This module introduces you to the scholarship in criminological theory and the sociology of deviance from the nineteenth century to the present.

A unifying theme is the relationship between the problem of social order and strategies of social control as this has been conceived since the late nineteenth century. You will learn about the social and political context from which these various theories have emerged as well as their place within the intellectual development of Criminology.

This module will explore questions such as:

• How can we know about the true extent of crime?
• Are official data sources valid and reliable in informing crime-related policy?
• Can we predict future offending behaviour?
• How should we evaluate crime reduction programmes?

By the end of the module, you will have some of these answers.

You will be learning and working with different data sources related to crime and criminal justice, exploring data from police-recorded crime, the Crime Survey for England and Wales and criminal justice statistics from the courts.

You will develop highly valuable skills in data-handling and analysis during the computer workshops. You do not require any previous knowledge of maths or statistics. All you need is the willingness to learn and continuous practice.

Research provides an important means of producing knowledge and evidence within Criminology. It also contributes to the planning and evaluation of policies and provisions operating within the criminal justice system (CJS); an area of interest for criminologists. Focusing on real-world research in the ‘field,’ you will study the theoretical foundations of how knowledge and evidence is understood and produced and how this underpins the methods adopted by researchers.

You will explore the methods commonly used in criminological research such as:

• Quantitative questionnaires
• Evaluation and randomized control trials (RCTs)
• Qualitative interviews
• Ethnography
• New innovative creative methods
• Participatory action research

You will be able to engage critically with methodological debates within the field of Criminology and develop your own practical research skills.

In this module you will focus on the criminal justice response to children in conflict with the law.

The prevalence and nature of youth crime has been a persistent concern for society and is regularly subject to media and political debate. You will examine trends in youth justice policy as well as various possible responses to offending behaviour. You’ll focus particularly on the tension between conceptualising individuals as 'children in trouble' or 'children in need' and an explore how this shapes youth justice policy and practice.

Whilst the current focus on ‘child-first’ youth justice highlights the need to remove the label of ‘offender’, you will examine how far a ‘child-first’ approach is applied equally to all children. You will undertake a critical exploration of why some children continue to be stubbornly over-represented in the youth justice system and what efforts at diversion and decriminalisation might look like.

Many commentators claim that organised crime is one of the greatest problems facing contemporary societies. Law enforcement officials around the world have reported a significant increase in the range and scope of international criminal activity since the early 1990s.

Worldwide shifts in social, political and economic arrangements- often described as ‘globalisation’ - have opened up opportunities for organised crime groups. The extent of groups involved in transnational organised crime (TOC) and the profits made means TOC has become a priority area for governments around the world.

This module aims to provide you with knowledge and understanding of:

• The range, extent and nature of cybercrime in the 21st Century.

• The role of the Internet and other ICT in criminal networking, planning and communication for both cyber (online) and 'traditional' (offline) crime.

• The challenges inherent in responding to cybercrime and online aspects of traditional crime and criminality.

• Criminal justice and other (e.g. personal and private security) responses to cybercrime and criminality.

• The application of established criminological theories to cybercrime and online criminality.

Explore a range of topics and perspectives related to Contemporary Issues in Policing. This module will cover three key core areas:

• The role of the police in a contemporary and historical context
• Key policing concepts
• Contemporary issues related to policing in the UK

You will develop an understanding of contemporary issues in policing in the UK and critically consider the role of police officers within the criminal justice system. You’ll gain a critical understanding of key policing concepts such as police power, accountability and ‘cop culture’ and interpret theories in the context of policing.

The landscape of financial crime has dramatically shifted in recent decades, becoming a pervasive threat to economies worldwide and legal systems are constantly challenged to adapt. In this module you will delve into the core aspects of this complex field, specifically: fraud, money laundering, terrorism financing and the increasingly intertwined relationship between financial crime and cybercrime, where technological advancements often outstrip regulatory capabilities.

You will analyse how these crimes operate, including where appropriate, the implications of technology - cryptocurrencies, ransomware, dark web on these crimes - emphasising the inherent difficulties in effective legal enforcement.

