some forms of collective efficacy constrain more than enablespecifictypesofcrime,otherexpressionsofcollectiveefficacyenablemorethanconstrain.Second,thebodyofscholarshipassociatedwithruralcrimeandcommunityremindsusthatacritical approach should not conflate control and cohesion.While controlmeans to limit theactionsofindividualsthroughsanctions,cohesionreferstoagreementsaboutculturalmeaningsand the reciprocities embedded in human relationships. Hence, some forms of cohesionmaycontrollocalresidentssuchthattheydonotreportcrime,asBarclay(2003)discoveredinherworkonagriculturalcrimeinNewSouthWales(seenextsectionofthispaper),whichinturnallowsittohappenevenmore.Aswell,hegemonicpatriarchyperpetuatesalocalisedcontextinwhichviolenceagainstwomencanoccurrepeatedly,eventhoughitmayconstrainothercrimes,suchasburglaryorarobbery(DeKeseredy,DonnermeyerandSchwartz2009).Third, critical criminology can highlight relations of power in rural contexts and how suchpowerrelationsinformthedefinitionofcrimeandreactionstocrimeinaruralcontext.AsidefromHoggandCarrington’s(2006)workonthe‘architectureofrurallife’,therehasbeenlittleexplorationofhowideologyandmythoperatetoproduceaspecificcriminogenicorderatruralplaces. Reaction to crime in both rural and urban places is always aboutmore than just lawbreaking (Lee 2007). It has symbolic dimensions as expressed through a collectiveconsciousness; hence, the collective efficacy of a place should be viewed as simultaneouslyreducingthelikelihoodofsomeformsofcrimeevenasitcreatesconditionsunderwhichothersforms of crime can occur through selective citizen vigilance, uneven enforcement of criminallaws,andvariableprosecutionofcriminalcases.Byworkingfromimagesofplaces,whichare,to quote Liepins (2000a: 30), ‘temporally and locationally specific terrains of power anddiscourse’, we recognise that the simultaneity of social organisation to constrain and enablevarietiesofcrimeinthesamelocalitiesandamongthesameactorscanbeconceptualisedasanembedded expression of localised forms of economic, political, and other social structuralinequalities and segmentation/divisions in a population. Far from being disordered anddisorganized, crime is ordered and organized through place‐based expressions of collectiveefficacythatreinforceandareconsistentwiththeseinequalitiesandsegmentation.Thebottomlineonwhatruralcriminologycanteachcriticalcriminologyisthis:anyecologicalor place‐basedperspectivewill almost always bepart of criminology, but to endow itwith amorecriticalecologicalview,itmustrecognisethediversityofculturesandnetworkswithinthesame places; in other words – as Merton and Gans asked long ago – functional forwhom/dysfunctionalforwhom?2. Problemsolving:Agriculturalcrime

Even though agriculture inmany parts of theworld continues to relymostly on human andanimalpowertoproducefood,itisalsotruethatagriculturehastransformedintoahigh‐tech,capital‐intensive, multi‐billion dollar industry. Either way, agriculture for the most part hasdefiedacommonfeatureofcapitalismbecausethevastmajorityofoperations,eventhelargestandmostmechanised, are still family (not stockholder) owned (Lobao andMeyer 2001). Aswell, agriculture itself remainspart of the rural idyll (Philo1997), especially in the collectivepsychic of advanced capitalist countries, evokingpastoral imagesofpeaceful living and tight‐knitcommunities.Despite thefamily‐basisof farmingandthenostalgicviewswhichwith it isendowed,agriculturetodayisas‘business’initsorientationascanbefoundamongbusinesseswithinanyothereconomicsector.BasedonanumberofvictimisationstudiesconductedinAustralia,England,Scotland,andtheUSoverthepast30years,Donnermeyer,BarclayandMears(2011)concludedthatfarmcrime


