Question

Identify where Victimology is today.

Answer 1

The World Society of Victimology (WSV) was established in 1979 in Munster, Germany.  Benjamin Mendelsohn (1976) is supposed to be the father of victimology who was the attorney. Victimology is one of the branches of criminology. It scientifically studies the psychological effect of crimes on victims. The relationship between the victim and the offender. The relationship between the victim and the criminal justice system. They try to establish why some people are more likely to become victims than others thus by identifying these factors risk-reduction strategies could be discerned. It studies the kind of service the victim’s need (WSV) provides them with aid and assistant to cope with the situation. It helps the victims to come out of the traumatized situation.

The victimology includes other fields of study like psychology, political science, economics, sociology, and law, etc. The lawyers, counselors, medical professionals, and therapists work with all types of victims like disable persons, those who were targeted based on race, ethnicity, and hate. They focus to find out how the interest of the victim is overlooked by the justice system.

From its first emergence in the 1940s and ’50s, victimology is widely studied. By the 1970s it had become more focused on how to prevent victimization and help the victims to cope with the situation. On November 11, 1985, The General Assembly of the UN approved victimology as the “UN Declaration of Basic Principles of Justice for Victims of Crime and Abuse of Power”.  In today's time victimology studies the case under three categories these are:

1. Victim precipitation theory: The theory says that the offender precipitates the victim based on color ethnicity, sexual orientation, and gender, etc.

2. Lifestyle theory: The study suggests that some become the victims due to their lifestyle and choices the offender targets these people as they are the soft target because of their choices.

3. Deviant places: The places where the crime rates are higher and the chances of committing crimes are higher for example the areas where economically poor people live and they have no chances to move out of this place.

Victimology is widely used to curb the crime and find out the trend and offender’s modus operandi. It covers a wide range of topics like causes and consequences of victimization, Interaction with the justice system and the victims, and victims and offenders. It is widely used in Forensic psychology it is providing new understandings that can be well used in the criminal justice system. It is being used in training the law enforcement personnel as they are often the first targets of the offenders.

Victimology helps the forensic psychologist to understand the impact of the crime on the victim. Thus victimology is helping to reduce the crime by studying the psychology of the criminals.