Journal of Contemporary Crime, Harm, and Ethics

Scholars have often coined terms to convey the significance of a natural historical period rather than a simple calendar definition of time. Historians have spoken of the ‘long nineteenth century’ and the ‘short twentieth century’ of 1914-1991, both of which bore witness to events of such significance in the realms of war, global politics, political economy, political philosophy, and cultural and technological change that it came to redefine their respective eras and set the world on a new historical course (Hobsbawm, 1994).

Therefore, it might be fitting to describe 2020-2021 as ‘the longest year’. Much has happened, and the shockwaves of the past two years will have criminological and zemiological reverberations that last long into the future. Therefore, this special issue contains criminological, zemiological, and interdisciplinary contributions that not only look back on the significance of what has transpired in this time, but looks forward to scan the horizon of what lies in the future for crime, harm, and justice in the shadow of the long year of 2020-21, and what intellectual tools we will need to keep track and make sense of them.