| Chairman, | John H. Wigmore, Professor of Law in Northwestern University, Chicago. |
| Ernst Freund, Professor of Law in the University of Chicago. | |
| Maurice Parmelee, Professor of Sociology in the State University of Missouri. | |
| Roscoe Pound, Professor of Law in Harvard University. | |
| Edward Lindsay, Of the Warren, Pa., Bar. | |
| Wm. W. Smithers, Secretary of the Comparative Law Bureau of the American Bar Association, Philadelphia, Pa. |
[[xv]]
EDITORIAL PREFACE TO THE PRESENT VOLUME.
By Edward Lindsey.
Any adequate study of the phenomena of crime and of the criminal must take into account the economic phase—must consider the subject matter of the study from the economic standpoint; for while few will follow the socialist theorists in the controlling importance they assign to the economic factors of social life it is nevertheless manifest that these factors are powerful elements in the totality of social conditions and must be given due consideration in the survey of all societal phenomena, including that of crime. The work selected to represent this viewpoint in the Modern Criminal Science Series is that of one of the younger criminalists—an able and thorough study of the effect of economic conditions on crime and distinguished by the extensive and critical use made of a wide range of statistical data.
William Adrian Bonger, the author of the work here translated, of Amsterdam, Holland, is a Dutch Publicist, a pupil of Professor Van Hamel, well known as one of the founders of the International Union of Penal Law and the most eminent of Dutch students of criminology. He was born at Amsterdam, September 6, 1876, and received the degree of Doctor in Law from the University of Amsterdam in June, 1905. The first part of the present work, which consists of a survey, with copious extracts and critical comments, of the previous literature upon the subject of the relation of crime to economic conditions is a revision of a thesis originally presented at the University.
Dr. Bonger is also the author of “Religion and Crime: A Criminological Study”; Leiden, 1913, and numerous articles in Dutch and German periodicals. Among these are the following in “Nieuwe Tijd” (The New Age), a well-known Dutch socialist review: “An Apology for War”, a critical review of “Die Philosophie des Krieges” [[xvi]]by Professor Steinmetz (1908); “Capital and Income in the Netherlands” (1910); “Marxism and Revisionism” (1910); “Crime and Socialism: A Contribution to the Study of Criminality in the Netherlands” (1911); and “Religion and Irreligion in the Netherlands” (1911). Two noteworthy contributions to “Neue Zeit” are “Cesare Lombroso” in Vol. XXVIII, number one (1910), and “Verbrechen und Sozialismus: Zugleich ein Beitrag zum Studium der Kriminalität im Deutschland” in Vol. XXX, number two (1912). In 1912 also appeared “The Social Factors of Crime and their Significance in Comparison with the Individual Causes” in Vol. XXIII of the “Tijdschrift voor Strafrecht”, the only Dutch journal of criminal law.
In the first part of this work, instead of stating in his own language the views expressed in the previous literature on the subject Dr. Bonger has by extracts from the various authors given us their opinions in their own language, adding brief critical comments of his own. The second part contains Dr. Bonger’s own discussion of the phenomena of crime based upon an unusually thorough collection of statistical data and the elaboration of his views. In the selection of authors from whom he quotes Dr. Bonger shows his sympathy with the social philosophy of socialism which appears as well in the exposition of his own explanation of criminality; but the facts which he collects together with the evidence on which they rest are so explicitly set forth and his own conclusions so carefully distinguished that the value of the study is not diminished even for those who are not disposed to accept his social philosophy.
Dr. Bonger sees clearly that the concept of crime is a social and not a biological one. It is the social value or harmfulness of acts or conduct that is involved in the concept and if we use terms that have a predominantly biological connotation such as “normal” or “abnormal”, we must be careful to distinguish that use as referring to a social standard or we will be in danger of a confusion of thought. That some of the acts which society has classed as crimes may be deemed pathological is incidental; it is not on this account that they are termed crimes but because they are socially detrimental. That some of the individuals who have committed crimes may be called “abnormal” is incidental; it is not because of this that they are classified as criminals. That the economic factor has a large influence in connection with that kind of conduct the social significance of which stamps it as criminal the author abundantly shows. The extent to which this is the case and the extent to which the economic conditions involved are inherent in our present social organization are [[xvii]]matters on which there will be difference of opinion with the author. Dr. Bonger’s expressed belief that his main positions will be received without sympathy in this country we venture to think will not prove to be well founded. On the contrary so clearly has he set them forth and so well has he supported them that they can hardly fail of appreciation. If this work serves to some extent as a corrective to a too prevalent tendency toward a confusion of thought between biological and social concepts and standards in the study of human conduct—and especially that kind of conduct which we have deemed so socially detrimental as to brand as crime—its inclusion in this series will be amply justified.