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isbothextensiveandexpensive.Theftofmachinery, equipment, supplies, livestockandotherinputsnecessarytorunafarmbusinessisexperiencedbyover25percentoffarmseachyear.Furthermore,breakandenteroffencesarecommittedatabout8percentoffarmsonanannualbasis. Barclay andDonnermeyer (2011)note that this exceeds the rateof burglary forurbanneighbourhoodsincountriesliketheUS,asestimatedbynationallevelvictimisationsurveys.Inaddition to theft and burglary, illegal trespassing offences, often by hunters – which, bythemselves,arecostly–arealsofrequentlycommittedonfarms.Aswell,becauseoftheirsizeand the difficulty of detection by owners (and some even operated by owners), farms andranches may be the location for clandestine drug production, especially marijuana andmethamphetamines(BarclayandDonnermeyer2011;DonnermeyerandTunnell2007;Garriott2011;WeisheitandFuller2004).From a critical perspective, these rates of victimisation should be viewed as normal, notexceptional,andthechangingecologyoffarmcrimeassociatedwithitsindustrialisationisvitalformakingthislink(DeKeseredyandDonnermeyer2013).Forexample,thelocationofabreakand enter into a farm building, usually for the purposes of stealing valuable equipment andsupplies,isdirectlyrelatedtothelocationofastoragestructure,suchasabarnorshed,tothefarmhomestead.Whenthebuildingismoredistantand/ornoteasilyobservedbymembersofafarmfamily fromtheplacewhere they live, it ismuchmore likely tobe thesiteofaburglary(Donnermeyer,BarclayandMears2011;Hedayati2008).Agriculturaloperations locatednearpublic roads aremore accessible andmore likely to experience various forms of theft, illegaldumping,vandalism,andtrespassing(BarclayandDonnermeyer2011).Plus,manyagriculturalareas are subject to forms of urbanisation brought about by the consumption of rurallandscapesby tourists and recreationalists (KrannichandPetrzelka2003;LichterandBrown2011),suburbanandindustrialdevelopments,andahostofothereconomicandculturalfactorsthatincreasinglytietogethertheruralandurbansectorsofmanysocieties(BrownandSchafft2011).Farmsandranchesnolongerare,andreallyneverhavebeen,isolatedandautonomous–physically,culturally,sociallyandeconomically–andtheycertainlyarenottodayascapitalismand modernity penetrate into every nock and cranny of the world. Hence, from a criticalcriminology point of view, farms and ranches are not merely simple producers of foodcommodities. They are industrialists who produce food through capital intensive productionmethods,embeddedwithinglobalisedmarketingsystems.Agriculturalcrime,whenseenasaproductofafoodproducer’slocationinthecomplexwebsofeconomic,politicalandsocialclassrelationsofasociety,canblurthedistinctionbetweenvictimandoffender.Forexample,acombinedquantitative‐qualitativestudyinAustraliadiscoveredapattern which indicated a surprising degree of neighbour‐to‐neighbour victimisation amongfarmersthatwasenabledpreciselybythetypeofgemeinschaftrelationsthatmanymainstreamcriminologists presume to be expressions of collective efficacy and that supposedly describeneighbourhoods with relatively little crime (Barclay 2003; Donnermeyer 2007; Sampson,RaudenbushandEarls1997).Farmersasvictimsconsidered the impactof reportinga crime,especially stock theft, allegedly committed by a farmer‐neighbour in small agriculturalcommunities where norms may create forms of ostracisation against those who ‘dob in’ orsnitch to thepolice. In turn, thepolicepracticed considerablediscretion about responding toreportsofstocktheftbasedontherelativesocialstandingsofboththevictimandthesuspectedoffender within the community (Barclay, Donnermeyer and Jobes 2004). These place‐baseddynamicsarenotunlikethosedocumentedbyDeKeseredyandassociatesintheirexaminationof intimate partner violence, even though the two types of crimes are completely different(DeKeseredy, Schwartz, Fagen and Hall 2006; DeKeseredy and Schwartz 2009). As well,Carringtonetal.(2013)linktraditionaldefinitionsofmasculinitiesinfarmingcommunitieswithchangingmarketconditionstohighlightanincreasedpotential forviolenceagainstwomenonagriculturaloperationsinAustralia.


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Notonlyareagriculturaliststhevictims,theyarealsotheoffenders.Someareillustrativeofthephrase ‘crimesof thepowerful’. See, forexample,Basran,Gill andMacLean's (1995) researchconducted on violence against Punjabi farm workers and their children in British Columbia,Canada. As well, studies in other countries note the exploitative characteristics of farmowner/farmworker relations, especiallywithmigrant labour (Bunei, Rono andChessa2013;Rothenberg1998;RyeandAndrejewska2010).The phrase ‘food regimes’was created by sociologistswho study agriculture to describe theplaceoffoodproducerswithininternationalisedformsofcomplexcommodityproductionthatextend beyond themeans of the State to regulate in terms of environmental policies, labourlaws,andtheprice/distributionoffood(ButtelandGoodman1989;Friedman1993;McMichael2012).Itcanalsobeusedtorelocateagriculturalistsasoffenders.There are two potential forms of offending among those who grow or raise food forconsumption.First,agriculturalistscanbesimultaneouslyengagedinbothlegitimateandillegalactivities. This is called ‘pluriactivity’ (McElwee, Smith and Somerville 2011 Smith2004) andreferstoagriculturalistswhogrowcropsandraise livestockforthemarketplace,butwhoarelikewiseinvolvedinvarioustypesofcriminalactivities.Oneexampleisfarmerswhostealfromother farmers,suchasdescribed in theworkbyBarclay (2003).Anothersetofpluriactivitiesincludes food producers who use their land and resources for the production of illicitsubstances (Donnermeyer andTunnell 2007;Weisheit 1992). Still other activities encompassviolations of government regulations related to both flora and fauna. Previously, thesemighthavebeendescribedasatypeof‘folkcrime’(Gibbons1972);thatis,aslocalisedexpressionsofoppositionalbehavioursbyagriculturalists in response toState imposedgaming/huntingandotherlaws(Weisheitetal.2006).Althoughthisissometimesthecase,itisalsotruethatfarmersand ranchers can be integrated into complex networks engaged in various forms oftransnational crimes (White 2011). In essence, studies of farmers as offenders illustrate in adifferentwayhowactorsparticipateinmultipleformsofcollectiveefficacy.Asresidentslivinginruralplaceswithmanyotheragriculturalistsastheirneighbours,theyparticipateinlocalisedsocial structureswhich constrain crimewhile, at the same time, engaging in illegal activitieswhichinvolvetheirparticipationinnetworkswhichenablecrime(Barclay2003).Acriticalcriminologyapproachwouldseepluriactivityasarationalizedform(Mooney1988)ofexploitative behaviour, and would seek to link the specific or micro expressions of crimecommittedby agriculturalists to broader, structural characteristics of societies. Further,mostfarmersarenotsimplyautonomousproducersoffoodwhoactontheirowntomakealivingfortheir family. They are often members of a privileged capitalist class of landowners whoapproachprofitandefficiencyinmuchthesamewayasanyotherbusinessfirmwould(LobaoandMeyer 2001). Often, they are the local eliteswho react to economic, social and politicalpressures that extend well beyond their home communities (Lichter and Brown 2011;McMichael2008).Hence, for the agriculturalist as offender, behaviour is not situatedwithin local norms, but isembedded in the imperatives of world‐wide markets for goods and services and associatedState‐sponsored regulatory features of these systems. Thework ofWalters (2004, 2006), forexample,demonstrateshowacriticalcriminologystudyofagriculturalcrimecansituatecertainfarms as specific placeswhere forms of corporate crime related to the control of geneticallymodified organisms (GMOs) and themonopolisation of seeds are carried out.Walters (2004,2006)hasstressedthegeo‐politicalforcesthatthreatenfamily‐basedfarmingsystemsinmanycountries, and theresultantgrowthof internationalcorporationswhoareable tomonopolisesystemsof raisingcropsandanimals.Within thesebattlesover thecontrolof seedand livingorganisms, and concerns over the biological and environmental impacts ofGMOs, are family‐based food producers themselves. Taking the side of firms that seekmonopolisation of foodproduction places many family farms squarely in a complex web of exploitative capitalism


