The 'new etiology' raised by the debate is more broadly based than in the past. Gottfredson and Hirsch have contributed with arguments about the conceptualization and operationalization of etiological research and its funding. Blumstein et al., who have done so much to attract government support for the funding of this research, have played a significant role in reasserting some of the research issues that have attracted this support and by reprising the research framework that organizes their work. A renewed research agenda is best developed, however, through conceiving crimes as social events embedded in the life course and best analyzed through the methods of event history analysis, using retrospective histories or prospective longitudinal data. These issues of conceptualization and operationalization are more important than some of the more specific questions emphasized thus far in the debate. 22 references.