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This chapter examines the scope and value of activist criminology, and questions whether it should be defined in relation to its means or its ends. It also outlines the nature and potential value of something that the author describes as Janus-faced criminology – an amalgam of activist and administrative criminology, and one which therefore straddles two very different sets of goals and priorities. To explore these issues, this chapter draws on some recent work that the author conducted in the UK with the cross-party parliamentary Youth Violence Commission. Ultimately, the author contends that Janus-faced criminology has its place in advancing the causes of social and legal justice in the years ahead.

The ever-changing educational landscape, exacerbated by recent events surrounding COVID, political and cultural unrest, necessitates educators who are antifragile, able to withstand pressures and thrive amidst uncertainty. To this end, the pilot study reported here aims to examine mathematics educators’ initial reflections on what it means to be a risk-taker in the classroom, what prevents them from engaging in instructional risks and what would support their instructional risk-taking.

The pilot study utilized interviews with participants, including four pre-service teachers who were enrolled at the university and seven in-service teachers who were employed on active PDS campuses within the school district.

Preliminary findings suggest teacher beliefs concerning risk-taking, the barriers to engaging in such behaviors and the support needed to be able to take instructional risks. Results highlight the role of school–university partnerships in cultivating a culture of risk-taking through active collaboration and dialogue.

These findings have important implications for universities and PDS partners engaged in preparing teachers for an educational field that is unpredictable and continually changing. Additional research should be completed in varying PDS settings.

Findings highlight the role of school–university partnerships in cultivating a culture of risk-taking through active collaboration and dialogue.

Educators are currently faced with an unprecedented instructional landscape. Antifragile, risk-taking teachers are needed who are adaptable and innovative, thus better equipped to enter the challenging and uncertain realities of education.

This study aims to provide information concerning practices for creating strategic plans in municipal policing organizations and their use in practice.

This study surveyed a sample of Canadian police services, including four of the ten largest services in Canada, to investigate their planning practices and the study’s findings to the results of a content analysis of strategic plans reported by Rogers et al. (2020). This study did not conduct content analysis and therefore relied on the findings of Rogers et al. (2020).

Some respondents indicated they do not apply some practices generally considered advisable. Other respondents indicated they undertake a practice even though doing so is not evident from a review of the associated strategic plans.

This study is based entirely on self-reported survey data. The study did not interview respondents to find out why they responded as they did.

This study points to specific improvements municipal policing organizations could adopt which offer the prospect of creating better strategic plans and better strategic planning outcomes.

Policing organizations are important institutions in society. As a regular part of their activities, they interact with a broad cross-section of the society within which they operate. This paper presents ideas concerning how policing organizations can improve how they adapt themselves to their social environment to improve those interactions.

No other study collects self-reported data on how police services conduct strategic planning and use strategic plans at this level of detail.

This paper aims to explore perceptions and provides insights, from students who volunteer in policing whilst also studying the college of policing licenced professional policing degree (PPD) in Wales. It examines issues that act as enablers and blockers to volunteering in this public service, which also provides opportunities to develop their employability towards the careers to which they aspire. The paper provides insights from students and makes recommendations of interest to multiple stakeholders locally, regionally, nationally and internationally regarding attracting and recruiting volunteers.

Focus groups were conducted with students at three separate universities in the South and West of Wales. These undergraduate students were volunteers in different police forces and agreed to take part in connection with their experiences. The results were analysed using NVivo to establish commonalities.

The paper provides empirical insights concerning the issues surrounding the way those undergoing the process for recruitment as volunteers within policing are either hindered (blocked) or assisted (enabled). It identifies specific problematic areas as well as areas which have been of assistance. Policy makers, educators and recruiters should be aware of such blockers and enablers when considering adopting volunteering as an opportunity to enhance student employability. It also has resonance for other forms of volunteering in alternate public services.

This research is limited to those volunteers who are undertaking the licenced PPD at three separate universities in Wales. Although the research adds to the broader evidence-base with regards to volunteering and its use to enhance employability.

The paper includes practical implications for multiple stakeholders including university programme educators, administrators and decision makers in policing with regards to volunteering, employability, programme structures and process management.

The research is based upon the experiences and perceptions of those individuals who are actually engaged in volunteering.

Disasters and other emergencies are increasing, with millions of people affected by events like earthquakes, fires and flooding. The use of mobile emergency alert systems (MEAS) can improve people’s responses by providing targeted alerts based on location and other personal details. This study aims to understand the factors that influence people’s willingness to share the personal information that is needed to provide context-specific messaging about a threat and protective actions.

Drawing on protection motivation theory (PMT), this study proposes and tests a model of willingness to use personalised MEAS that incorporates key factors related to an individual’s appraisal of a potential threat (i.e. perceived vulnerability and severity) and coping capacity (i.e. response efficacy and self-efficacy), with deterrents like response cost and privacy concern. This study uses survey data from 226 respondents in New Zealand and SmartPLS to assess the model.

The results show how willingness to use MEAS is influenced by people’s appraisal of an emergency threat and their perception of how using MEAS would help them to cope effectively. Fear and perceived severity are significant motivators of MEAS use, along with coping appraisal. However, when the negative influences of privacy concern and response cost are strong enough, they can dissuade use, despite knowing the risks.

The study addresses a gap in research on the use of alert systems like MEAS, which require sharing of personal information and continuous engagement such as the real-time disclosure of one’s location. It confirms the significance of factors not studied in prior research, such as privacy concerns, that can dissuade use. This study also extends the application of the PMT in the context of emergency management.