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becausetheyarethelocalagentsofinternationalisedandcorporatizedformsofagro‐biologicalcrime;thatis,crimesofthepowerfulwithinthecontextoffoodproduction.Further,thevestedinterestsoffarmoperators(andagriculturalindustries)toachieveefficiencyandprofitattheexpenseoftheenvironmentshouldbecomepartofacriticaldiscourseoncrime(Donnermeyer, Barclay andMears 2011;White 2011). Various practices, both neglectful andpurposeful,canresultinanarrayofenvironmentalharms,fromtheuse(andover‐use)offarmchemicalsandunethicalabusivepracticesagainstanimals,tothepollutionofwaterorwetlandswitheffluentfromdairies,irrigatedpasturesandgrazinglivestock.Agriculturalcrimeandcriticalcriminology

Therearetwofundamentallessonswhichruralcriminologycanteachcriticalcriminology.First,ruralcriminology’srelative lackof theory ismostapparent inpreviousstudiesofagriculturalcrime.Toagreatextent,theworkisdescriptive,especiallytheresearchconductedinAustralia,GreatBritain,andtheUnitedStates.Onlyonestudy,byMears,ScottandBhati(2007),explicitlyutilisestheory;specifically,avariantofroutineactivitiestheorytoexaminefactorsassociatedwith farm crime in central California. Like every other issue of interest to criminologists,agricultural victimisation should remind the critical criminology community that without atheory which contextualises farm crime within the structures of a society, abstractedempiricismreigns(Young2011).Agriculturaloperationsarecapitalisticenterprisesembeddedincomplex,globalisedcommoditychains, and farmers themselves are situated in localised expressions of their respectivecountry’ssocialclassstructure.AsHenry(2011)pointsout, farmersareasignificantpartofa‘productivistlandscape’.Henry(2011:207)quotesLowe,Murdoch,Marsden,MuntonandFlynn(1993:221)whodefinedproductivismas‘acommitmenttoanintensive,industriallydrivenandexpansionist agriculture with state support and based primarily on output and increasedproductivity’.WithoutanunderstandingofthewayagriculturehastransformedintoaFordistmodel of production, agricultural crime research will remain mired in low‐level empiricalstudies which estimate victimisation rates and statistically discover various geographicalfeatures of farm crime hotspots, but littlemore. This familiar lesson about the hindrance toscholarshipwhendata areuninformedby theory shouldnever be lost on criminologistswhoapplyacriticalperspectivetotheunderstandingofcrime(Young2011).Fortunately, there are several agricultural crime studies which hint at the potential of ruralcriminologytobeginthedevelopmentofacriticalcriminologyoffoodandagriculture.Thefirst(Armstong2005)isastudyofagriculturalcrimeinacountyofNorthernIrelandwhichborderson Ireland, and the experiences of agriculturalists before and after the peace accords weresigned and security forces on the borderwere closed down. Bunie, Rono, andChessa (2013)examined farmcrime inKenya,noting therelationshipof farmownersand farm labourers tounderstand levels of theft to agricultural operations. The authors observed that, when farmworkersarenotpaidontimeorpaidlessthantheywerepromisedbythefarmownersbecauseofthepinchinpricestoownersfortheircommoditiesbasedonglobalisedmarketconditions,these labourers lookedto the theftof farmpropertyasanopportunity tomakemoney,albeitillegally. Fafchamps and Moser’s (2003) examination of agricultural crime in Madagascardiscovered that crime increasedwith the isolation of rural areas and rural‐based gangswhooperatedbeyondthereachofthepoliceasanapparatusoftheState.AndSmith,BarrettandBox(2001)linkedculturaldefinitionsofmasculinityandinter‐ethnictensionstocattletheftamongsemi‐nomadic pastoralists in Kenya and Ethiopia. Finally, Carrington et al. (2013) describestructural level changes in farming with challenges to traditional definitions of masculinityamongAustralianfarmhouseholds,increasingthepotentialfordomesticviolence.


