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Cultural criminologists have long been interested in the politics of crime and deviance, whether that be in relation to youth subculture resistance or the social reaction to transgression evident in the media construction of folk devils and moral panics. While contemporary ‘new’ cultural criminology continues to be focused on the situated experience of deviant ‘edgeworkers’, this chapter argues cultural criminology’s concern with the crime-media nexus provides particularly fertile ground for exploring insights provided by activists, academics, professional journalists and citizen journalists around informal interventions on formal criminal justice processes using social media and digital technologies. Drawing on examples from a burgeoning body of crime-media research, the chapter makes a case for ‘cultural criminology activism’, which, like activist criminology, is consciously disengaged from mainstream criminology’s alignment with the neoliberal-carceral state and its reformist agenda.

The stereotypes of the dodgy businessman and businessman gangster are established typologies in both the criminology and family business literature, but nevertheless, there is still an evident dearth of substantive studies on the topic. Family business scholars have begun to acknowledge the limited nature of such explorations of criminality in family firm businesses. The purpose of this article is therefore to review, synthesise and solidify existing research on this under-researched area of family business management.

This perspective article explores and synthesises the links between acquisitive crime, criminal predation and family business to address an identifiable research gap in the literature of criminology, entrepreneurship and family business. It examines the overlap between criminal activities and business practices, shedding light on how individuals in the family business community may become involved in criminal activities due to various factors, including coercion, addiction and financial gain.

This perspective highlights emerging research trends that have the potential to increase the knowledge about the “dark side” of family business.

Being a perspective paper this brief exploration of the literature can only cover a small cross section of the literature. A conceptual model emerges, which illustrates shared aspects of crimino-entrepreneurial identity between authentic entrepreneurs and criminals.

This perspective article scopes the extant literature covering the links between acquisitive crime, criminal predation and family business to help guide the direction of future research. The piece presents new perspectives on the intersection of acquisitive crime and family business, and its novelty lies in its synthesis of the disparate elements from the diverse literature to contribute to the said literature.

Murder is overwhelmingly a male affair (UNODC Global Study on Homicide, 2019). So, when women kill, their crimes gain a lot of attention and even more hysteria in both courts and media. This chapter will analyse the cases of Sally Challen, Belinda van Krevel and Maxine Carr to show that portrayals of women who are involved in killing exist on a continuum, from abused victims to those simply ‘born evil’ to the incomprehension of those whose crimes render them outside society altogether; or in simple terms, from sad, to bad, to mad. In all cases, the agency of the women is presented as incomplete or impossible, indicating our inability in heteropatriarchy to acknowledge that women are as capable as men of exhibiting the full spectrum of human behaviour. Denying agency, particularly to violent women, allows Western societies to avoid having to face and thus, attempt to understand, the female capacity for aggression.

The purpose of this paper is to bring to light the present civil and criminal asset forfeiture procedures within the South African context and to make suggestions for reform thereof. While there exists and is a need for constant change and reform of the law to ensure that it remains transparent, up-to-date and applicable to all means through which economic crime can be committed, South Africa lacks the necessary resources and attitudes to accomplish this essential goal.

The approach used in this paper is purely qualitative using journal articles, textbooks, reports, periodicals, speeches and legislation as its basis. It is through a consolidation of this literature that this paper was formed.

While South Africa’s present system of asset forfeiture is producing some impressive results, the process still has vast room for improvement. There are key areas which this paper outlines for reform. However, the probability of improvement is relatively low owing to the levels of corruption, illicit activities and attitudes of mistrust within the South African society at large.

The concept of asset forfeiture is not new to any international jurisdiction, let alone South Africa itself. However, this paper aims to give insight into the specific South African experience of this procedure and how it can possibly be improved within the specific context.