This paper aims to consider the training provided to Volunteer Police Cadet (VPC) Leaders in police forces across England and Wales who, as part of the wider policing volunteer family, lead organised youth development activities for uniformed police cadets.

An online ethically approved questionnaire was administered to volunteer leaders across six VPC schemes hosted by police forces in England and Wales. The sample population being selected due to their geographical spread across both nations, along with the similarities of their VPC schemes. The questionnaire collected demographic information of respondents, then used a blend of closed questions. Likert scales and free text boxes to explore attitudes.

The training for the volunteer leaders seems to focus on the mandated elements provided to protect the cadets from harm and also the organisation from litigation. With little development of additional knowledge, skills and behaviours (and in some cases required qualifications) to enhance the service and opportunities delivered to the young people by the volunteers.

Due in part to the limited response rate, this research cannot claim to be representative of all individuals engaged in this voluntary role; it does however provide insights into the training of such volunteers.

The research informs the decision makers of how the training of volunteer cadet leaders within forces seems to focus on the completion of the mandatory elements, with little further development of the volunteers to deliver both varied and challenging activities for the cadets.

The research provides an insight for decision makers on how the training of volunteer cadet leaders within forces seems to focus on the mandatory elements, with few opportunities for further development of volunteer leaders to deliver new, varied and challenging activities for the cadets.

The popularity of financial technology (fintech) is rising in society due to fintech's direct benefits to users. This digital-based approach is one of the outputs of the Industrial Revolution 4.0, which transformed the path of human history and resulted in the development of digital transformation strategy innovation, more commonly referred to as digitalisation. Previous literature has predicted that integrating fintech into waqf management will facilitate fintech's growth and expand waqf outreach in Malaysia. Therefore, this paper aims to examine the impact of “Industry 4.0” on the expansion of fintech into cash waqf in Malaysia.

This study uses Rogers' (2003) diffusion of innovation (DOI) model. In addition, a quantitative approach based on structural equation modelling (SEM) was utilised to analyse the relationship between awareness, knowledge, relative advantage, social norms, perceived trust and fintech adoption in waqf institutions by using the tool Analysis of Moment Structures (AMOS) version 23.0 with maximum likelihood estimation.

The overall indicate that perceived trust and social norms significantly influence the adoption of fintech by Malaysian waqf. At the same time, other factors such as awareness, relative advantage and knowledge do not appear to significantly influence the adoption of fintech amongst Malaysian waqf institutions.

This study contributes significantly to the current literature concerning the Fourth Industrial Revolution and the wave of technologies. In addition, this study supports relevant theories, including DOI and other technology adoption theories. Aside from this, the study provides empirical contributions to waqf management regarding collecting and distributing waqf, improving the level of regulation of the waqf institutions and enhancing trust between donors, waqf management and beneficiaries. This study is amongst the first in the area of waqf that focus on Malaysian waqf intitutions.

This is important for policy development to support the utilisation of fintech for waqf institutions, which leads to more transparency and efficiency.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-04-2022-0264

When retail businesses, especially small businesses with greater vulnerability, could not meet consumers in person during the recent pandemic crisis, how did they adapt to the situation? This study examined how small business practitioners (SBPs’) perceptions, trust and adoption intention levels for social media, as well as the relationships among these variables, changed before and during the crisis based on the integration of the contingency theory and the diffusion of innovation theory (DIT).

Online surveys were conducted with USA SBPs before (n = 175) and during (n = 225) the recent pandemic. The hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling (SEM), multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) and multiple-group SEM analysis.

The results confirmed significant sequential positive relationships between SBPs’ perceived external pressure and perceived benefits of adopting social media, which in turn led to their trust in and then adoption intentions for social media. Further, the comparisons between the pre- and in-pandemic samples revealed that SBPs’ perceptions and adoption intentions all became significantly higher during (vs before) the pandemic, but the structural relationships among these variables weakened during the pandemic.

This study uses a novel approach to integrate the contingency theory with the DIT to propose small businesses' perceptions, trust and adoption intentions for social media during the innovation decision process under rapid contingency changes. Our findings also offer practical implications including recommendations for small businesses’ innovation management as well as training programs.

The Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) for Higher Education in the UK focuses on maintaining, enhancing and standardising the quality of higher education. Of significant impact are the development of subject benchmark statements (SBS) by the QAA, which describe the type and content of study along with the academic standards expected of graduates in specific disciplines. Prior to 2022, the QAA did not have a SBS to which higher education policing programmes could be directly aligned.

Over 12-months, a SBS advisory group with representatives from higher education across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, The College of Policing, QAA, Police Federation of England and Wales and policing, worked in partnership to harness their collective professional experience and knowledge to create the first UK SBS for policing. Post publication of the SBS, permission was sought and granted from both the College of Policing and QAA for members of the advisory group to reflect in an article on their experiences of collaborating and working in partnership to achieve the SBS.

There is great importance of creating a shared vision and mutual trust, developed through open facilitated discussions, with representatives championing their cause and developing a collaborative and partnership approach to completing the SBS.

A collaborative and partnership approach is essential in developing and recognising the academic discipline of policing. This necessarily requires the joint development of initiatives, one of which is the coming together of higher education institutions, PSRBs and practitioner groups to collaborate and design QAA benchmark statements.

The SBS advisory group has further driven forward the emergence of policing as a recognised academic discipline to benefit multiple stakeholders.

The SBS for policing is the first across the UK. The authors experiences can be used to assist others in their developments of similar subject specific benchmarking or academic quality standards.