Understanding Criminal Networks: A Research Guide
Gisela Bichler · Social Forces · 2020
Reviewer: Jason Gravel, University of Pennsylvania Social network analysis (SNA) is not your typical research methodology; it is a world view masquerading as a mere statistical and methodological tool. The eclectic, multidisciplinary foundations of SNA are a singularly difficult hurdle to overcome for students (and teachers). This is a problem for graduate students who are busy enough mastering a single discipline. This is a problem for practitioners who have no time (or no real need) to review jargon, theories, and methodologies from different fields. Gisela Bichler’s Understanding Criminal Networks: A Research Guide is precisely what the burgeoning area of criminal network scholarship needs at its current stage of evolution: a handbook for a practical and realistic (i.e., not too idealistic, not overly prescriptive) approach to SNA in criminal justice and criminological research. Understanding Criminal Networks is designed as a graduate-level introduction to SNA for criminologists by a criminologist, a first of its kind. It is also intended to appeal to practitioners and crime analysts who may have an intuition that SNA could become a valuable tool for their methodological belt, but have to produce useful results quickly—not after 4–5 years of graduate school. Its target audience may not be seasoned criminal network scholars, but they would be missing out on the many theoretical innovations, Bichler contributes to the field in this book.