Inventing The Criminal: A History Of German Criminology, 1880-1945 (studies In Legal History)

Annotation. Recent years have witnessed a resurgence of biological research into the causes of crime, but the origins of this kind of research date back to the late nineteenth century. Here, Richard Wetzell presents the first history of German criminology from Imperial Germany through the Weimar Republic to the end of the Third Reich, a period that provided a unique test case for the perils associated with biological explanations of crime. Drawing on a wealth of primary sources from criminological, legal, and psychiatric literature, Wetzell shows that German biomedical research on crime predominated over sociological research and thus contributed to the rise of the eugenics movement and the eventual targeting of criminals for eugenic measures by the Nazi regime. However, he also demonstrates that the development of German criminology was characterized by a constant tension between the criminologists' hereditarian biases and an increasing methodological sophistication that prevented many of them from endorsing the crude genetic determinism and racism that characterized so much of Hitler's regime. As a result, proposals for the sterilization of criminals remained highly controversial during the Nazi years, suggesting that Nazi biological politics left more room for contention than has often been assumed Acknowledgments......Page 12 Abbreviations......Page 14 Introduction......Page 18 1: The Origins of Modern Criminology......Page 32 Medical Explanations of Crime......Page 34 Moral Statistics......Page 38 Studies of the ‘‘Criminal Classes’’......Page 42 Lombroso’s Theory of the ‘‘Born Criminal’’......Page 45 The German Penal Reform Movement......Page 48 2: From Criminal Anthropology to Criminal Psychology, 1880-1914......Page 56 Psychiatrists, Prison Doctors, and the Reception of Lombroso......Page 57 Degeneration Theory and Lombroso’s German Critics......Page 63 The ‘‘Born Criminal’’ Redefined......Page 69 Combining Biological and Social Explanations of Crime......Page 77 Conclusion......Page 85 Criminal Justice, Criminology, and the Question of Legal Responsibility......Page 90 The Question of Diminished Legal Responsibility......Page 96 The IKV Debate over the Treatment of Minderwertige......Page 100 The Juristentag Debate over the Treatment of Minderwertige......Page 107 Proposals for the Surveillance and Preventive Internment of Minderwertige......Page 113 Proposals for Sterilization......Page 117 4: Criminal Sociology in the Weimar Years......Page 124 ‘‘A Giant Experiment’’: Studies of Crime during the First World War......Page 125 Franz Exner’s Criminal Sociology......Page 132 Criminology and Criminal Justice in the Weimar Years......Page 137 5: Varieties of Criminal Biology in the Weimar Years......Page 142 The Creation of Bavaria’s Criminal-Biological Service......Page 145 Criticisms of the Criminal-Biological Service......Page 154 Psychoanalysis and Somatotyping......Page 159 The Search for Abnormal Character Traits: From Minderwertige to ‘‘Psychopathic Personalities’’......Page 161 The Search for Genetic Factors......Page 171 The First Twin Study......Page 178 Criminal Psychology......Page 185 Assessing the Different Trends in Weimar Criminal Biology......Page 191 Criminology and Nazism......Page 196 Anti-Semitism......Page 203 The Search for Genetic Factors Continued......Page 207 Friedrich Stumpfl’s Family Study......Page 208 Stumpfl’s Twin Study......Page 211 The Search for Genetic Factors Criticized......Page 218 Psychopathy: A Problematic Concept......Page 220 Challenging the Evidence for the Inheritance of Criminogenic Traits......Page 222 The Complex Connection between Character and Criminal Behavior......Page 224 Edmund Mezger’s Survey......Page 225 Franz Exner’s Synthesis......Page 231 Research on ‘‘Asocials’’......Page 237 Conclusion......Page 247 7: Criminology and Eugenics, 1919-1945......Page 250 Sterilization Debates among Weimar Psychiatrists, 1923–1933......Page 254 Weimar Bureaucrats and Politicians Respond, 1923–1933......Page 263 The Nazi Sterilization Law of July 1933......Page 271 Expanding the Definition of Feeblemindedness......Page 277 Feeblemindedness and Crime in the Sterilization Courts......Page 283 The Treatment of Criminals under the Marriage Health Law......Page 289 Debates about Expanding the Sterilization Law to Include Criminals......Page 293 Radical Schemes and the Murder of Criminals in the ‘‘Euthanasia’’ Operation, 1939–1945......Page 297 Conclusion......Page 306 Conclusion......Page 312 Bibliography......Page 324 Index......Page 362 Recent years have witnessed a resurgence of biological research into the causes of crime, but the origins of this kind of research date back to the late nineteenth century, when the theory of the "born criminal" was first proposed and debated. In this book, Richard Wetzell presents the first history of German criminology from Imperial Germany through the Weimar Republic to the end of the Nazi regime, a period that provided a unique test case for the perils associated with biological explanations of crime.Drawing on a wealth of primary sources from the criminological, legal, and psychiatric literature of the time, Wetzell shows that from the late nineteenth century onward, German biomedical research on the causes of crime predominated over sociological research and therefore raised the expectation for medical solutions to the problem of crime. Criminology thus contributed to the rise of the eugenics movement and the eventual targeting of criminals for eugenic measures, including sterilization, by the Nazis.However, Wetzell also demonstrates that the connection between criminological research and biological politics in the Third Reich was complicated. The development of German criminology was characterized by a constant tension between the criminologists' hereditarian biases and an increasing methodological sophistication that showed criminal behavior to be the result of complex interactions between heredity and environment. This trend toward increasing methodological sophistication continued into the Nazi era and prevented many criminologists from endorsing the crude genetic determinism and racism that characterized so much of Hitler's regime. As a result, proposals for the sterilization of criminals remained highly controversial during the Nazi years, suggesting that Nazi biological politics left more room for contention than has often been assumed. The Origins Of Modern Criminology -- From Criminal Anthropology To Criminal Psychology, 1880-1914 -- Criminology And Penal Policy, 1880-1914 -- Criminal Sociology In The Weimar Years -- Varieties Of Criminal Biology In The Weimar Years -- Criminology Under The Nazi Regime -- Criminology And Eugenics, 1919-1945. Richard F. Wetzell. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [307]-343) And Index. German criminology emerged as a recognized scientific field in the last quarter of the nineteenth century as a result of three interconnected developments: the emergence of a new German penal reform movement, the publication and reception of Cesare Lombroso's theory of the "born criminal," and an increasing interest in criminological questions among German psychiatrists.