Conclusion: A Criminological Paradigm Shift

Abstract

We have argued that by framing sex offenders as monsters and sex crimes as monstrous we dehumanize and exclude them, thereby putting them outside the scope of preventive strategies. We have recommended a public health framework, and we have distinguished the two frameworks as “hot” and “cold” approaches to sex offending. However, we must conclude on a cautionary note. If we knit together the chapters of this book, they may constitute an argument for what Eric Janus calls the “preventive state,” in which the paradigm of governmental control is shifted from solving and punishing crimes that have been committed to identifying ‘dangerous’ people and depriving them of their liberty before they can do harm (Janus 2006, 93–94). By adding to criminal justice policy instruments of psychiatric diagnosis and categories of mental disorder – and a public health framework for deploying health care resources to criminal conduct reinterpreted as mental disorder – attention is inevitably directed toward a preventive approach to crime. If we, in addition, frame sex offenders as monsters and predators, we have a recipe for a civil commitment approach to at least one category of crime: sexual violence.