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Theworkof theseauthors isa reminder that farmersarenotsimple foodproducers, isolatedfrom political strife, ethnic tensions, labour relations and repercussions of the marketplace.Eventhoughtheydidnotexplicitlyemployacriticalcriminologyapproach(withtheexceptionofCarringtonetal.2013),theirrecognitionoffactorslargerthanthecharacteristicsofthefarmoperation itself showsgraphicallywhat ismissing frompaststudiesofagricultural crimeandwhy critical criminologists should address agricultural crime issues as indicative of thewaysvarious structural arrangements within a capitalist mode of production create criminogenicconditionswithinthefoodproductionanddistributionsystemsofsocietiesaroundtheworld.ThesecondlessonwhichruralcriminologycanteachcriticalcriminologycomesfromresearchbyBarclay(2003),Basran,GillandMacLean(1995),Bunei,RonoandChessa(2013),McElweeet al. (2011), Smith (2004), Walters (2004, 2006) and White (2011), among others. Thesestudies should serve as a reminder that food producers themselves can be the offenders,participating in multiple forms of collective efficacy. They steal, they violate environmentalregulations, they exploit labour, and they engage in other clandestine, illegal operations.Furthermore, some of the illegal behaviours of farmers are illustrative of ‘crimes of thepowerful’.Larger,corporate(bothnon‐familyownedandfamilyowned)agriculturaloperationsnotonlydisplace smaller, family‐based farms inmuch the sameway franchises (that is,Wal‐marting)areaccusedofunder‐cuttingfamily‐ownedbusinessesinruralcommunities,theymayalsomaximizeprofit at the expense of the environment, theirneighbours, and theirworkers.Evensmaller,familyownedfarmoperationscanbeexaminedfromtheperspectivethattheyarethelocalrepresentativesoragentsofacapitalistsystemwhichisexploitingandcausingharm(White2011)toboth labourand land.Regardlessof farmsizeandothercircumstances, therehasbeenlittleattentionpaidtoagriculturalcrimebycriticalcriminologists,andthereshouldbemuchmore.3. Problemanlalysis:Rural‘otherness’

Philo(1997)haspleadedwithruralsocialscientiststoengagewithneglectedrural‘others’whohavebeenpaintedoutoftherurallandscape.Inasimilarvein,MurdochandPratt(1997)havedrawn attention to ‘strange ruralities’ in order to highlight difference and division in thecountryside.Inthepast,urbanstudiesofcrimeanddeviancehavedrawnheavilyfromTőnnies([1887] 1955) distinction between gemeinschaft and gesellschaft. By doing so, they greatlyskewed thewayearly studiesof rural crimewere framed,whichmisinterpreted crime in therural context as either exceptional or a lagged effect of urbanisation, but never endemic orinternaltoruralcultureandsociety(DonnermeyerandDeKeseredy2008).Grounded in this distinction, two discourses haunt popular and scholarly accounts of ruralcrime.Theymayseemtobeopposites,andindeedtheyareinmanyrespects,buttheyarebestseen as the proverbial opposite sides of the same coin, albeit, a coin which is altogethercounterfeit. The first is the ‘rural idyll’ and the second is the rural as a place of ‘dread andhorror’.Gemeinschaft renderings of rural spacedrawonwhatBell (2006) has described as the ‘ruralidyll’.Wehavealreadydiscussedhowvariantsofthiscondescendinganddichotomousviewoftherural,asexpressedthroughthetheoryofsocialdisorganisationandtheconceptofcollectiveefficacy,aretheoreticallyflawed.Further, itenforcesanideologythatobfuscatesdepictionsofboth the rural and theurban for criminological scholarship. The idyll represents the rural asconsisting of simple, harmonious, cohesive and homogeneous communities surrounded by ahinterlandoffarmersandgraziers/ranchers,whicharelargelyfreeofsocialconflict(LockieandBourke 2001). However, the stereotype, which has become a rich resource for nationalisticmythologyincountriesfromAustraliatotheUS,isbothhighlygenderedandracialised.


