Abstract of the Jury report Willem Adriaan Bonger prize,
Leiden, 19 June 2009
At the 50th anniversary of the Dutch Journal of Criminology, the board of the Dutch Society of Criminology
has decided to award a very special prize to a Dutch criminologist that has in the last fifty years contributed
in an exceptional way to this professional field by his oeuvre. Because of the theme of this conference - the public role of criminology -
we have based our judgement primarily on the aspects of the contributions to a societal or public debate on crime and punishment,
as a public criminologist.
The jury consisted of Prof. Dr. Chrisje Brants (Penal Law, University of Utrecht), Prof. Dr. René van Swaaningen
(International and Comparative Criminology, Erasmus University Rotterdam) and Prof. Dr. Willem de Haan (Criminology, University of Groningen).
The work of eight criminologists has been discussed and has been reviewed in the light of the criteria mentioned.
The conclusion is that there is only one person whose contribution to the societal and public debate has left traces in the Netherlands and outside of the Netherlands; someone who started to develop new ideas to a consistent form for the occasion of his inaugural lecture, ideas that were scientifically a breakthrough and that in the course of time have influenced politics and policy. Ideas that stimulate thinking about apparent basics of crime and punishment, ideas that are prominently visible in the scientific discourse both national and international
The jury has unanimously decided to award the W.A. Bongerprize to Louk Hulsman.
The name of Louk Hulsman is tied to the abolitionist movement that called for the abolition of penal law. Abolitionism is nowadays seen as an unrealistic stance of the seventies. In doing that the quality and relevance of a number of issues in the work of Hulsman are denied, issues that make him an outstanding lawyer and criminologist.
Hulsman’s idea to abolish penal law is no more than a logical final consequence of the underlying thoughts about society, state and justice, and the way problems and conflicts are being dealt with, that was already taking shape way before the seventies, when he was working at the Ministry of Justice as a legislative lawyer. His first academic conclusions from that experience were to be found in his inaugural lecture (1965), to many still an eye opener even today. He argued that labelling is making the only difference between a criminalizable or non-criminalizable ‘problematic behaviour’. Decriminalization has a central place in his work. In 1968 he proves that not only deprivation of liberty is the problem but penal law itself, since the state steals the conflict from the actors involved, thereby creating an escalation of feelings of revenge. Harsher punishment leads to stigmatisation and social exclusion. His criteria for criminalisation (1972) are even forty years after he has written this, still often obligatory reading for students. Critical criminology and the concept of crime’ (1986) is often being cited in English publications, even recently (2009).
Second, his work has been very important for policies on decriminalisation (Report on decriminalisation, Council of Europe 1980), like the tolerant Dutch drug policy of which Hulsman is considered to be the founding father. Less well known, but at least as important, is Hulsman’s influence on the transaction options (the prevention of further prosecution by paying a proposed fine to the Public Prosecutor’s Office) in crimes, reducing the amount of prison sentences (1986).
Third, Hulsman was really a teacher. To realise an independent, creative and critical view on (penal) reality, one had to address education. He started activating learning programmes and an international focus on education in a time that still nobody was interested in that. Almost everything he has written starting in the seventies has been translated in many languages. We think it is likely that Hulsman is - maybe after Bonger - the most cited Dutch criminologist. His importance in mainly France and Latin America is substantial.
To state that Hulsman’s ideas were fashionable and they are now outdated is a misconception. His theoretical foundation, foreseeing a relativism of penal intervention, is still relevant, even for those who don’t share his conclusion of penal abolition. The penal law climate in the Netherlands has toughened and there is little space in Dutch politics to renounce the use of penal law as a means of solving societal problems. For those who want to criticise this repressive turn with firm arguments Hulsman’s work can’t be passed over. His work is seen as a precursor to restorative justice and mediation. The basis of his work is also important for transitional justice for criminologists like John Braithwaite.
Hulsman was much more than a criminologist who was sensitive for a certain Zeitgeist. He vowed for a society that was not based on exclusion and stigmatisation, but on inclusion and acknowledgement of diversity. His whole professional life he stood with passion for his unorthodox ideas and worked on developing them. Even when it was politically inconvenient and not accepted, he continued to voice his ideas with conviction and ceaseless energy. Hulsman was a thinker that considered everything as an opportunity to learn and that kept searching for possible explanations and solutions. He is the type of independent original thinker that criminology needs to stay sharp and critical and to stay in balance socially and scientifically, and that at this moment are hardly welcome in Dutch universities. The jury wants to emphasise that by honouring Louk Hulsman.
We regret that we will have to bestow this award posthumously because Louk died on the 28th of January 2009. The prize will be given to Marianne, his wife and Jehanne his daughter. Marianne has supported Louk in many ways and Jehanne has made an effort to keep Louk’s work alive after his death. To contribute to the latter, the jury has decided to publish a selection of his work that will appear next year under the editorship of John Blad, Chrisje Brants and René van Swaaningen.