Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law

Team of researchers examines common core of populist and conspiracy mentalities

Interview with Johanna Rinceanu and Randall Stephenson, senior researchers at the Department of Criminal Law at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law in Freiburg, on what medical diagnosis and modern-day internet regulation have in common

Following the attacks by rioting youths on police officers in Stuttgart and the police violence against blacks in the USA, Max Planck Director Ralf Poscher explains in an interview the different cultures of the police in Germany and the USA and the possibilities of preventing discrimination.

Many publications by Max Planck scientists in 2019 were of great social relevance or met with a great media response. We have selected 15 articles to present you with an overview of some noteworthy research of the year.

A German law abolishes child marriages in general - not always in the interest of those affected

Stormed parliaments or racist attacks in the US and Germany: politically motivated violence is on the rise. Most of the time, these incidents seem to be isolated, the actions of individual perpetrators. Nevertheless, researchers do recognize terrorist patterns in these acts. James Angove at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law is exploring the question of how this “stochastic terrorism” arises and how it can be countered.

What objectives should a modern, enlightened penal system pursue? And how compatible is the idea of reintegration with the option of handing down a life sentence? Federica Coppola, a jurist at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law poses questions that lead her to the conceptual limits of legal practice. And she provides some surprising answers.

Hate speech, propaganda, and disinformation are increasingly presenting problems on the internet and social media. Efforts to regulate undesirable online content through platform-specific rules or legislation have been unsuccessful. Johanna Rinceanu and Randall Stephenson believe that what is needed is a more precise diagnosis of the underlying causes. Such a legal approach should be inspired by lessons from social medicine.

In Germany’s diverse society, law and order are not just overseen by the police and the courts. There are communities that have their own means of settling disputes: family clans with foreign roots, for instance, but also motorcycle gangs and so-called Reichsbürger (Reich citizens), who turn their back on the modern German state and long for a return of the days of empire. Hatem Elliesie of the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Halle and Clara Rigoni of the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security, and Law are studying this phenomenon.

Max Planck scientists cooperate with partners in around 120 countries all over the world. Here they write about their personal experiences and impressions. Carolin Hillemanns from the Max Planck Institute for Foreign and International Criminal Law spent seven months in California with her family. Here she met a bicycle thief, a lot of homeless people, just one Trump supporter and some remarkably friendly, generous neighbors

In no other federal state are as many people admitted to psychiatric units against their will as in Bavaria: the numbers add up to around 60,000 a year, almost two and a half times as many as in Baden-Wuerttemberg. Now the free state is revising the corresponding legislation. As in other federal states, this law will in future be known as the Psychisch-Kranken-Hilfe-Gesetz (Act on Assistance for Persons with Mental Illness). However, our author is critical of the new regulations and does not believe that they provide appropriate support for persons with psychiatric disorders. On the contrary, these patients are classified as a danger to the public.

State surveillance measures and their impact on constitutional freedoms have long been the subject of legal and political discourse. We began developing a concept for establishing a periodic surveillance barometer. Designed as a theoretically and empirically grounded instrument it shall measure and assess the actual status of surveillance. The pioneering project aims at making the cumulative impact on privacy through the various surveillance activities by security and prosecution agencies recognizable and quantifiable.

The COVID-19 pandemic has at times made it impossible to treat every patient with a life-threatening illness. There are no laws on triage. Which selection criteria – such as age or the likelihood of successful treatment – are appropriate and permissible, and who gets to determine them, is a highly controversial issue. What are the regulations in German constitutional and criminal law? Is ex-post triage a criminal offence? We have reviewed such ethical and legal questions with experts from several disciplines

Stopping burglaries before they happen? At least this is how commercial providers advertise their Predictive Policing software. The Max Planck Institute for Criminal Law conducted an evaluation study to find out whether or not this works. Such software was tested by the police in Baden-Wuerttemberg, and a pilot study assessed whether a higher risk of future residential burglaries could be predicted for certain residential areas. This is possible to a certain extent, but the crime prevention effects are moderate. The use of such software is the subject of controversial debate within the police.

Terrorism, cybercrime, and other complex crimes are leading to a paradigm shift in crime control on a global scale: A new architecture of security law is emerging, one in which criminal law is coalescing with other preventive legal regimes. These changes can enable a more effective control of crime. However, they often jeopardize the traditional rule-of-law safeguards of criminal law, unless a new architecture of civil rights and liberties is developed simultaneously.

A project at the Max Planck Institute for Foreign and International Criminal Law evaluates the treatment of sexual offenders in Saxony’s social therapeutic institutions through an analysis of the causes and rates of criminal relapse amongst sexual offenders, including an assessment of criminogenic factors, therapeutic measures, and the climate in the correctional facilities. In addition, the study analyses the life-courses of sex offenders after prison release and the recidivism influencing factors within the reentry process.