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Referring primarily to the European experience, Bell (2006) argues the rural idyll to be asymbolic landscape into which various meanings of rurality are condensed. ‘Idyllisation’involves processes which produce stylised representations of the countryside, whilesimultaneouslyrenderingcertainaspectsofruralitymarginalisedandeveninvisible.Theidyllissymbolically and materially an exclusive and exclusionary space. With respect to this,idyllisationtendstoobscureaspectsofdifferenceanddivisioninthecountryside.Inthisway,itisideological.Idyllisation isoftenasymptomofurbanisation, the idyllbeingproduced in thecityabout therural. The idyll sources nostalgic urban yearnings for an imagined gemienschaft community,rememberedaspurer,simpler,morenaturalandmorestable. Itprovidesanescapefromcitylifeandtheproblemsconsideredtomanifestit(Short2005:134).Intheseidealisednarrativesof landscape, nature is a repository of everything civilisation is not: pure uninhibited, non‐rational and free of intent. Rural space is presented as a space of bucolic tranquillity andcommunionwith nature: an authentic place of retreat from pace of city life (Bell 2006: 152;DuPuis2006:126).Insuchrepresentationstherurallandscapemaybedevoidofabjectfiguressuchasout‐of‐controlteenagerswhoaredisrespectfulofallauthority(incontrasttocourteous,conformingyoungpeople),homosexuals, thehomeless andwomenworking the land (DuPuis2006:127;Short2005:145).Notablyhere,therurallandscapeisalsodevoidofcriminalsandcrime.Ifsuchthingsexist,theyareaproductofaninvasiveurbaninfluenceandofmodernity’spenetrationintoso‐called‘folk’societiesandIndigenouscultures.InAustralia,thebushbecameaplaceinwhichtraditionalvirtuescanthrive.Andso,whilethebush also signified danger in terms ofmarauding bushrangers, these dangerswere balancedagainst a belief that the bush broughtmen back to their natural state. A bushranger like theAustralian outlaw, Ned Kelly, was a criminal. Yet he possessed (masculine) qualities bothadmired and lauded. The cities did not produce an equivalentmythology. Less admired thanbushrangersaretheAborigines.TherewerenoAboriginalfolkheroes.Likecitymen,Aborigineswerepacified,emasculated.Indigenouswomen,ontheotherhand,becamesexualobjects.TheothernessofAborigineswasemphasisedwithreferencetotheirapparentunproductivity,livingoff the land rather than conquering it by changing the landscape to a productivist mode ofgrowingfood,raisinglivestockanddevelopingmarkettowns.Pioneering studies of gender and rural social life conducted over the last two decades haveconsistently shown rural masculinity to be narrowly constructed around traditionalconceptionsofgender (Alston1995;Dempsey1992;Poiner1990).Thisbodyof researchhasbeen largelyconcernedwithexposinggendereddivisionsof labour inagriculturalproduction,exposingthelongneglectedcontributionwomenmaketotheruraleconomy(Allen2002;Alston1995). While worthwhile, the impact of these social changes on rural men has gone largelyuntheorised.While there isawelcomed–andmuchneeded–growingbodyofcriminologicalliteratureonmasculinitiesandcrime(Carrington,McIntoshandScott2010;Collier1998;GaddandJefferson2007;Messerschmidt1993),therehasbeenlittleattentionpaidtothecomplexityofviolenceandmeninruralsocialsettings.Carrington’s(2007)researchhasarguedthatinterpersonalviolencetendstobeveryhighpercapita in rural settings, especially violence against women. Her findings contradict theconventionalwisdomthatcrimeratestendtoincreasewithpopulationsizeanddensity(HoggandCarrington2006:67).Abodyofadministrativedataconfirms thatruralmenhavehigherratesof intimatepartner abuse and sexual assault, and are2.6 timesmore likely to die frominterpersonalviolence(Carrington2007:91).Bycontrast,violenceinlargecitieslikeSydneyisreportedtobedeclining.Internationalresearchhasalsoindicatedqualitativedifferencesintheexperienceofviolencebetweenruralandurbanwomen.IntheUS,ruralwomenhavereportedhigher frequencies of physical and sexual abuse, compounded by significantly less socialsupportandlimitedaccesstoservices(Logan,Walker,Cole,RatliffandLeukefeld2003:83).


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Explanations for these higher rates of violence have examined rural ideology and theconstructionofmasculinityinruralcontexts.Strategiesthroughwhichmasculinityisproducedare historically and culturally contingent. In frontier societies, such as Australia and the US,exploitation and colonisation allowed for the development of the idea of specific ‘frontier’masculinities,whichachievedtheirownkindofsymbolicascendancyincolonialsocieties.Theseshared with earlier aristocratic and bourgeois articulations of masculinity a disdain ordevaluationofthefeminineandarelateddistasteforcivilisationandurbanisation.Indeed,thepervasivenessof ideasassociatedwith frontiermasculinitiesowedmuch to theway inwhichthecityor ‘culture’cametobecorrelatedwithfemininity.Forexample,theverynotionofthe‘wild frontier’ ispremisedon it being lawless,with survival represented as amasculine ideal(Liddle1996:373).Just as rural communitieshavebeen constructed innational cultureas symbolisingauthenticforms of community, rural men have also come to symbolise what comprises ‘authentic’masculinity in national culture and among urban men (Carrington 2007). Rural men areassociatedinpopularculturewithvisiblemarkersofstrength,physicality,courage,andpower(HoggandCarrington2006:164).Popularimageryofruralmenisregularlylimitedtophysicaloccupations such as farming, forestry or mining. In terms of leisure activities, there is anemphasis on outdoor activities such as hunting. Leipins’ (2000b) study of agriculture andmasculinity found that the media portrayed farmers as a select composite of masculinity,drawing on rugged, physically active outdoorwork.Masculinity is here defined according totasks performed, the physical features of men, or through occupational success, with only aselectcohortofmenlegitimisedas‘realfarmers’.Animportantelementindefiningmasculinityisanongoingstrugglewithnature,definedthroughthedisplayofaggressionanddeploymentofcombativemetaphors.Meanwhile, ruralwomenaredefinedby their lackof relationshipwiththelandanddoubtsaboutthedurabilityoftheirbodiesandphysicalcapacitytoengageinrurallabourlikeminingoragriculturalwork(Little2002:669).Similarly, Campbell’s (2000) analysis of pub drinking adds another dimension to ruralmasculinities. In his analysis, Campbell (2000: 566) describes after‐workdrinking bymen asboth‘conversationalcockfightingandthedisciplinesofdrinkingwhichareincorporatedintoaperformance of masculinity ... [which] are never directly mentioned or addressed byparticipants’.Hence,itsexclusionarybutinvisiblenatureislikethe ‘glassphallus’displayedatoneofthepubswherehisresearchwasconductedandwhichinspiredthetitleofhisarticle.The secondmyth about ruralitywouldappear,on the surface, tobe theoppositeof the ruralidyll.Whiletheruralidyllcreatesruralspaceasanobjectofdesirebecauseitisnoturban,ruralspace may also be presented as an object of dread because it is not urban (Bell 1997;DeKeseredy and Donnermeyer 2013; Scott and Biron 2010). There exists in cultural texts acountrysidewhichisdangerousandmalevolent,exposingthefragilityofcivilisationitself(Bell1997). There is a radical shift from romantic images of rural communities to images ofbackwardness and savagery. The secondmyth of the rural presents us with communities indecline, which are populated by ignorant and conservative people. This is a dystopian rural,which,asBell(1997)discusses,hasbeendepictedinpopularcultureasfilledwithgothicstyledmonstersofthekindencounteredintherecentAustralianoutbackhorrorWolfCreek(2005)orthe various renditions of the American horror film The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. It is alandscape of violence and rigid gendered divisions. This myth works to exaggerate rural‘strangeness’ and, indoing so,works tobroaden the assumedgulfwhich separates rural andurbanlife.Heretheruralorderemanating fromimaginedgemeinschaftqualities is turned inon itself,sothat what was normatively valued in the idyll becomes a source of the abject. For example,dense social networks and organic solidarity may produce and support violence, as seen in