In this module, you will gain a comprehensive understanding of the limitations of global and domestic regulatory frameworks, engage in critical analysis of leading cases and statute. You’ll acquire the knowledge and skills necessary to navigate the challenges of financial crime prevention and detection, while acknowledging the ongoing struggle of law to effectively regulate these activities.

The future of state-funded welfare is one of the most pressing social questions of our time. This module explores the history, purpose and politics of welfare states, examining what social welfare is, who it is for and how it should be funded and delivered.

You will consider the social and political debates that have shaped social welfare and trace their development over time. Topics covered may include education, health, housing, social security and unemployment. You will explore how welfare systems are funded, managed and organised and analyse the impact of social welfare cuts on poverty and social inequality.

The module also examines the moral and political tensions within welfare debates, such as distinctions between ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ recipients. Engaging with diverse sources—including academic texts, policy reports, and media—you will develop critical insights into the past, present and future of welfare provision.

How many advertisements have you already seen today? From moving billboards to advertisements between games on your phone - advertising is everywhere.

How many advertisements have you already seen today? From moving billboards to advertisements between games on your phone, advertising is everywhere.

In this module, you will learn how advertisers use language, visuals, sound and music to influence behaviour. You will discover how to differentiate advertising from marketing by examining hard and soft selling, influencer advertising and the role of “prosumers” on social media. You will explore consumer research to ask what makes a good advertisement. Rich examples show how advertising has borrowed from prose, poems and plays.

You will explore aspects of language including:

• Phonetics (sounds in a language)
• Stylistics (linguistic analysis of literary texts)
• Pragmatics (meaning in context)

By the end of this module, you will be able to analyse the creative use of language in advertisements, understanding the role that advertising plays in wider marketing efforts and reflecting on its uses in your future professional and personal lives.

In this examination of the evolving landscape of global power, we identify the forces challenging the world’s leading nations and explore the fluid nature of influence in the 21st century.

We will analyse the shifting balance of power, explore the relative decline of traditional superpowers and the simultaneous rise of new actors on the global stage.

You’ll be encouraged to consider how economic, military, and cultural influence is being reconfigured in a multipolar world, reshaping traditional understandings of world order. Crucially, we will also analyse the internal and external pressures these powers face, form rising regional actors, to the evolving nature of global threats, and the erosion of traditional power structures.

Through different case studies and theoretical frameworks, you will gain a nuanced understanding of the complex interplay between rising and established powers and the implications for global stability and future orders.

This module offers a critical introduction to the complex political landscapes of regions in the Global South, exploring how historical, economic and social forces have shaped contemporary states and societies.

You will examine colonial legacies and their lasting influence on political institutions, and the impact of external interventions on regions. The module also investigates the consequences of neoliberal economic reforms, the challenges faced during democratization processes, narratives of ‘development,’ and the dynamics of armed conflict and peacebuilding.

Consideration is given to grassroots activism as well as the role of regional integration and cooperation in shaping political and economic outcomes. Through these themes, you will develop a sophisticated understanding of power, resistance and development in the Global South.

Explore gender through a transnational and decolonial approach, as this module examines its intersections with race, class, nationality, sexuality, disability, religion and the environment.

You will analyse historical and contemporary examples from around the world, engaging with key debates that shape feminist research and activism. Drawing on diverse feminist perspectives, including Black, Indigenous and queer critiques, the module will challenge you to think critically about complex topics such as:

• Sex work
• Sexual violence
• Islamophobia
• Transgender rights
• Reproductive justice
• Ecofeminism
• Migration

The course also brings these perspectives and positions to bear on what it means design, conduct and reflect the researcher’s positionality in the processes and practices of qualitative research. Through these activities, you will explore how feminist theories connect with lived experiences and shape struggles for social justice.

Our everyday lives are saturated by images of all kinds. This module will introduce you to some key ‘ways of seeing’ our world of images. We will explore questions such as:

• How are images made, who gets to produce them and, importantly, from whose point of view?
• How do pictures circulate?
• How do viewers read and interpret images?
• Who gets to look and through whose eyes?
• How do these processes and practices relate to power?

We’ll consider these questions in relation to a range of media texts, from photographs and advertisements to television and film.

