Using the law to save the planet:Legal options to address climate change and ecological destruction

Climate change and ecological destruction are among the most pressing issues of our time. In this special issue, academics from various legal and empirical disciplines contribute to providing an answer to whether, when and how different fields of law can be used as tools to enhance sustainability and to address climate change and ecological damage. These include (international) criminal law, liability and tort law, European law and regulations, competition law, corporate law, private law and tax law. These contributions were initially presented and discussed at a seminar held at the Erasmus University Rotterdam in May 2022. This editorial introduces the subject, discusses recent international developments and legal achievements to address the current ecological crisis, and describes how the law is increasingly mobilised from the ground up, by non-government organisations and individual legal professionals. It then progresses by summarising the keynote lecture of the seminar, given by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Toxics and Human Rights. After this, all contributions to this special issue are shortly introduced and summarised.</p

The space-time budget method in criminological research

This article reviews the Space-Time Budget method developed by Wikström and colleagues and particularly discusses its relevance for criminological research. The Space-Time Budget method is a data collection instrument aimed at recording, retrospectively, on an hour-by-hour basis, the whereabouts and activities of respondents during four days in the week before the interview. The method includes items about criminologically relevant events, such as offending and victimization. We demonstrate that the method can be very useful in criminology, because it enables the study of situational causes of crime and victimization, because it enables detailed measurement of theoretical concepts such as individual lifestyles and individual routine activities, and because it enables the study of adolescents’ whereabouts, which extends the traditional focus on residential neighborhoods. The present article provides the historical background of the method, explains how the method can be applied, presents validation results based on data from 843 secondary school students in the Netherlands and describes the methods’ strengths and weaknesses. Two case studies are summarized to illustrate the usefulness of the method in criminological research. The article concludes with some anticipated future developments and recommendations on further readings

The Putative Effect of Identity on Extremist Radicalization:A Systematic Review of Quantitative Studies

Despite its prominence in radicalization models, we lack an integrated understanding of how, when, and to what extent identity causes or prevents extremist radicalization. In this systematic review we therefore inventoried the various conceptualizations of identity as determinant of extremist radicalization in quantitative research, and evaluated their effect. Synthesis of 75 studies revealed that the majority examined social and contextual identity concepts, around a quarter investigated identity needs and motives, and only two tested personal and developmental identity concepts. While the link between some identity concepts and extremism enjoy good empirical support, many are in need of further scrutiny.</p