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horror films in which traits that were legitimated in the idyllisation of the rural are nowpresentedasexcessive.Inbreeding,insularity,backwardnessandsexualperversion(incestandbestiality) are traits associated with the village idiot, white trash, hillbillies, rednecks andmountainmen.Incestanddegeneracyaretransformedintosymptomsofsolidarity(Bell1997:96;Bell2006:152).Even though the bush has largely been celebrated in Australian national mythology, forexample,thereareotherdarkersubterraneanculturalvisionsofthebushassociatedwithruralhorror (Bell 1997). From the earliest days of frontier settlement, people have ‘vanished’ inAustralia’svastexpanses,seeminglyswallowedupbythecountrysideitself.Thebushhasbeenhost to some of Australia’smost publicised crimes, from the ‘Ripper‐like’ Gattonmurders of1898tothemorerecent(1980)disappearanceofAzariaChamberlain,the‘backpacker’murdersofthe1990s,andthemurderofBritishtouristPeterFalconiooutsideAliceSpringsin2001.Insuchexamples, thebush isahostile environmenthome toatavistic typeswhopreyonurbaninnocents (Hogg and Carrington 2006: 4). The bush as a dark or alien environment is alsoexplored in popular culture, notably in a range of books and films, such asPicnicatHangingRock (1975),which draws on the themes of the bush as a place inwhich youngwomen aresexuallymolestedorvanishaltogether.Another dimension of crime in the rural context is its racial overtones. Hogg and Carrington(2006)identifytwothemesofrural‘crimetalk’–Aboriginalpeopleingeneralandyouth–withthe two often woven together. Inclusion of references to Indigenous crime operates tocontextualise and signifyuniqueaspectsof the crimeproblem inAustralia. If crimeoccurs in‘thebush’itisaproductofIndigenouspathologiesor‘race’relations.Presumably,townswithalowIndigenouspopulationdonotexperiencecrime.ItisnosmallironythatIndigenousAustralianswho,historically,havebeenviolentlydisplacedfromtheir landsandculturehavebeenrepeatedlycharacterizedasanuncivilisedpresenceinthereconstructedlandscapefromwhichtheyhavebeendisplaced.Onemarkofthisincivilityisaperceivedcapacityforviolence.Aboriginalsare‘outsiders’whodonotconformtoanimaginedsenseof‘community’whichpervadestheruralspacestheyinhabit.Aboriginalsare,againwithsome irony, ‘outsiders’ in rural space. The apparent ambiguous and inarticulate status ofIndigenous people within the rural social order stimulates fear: they do not conform to theidealisedimagesof‘traditional/tribal’Indigenouspeoplewhichdominatetheimaginedspaceoftheruralidyll(seeBell1997).Nordotheybelonginthe‘white’community.Theyarenotpartofthe landscape – not its past or its future. Similar perceptions of Indigenous people and thesettler societies which came to dominate them in post‐colonial times can be found in othercountries as well, and continues to contextualise their contemporary relationships withmainstreamsocietyanditscriminaljusticeinstitutions(Hazlehurst1995;Wakeling,Jorgensen,MichaelsonandBegay2001;WoodandGriffiths2000).A third dimension of problem analysis illustrated by rural criminology scholarship is thelocalisedcontextforruralresidents’constructionsofcrime(Young2011:83‐110).Forexample,oneofthefirstaccountsoffearofcrimeinaruralsettingwasO’ConnorandGray’s(1989)studyof the small Australian town of Walcha. Walcha was a relatively culturally‐homogenouscommunity with strong agricultural roots. In Walcha, crime was considered virtually non‐existentbut,ifcrimewasaccountedfor,itwasassociatedwithoutsidersandeventsthatboughtoutsiders into the town. This strong externalisation of crime can be partly explained byWalcha’sgeographicisolationandstrongintergenerationalandhorizontaltiestolocale.Theseties meant that, when crimes did occur within the community, they were not perceived asthreatening.Offenderstendedtobestrangersratherthanknownothers.Blamingtheoutsiderassistedinthepromotionofinternalsocialorder.Theauthorsarguedconcernaboutcrimemayactuallybeconcernaboutunwantedsocialchange–athreatto‘howtheplaceusedtobe’.Inasimilar vein,Dempsey’s (1990) study of community structure and social problems in a small