Learn about forms and methods of punishment today and historically and consider the place of prisons within this wider context. You’ll explore key theories and perspectives around the justification and limitations of past and present practices as you examine the shift to a prison industrial complex.

You will learn to ask key questions such as:

• What constitutes ‘punishment’?
• How have prisons evolved, and what perspectives have influenced carceral projects nationally and internationally?
• Who is most likely to be punished or imprisoned?

You will also question who is most likely to be subject to punishment or imprisonment and how this relates to wider social inequalities and demographic experiences of social control.

Throughout the module you will critically consider the role of reformative approaches to punishment as well as abolitionist perspectives on prisons and restorative and community alternatives to punitive punishment.

Green Criminology is the application of Criminological thought (concepts, methods, theories etc.) to environmental harm.In this module, you will engage with the increasing awareness of the damage contemporary industrial society inflicts on the natural world - and the urgent need for effective responses and solutions to environmental problems. You’ll focus on a range of environmental harms, whether or not subject to criminal control and you will examine society’s attempts to control them.

A relatively recent addition to criminology, Green Criminology draws on established traditions of examining ‘crimes of the powerful’ and focuses on a zemiological (harm-centred) perspective rather than legalistic definitions of crime. You will learn about the theoretical roots of this approach based on Ulrich Beck’s ‘Risk Society’, 'ecological Marxism' and theories of criminalisation and crime control.

An engaging and highly relevant module, Drugs, Crime and Society examines the nature and extent of drug taking in the UK and beyond.

We will:

• explore the difficulties of researching hidden populations, like drug users

• engage with theories of drug use from a sociological, psychological and cultural perspective

• consider global and national drug markets

• investigate the links between drugs and crime

• evaluate policing responses to drugs

You will be taught by research-active lecturers who will introduce you to the latest research in this field and contemporary debate. For example, you might study current research and publications concerning cannabis cultivation, world markets, and drug distribution among friends (also known as ‘social supply’).

This module focuses on the crimes that power makes possible. Criminological theory and research has traditionally prioritized the crimes of the powerless over and against the crimes of those that make laws, wield influence and capital or authorize State violence.

As such, this module will introduce you to theory, research, and case-studies on corporate and white-collar crimes, as well as state crimes like genocide and torture, in order to provide an analysis of the commission and punishment of such crimes.

Engage with the often-neglected, marginalised and overlooked needs of women within the fields of Criminology and Criminal Justice. This module explores how harm and injustice may occur in various ways and at various intersections, as well as the often-blurred boundaries between victimisation and criminalisation. Yet there is also a focus on power, protest and resistance and how this might play out in different contexts.

Indicative topics and perspectives related include:

• Women, crime and poverty in an age of austerity
• Domestic violence as a pathway to offending and
• The experiences of Black and minoritised women
• Women in the global south

You will engage with a range of sources that seek to decolonise ‘official’ versions of crime and justice and that encourage learning from lived experience.

Is there such a thing as a ‘hate crime’? Not according to the stance wholeheartedly adopted by the criminal justice system in the United Kingdom within the last two decades. In this module you will study a range of perspectives.

You will examine the notion that hate crime is socially constructed by a range of social actors, such as perpetrators, victims and police officers. In an interactive process, you will define whether an interaction is a hate crime or not.

You will consider the role of legal and academic definitions used to decide if something is a hate crime. You’ll explore these by placing them in an international context

Informed by the latest research, this module critically examines the complex interactions between the media and crime.

Included in this fascinating area of study are:

• theories of deviancy, moral panics and newsworthiness

• representations of youth and female offenders

• sex and hate crimes

• revenge pornography and cybercrime

• critical explorations of the use of media in the context of crime and criminal justice

We take a multi-disciplinary approach to the module so you will study key media concepts and then discuss how these relate to crime, deviancy and criminal justice issues.

The module assessment is both novel and creative. You will produce a media portfolio - completing a literature review on a topic of your choice - before engaging in a critical analysis using sources such as newspapers, documentaries or social media content. This approach helps to ensure that you develop a practical understanding of media analysis and of the representation of crime in the media.