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Victorian town illustrated how labelling and social marginalisation of groups known as ‘nohopers’ assisted in theallocationofblame formostcrimeproblems.Likewise,Loader,GirlingandSparks(2000)showedhowcrimetalkwasusedinanEnglishvillagetohighlightdesirableandundesirablequalitiesofplaceandsocialactivities(seealsoJobesetal.2005).Morerecently,Lee(2007:121)studied fearofcrime in tworuralcommunities inNewSouthWales, arguingthatdivergent responses fromthesame townreflect thesymbolicdimensionsof crime in thelocalityandeachrespondent’sstakeinparticularformsofcrimetalk.Notably, given our consideration of crime‐talk, gossip is an important element in relationsamongpeople livinginsmallruralcommunitiesbecauseitprovidesameansbywhichpeoplecandemonstratetheiraffirmationofnormswithinthegroupstowhichtheybelongandthroughexpressions of shock and horror about crime events both local and non‐local, reinforcingconstructedperceptionsofotherswhodonotconformorwhosestatusismarginalizedbytheirgender,raceandlifestyles.Thetightorganisationofsocialnetworksamongestablishedgroupsat the local level facilitiestheflowofgossip(Elias1994:89).Gossipcanbeusedtoproduceastereotypicalrepresentationof theoutsider,but it canalsobeused to reinforcegroupsolidarity.Thus, gossipoperates toboth denigrate and idealise aspects of certain social figurations, especially when it isexaggerated.Whatoccurs,then,isaprocessinwhichthediversityandcomplexityofsociallifeis reducedtostereotypicalrepresentationswhichoperate tomaintainandreproduceexistingconfigurations.Praiseandblamegossiparepowerfultoolstoenforcegroupcohesion,butalsomarkhierarchiesbetweenestablishedandoutsider.Ruralothersandcriticalcriminology

Earlier,wearguedthatoneofthelessonstheaccumulatedresearchonruralcommunitiesandcrimecanteachcriticalcriminologyistheneedforthedevelopmentofacriticaltheoryofplace.One important component of this theory is the need to understand that rural places are‘contested’ in a variety of ways, including the ideologies which underpin publicly helddefinitionsofcrimesandoffenders,andof theways thesebeliefsystemsaffectpolicingstylesand the operation of the criminal justice system in non‐urban localities. Hence, a criticalcriminologyapproachto thestudyofcrimeandplaceshouldbemorethanaconsiderationofstructuralfactorssuchasinequality,povertyandmultiplecollectiveefficacies:acomplementaryconsiderationoffactorsfromaculturalcriminologicalapproachisnecessaryaswell(Muzzatti2012; Young 2011: 96‐98). Indeed, geography and place thus have a strong symbolic value(Liepins 2000b) in cultural constructions of traditional rural masculinities, racialisation ofIndigenousandotherruralpeoples,andother ‘strangeruralities’ (HoggandCarrington2006;Kenway, Kraack and Hickey‐Moody 2006; Saugeres 2002). The crime and justice realitiesaffecting rural places may be national and even international in scope, and may be largelyexpressed today through virtual or non‐physical communities (that is, social media);nonetheless,thesesocial,culturalandeconomicforcesshapehowpeoplebehaveattheplaceswheretheylive,workandraisetheirfamilies.Withoutadoubt,ruralplaces(andbyextension,urban)areconstructedandcontested.Second, the ideology of crime at the local level can be examined in relation to how ruralresidents talk about crime. Rural communities make excellent laboratories to aid thedevelopmentofcriticalcriminologyscholarshipbecause theirsmallerpopulationsoftenallowexpressionsofmarginalityandracialisationtobemorevividandpronounced.Hence,theextantruralliteratureisalessonforcriticalcriminologiststhattheruralcontexthasgreatpotentialforthestudyofalldimensionsofcrimefromacriticalperspective.Theresearchonhowcrime‐talk isconstructedintheruralcontextshouldalsoremindcriticalcriminologists that the threat of crime must be situated in terms of both the internal and


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externalsourcesof threat.Typically,externalcrimethreats involvestrangersandnewcomers,whileinternalthreatsareassociatedwithendogenousgroups,suchaslocalyouthand/orracialminorities who live there but are marginalised. Race was less of an issue in the ethnicallyhomogenouscommunityofWalcha,inwhichIndigenouspeopleweregeographicallyseparatedand living at an old mission site a number of kilometres outside the town. In this respect,WalchapresentsanatypicalcommunitywithregardtomoststudiesofruralcrimeconductedinAustralia.IncommunitiesexaminedbyHoggandCarrington(2006)intheirextensiveanalysisof lawandorderpolitics inruralAustralia,perceptionsofcrimeandcommunitywereheavilyinfluenced by race (Hogg and Carrington 2006: 161), which was also noted by Jobes et al.(2005).Fearofcrimeissignificantintermsofnotonlywhat issaid,butalsowhatisnotsaid.Hogg and Carrington (2006) have indicated that crime‐talk in rural settings tends to ignoreinterpersonal violence and exaggerate the extent of property crime. Similarly, Indigenousviolence ishighlighted,while ‘white’violence tends tobemutedandeven ignored, remaining‘hidden’andpervasive’(HoggandCarrington2006:149).Indeed,asScottetal.(2007:1)havenoted:‘…crimeoutsidethecity[inAustralia]isnotsomuchspatialisedasitisracialised’.Conclusions

Ruralcrimescholarshipisgrowing,but,evenso,itscontributionstocriticalcriminologyremainmeagre. The purpose of this articlewas to help ford the gap between rural criminology andcriticalcriminologybydiscussingtheextant literature inthreeareas–ruralcommunitiesandcrime, agricultural crime and rural ‘others’ – and how each displays lessons for theadvancementofacriticalcriminology.Each area was discussed in relation to distinctive functions – criticism, problem‐solving andproblem analysis –which the rich body of critical criminology has contributed in thepast tocriminologicalthoughtingeneral.Thestudyofruralcommunitiesandcrimedemonstratestheneedforacriticalanalysisoftheoryandconcepts.Inparticular,theruralworkoncommunitiesandcrimepointstothelogicalfallaciesofsocialdisorganisationtheoryandalliedconcepts,likecollective efficacy. Social disorganisation theory is not merely a weaker framework forexplainingvariationsinofficialcrimeratesinruralareasthaninurbanlocalities:itisseriouslyflawedwhenitassumesalinearityofhighdisorganisationwithhighcrime.Whattheruralworkhasshownisthatthere is likelynosuchthingasdisorganisation,onlyvariations inthesocialstructureor socialorganisationof communitieswithcrime(regardlessof the sourceof crimedataandofitsvariousflaws).Hence,formsoforganisation–and,byextensiontomorerecentcriminologicalexpressions,formsofcollectiveefficacy–areassociatedwithvariationsincrime.The important implicationof this lineof reasoning is that it allows for a conceptualisationofdiversity in social structure at the local community/neighbourhood level, shoving asidefunctionalist notions by Sampson (2012) and others who see collective efficacy as a onedimensionalorholisticcharacteristicofurbanneighbourhoods(and,byextension,ruralplaces)in order to establish linear relationshipswith crime rates. In fact, the rural literature tells usthat multiple forms of social organisation exist side‐by‐side, and each can simultaneouslyconstrainsomecrimeswhileeachenablesotherkindsofcrime.Theoveralllessonforacriticalcriminologyissimple:itistimetobegintobuildacriticalcriminologyofplace.The distinctive function performed by agricultural crime studies was problem‐solving.Specifically,theoverwhelminglydescriptiveliteratureonagriculturalcrimepointstotheneedfor the development of a critical criminology of agriculture and food. Agriculturalists are nolonger simply food producers but business people entangled in complex webs of globalisedcommodity chains. With the industrialisation of farming has emerged a high rate ofvictimisation of food producers. Even so, they themselves are often the offenders: they stealfrom their farm neighbours, exploit labour, ignore and violate outright environmentalregulations,andengageinillegalactivitiessuchasdrugproduction.Hence,thosefarmerswhoengage inthesepluriactivities illustratehowactorscansimultaneouslyparticipate inmultiple


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formsofcollectiveefficacy(thatis,oneasafarmer/neighbour/citizenandoneasamemberofanetworkofoffenders), andserves to reinforce the criticismsofmainstreamcriminology fromconsiderationoftheruralliteratureoncommunityandcrime.Scholarship on rural ‘otherness’, like the research on rural communities and crime, calls forcriticalcriminologiststobuildalternativemodelsoftheecologyofcrimefromthoseheretoforeutilizedbymainstreamcriminologists.Thevalueofthefunctionofproblemanalysisascanbeseen inruralstudies,suchas thoserelatedtomasculinities,racialisation,andfearofcrime, isthat cultural criminologists will find rural communities to be rich with opportunities forexamination of various aspects of exclusion,marginalisation anddiscriminationbyboth localresidents and law enforcement and criminal justice agency personnel. Rural places are nothomogeneous, as the rural idyll suggest. They are contested landscapes. In that regard, howcrime is talked about shows the way people who live in physical proximity to each otherconstruct perceptions about crime, and how these perceptions are shaped by factors bothexternal and internal to the locality. Hence, place‐based criminologicalmodelswould benefitgreatly from a consideration of the role of ideology in shaping localised forms of humanrelations(Liepins2000a,2000b).Even though itwas not the intent of this article,we recognise that there is a great deal thatcritical criminologists can teach rural criminology scholars. However, this already has beendiscussedinotherplaces(DonnermeyerandDeKeseredy2008;2014),eventhoughadditionaldialogueisbothneededandwelcomed.Hence,weinvitecriticalscholarstoturntheirattentionto rural issues of crime and criminal justice so that the growing cadre of rural scholars cannurturetheirsociological imaginationsthroughamorecriticalapproachtothesubjectmatter(Young2011).Correspondence: Joe Donnermeyer, Professor, School of Environment and Natural Resources,The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 43210, USA; Adjunct Professor, School of Justice,Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, 4000, Australia. Email:[email protected] For a comprehensive (butnot complete) bibliographyof the rural crime literature, see the referencesectionofRuralCriminologybyDonnermeyerandDeKeseredy(2014).

2Portionsofthispaperarefromtwosources:(1)Chapter3(CreatingtheCriticalinRuralCriminology)inRuralCriminologybyDonnermeyerandDeKeseredy(2014)and‘WolfCreek,ruralityandtheAustraliangothic’byJohnScottandDeanBiron(2010)inContinuum:Media&CulturalStudies24(2):307‐322.References

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