Our academic staff research extensively in the areas of crime and media. They will use their research to guide lecture content and, where appropriate, will provide you with data from their projects to analyse and discuss.

Examine a range of sex crimes and forms of sexual offending as defined by the law in England and Wales. You’ll consider the wider social context which may explain why some sex crimes are defined by law and how new crimes emerge as the social context changes. Topics explored include:

• The extent of sexual offending
• How sex crimes are committed
• Who the perpetrators and victims are
• How sex crimes are dealt with by the criminal justice system, including the experiences of victims who engage with the criminal justice system

In this module you will research a criminological topic of your choice in much greater depth than you have previously.

The module is worth 40 credits, which is the equivalent of two optional taught modules. You are encouraged to undertake your own empirical research, using the methods and techniques you have learned in your second year to generate new evidence. There is also the scope to undertake a desk-based research project if you prefer. The dissertation will span the entire final year of study, but planning will start earlier in the previous academic year.

You will work independently on your project but will be supported by a Criminology academic working in the related field. Academic supervisors will oversee the entirety of your project and advise you on all aspects of it.

You’ll produce a dissertation proposal towards the end of your second year, apply for ethical approval to conduct your research early in your final year and finally, submit your dissertation, which will consist of a series of relevant chapters that collectively address a relevant research question.

Take an advanced look at how sociologists use paradigms, theories and concepts, as this module takes a deep dive into every stage of research.

Each week, you will explore a contemporary sociological study to see how key theoretical ideas shape research—from selecting topics and framing questions to choosing methods, interpreting data and influencing change. You will engage with a range of social theories, critically examining how they inform methodological strategies, site selection, sampling and the dissemination of research.

Running in parallel with your Independent Research Project, this module supports you in refining your conceptual approach and applying theoretical insights to your own work. By the end of the module, you will have developed a deeper understanding of the role of theory in sociological research and gained the confidence to use complex sociological ideas to shape and strengthen your own projects.

How are health and illness shaped by society? This module explores sociological perspectives on health, illness and healthcare, focusing on how social structures and inequalities influence health outcomes.

You will engage with key debates on medicalisation, health inequalities, mental health and the politics of healthcare provision, considering how forms of social organisation shape access to care and the experience of illness. The module also examines how health is central to social reproduction—the processes that sustain daily life and future generations—including the role of care work, reproductive labour and biopolitics.

Drawing on contemporary and historical examples, you will critically analyse how power operates in medicine, how bodies are regulated and categorised and how definitions of ‘normal’ and ‘pathological’ are socially constructed. By the end of the module, you will be equipped to analyse health and medicine as deeply embedded in wider social and political contexts.

We are living in an era of accelerating crises – of democracy, capitalism, environment, and governance itself – that are reshaping the 21st century global order. In this module you will examine these intersecting crises and their uneven social, political and economic impacts.

Moving beyond traditional political analyses, the module offers an original perspective on the complex interplay of technological disruptions, economic instability, health emergencies and geopolitical shifts. Informed by critical public policy, political economy and sustainability debates, the module explores how different actors, from international institutions to grassroots movements, attempt to contain these crises and how they are transformed by them.

Our understanding of power, security and governance is being reshaped by a world where crisis has become the norm. You will assess competing understandings and responses to ongoing challenges through in-depth case studies of specific crises, critical debates around their nature, and forward-looking research about their possible trajectories.

Why do we see gaps between what politicians say on immigration and what they do?

In the United Kingdom and in most of the Global North the movement of people across international borders is a key political issue of our time. The public, researchers and politicians across the political spectrum participate in passionate debates about immigration. Political parties make strong claims about how they would “manage” or “cut” migration, recognising that it is a key voting issue.

Meanwhile, the systematic study of human movement supplies us with robust evidence concerning such questions as:

• Is migration desirable or not?
• How should we understand its effects on origin and destination countries?
• How to address it in policy terms?
• Is migration a matter of human rights?
• Can border control be reconciled with respect for the rights of people on the move?

The module draws on cutting edge research in political science, international relations and similar fields. It equips you with fact-based evidence so that you can confidently participate in the ongoing societal debate on what it means to inhabit a world on the move.