The 23 member countries cooperate by recommending guidelines for legislation and practice; preparing policy statements on criminal law; and exchanging information and views through conferences, seminars, and publications. The Council convenes a crime policy conference every 5 years to evaluate current policies and forecast future crime and criminal justice problems. Priority issues include crime prevention; juvenile delinquency; child sexual abuse and exploitation; AIDS and other communicable diseases; and victim services. The main legal questions considered in recent years have been ways to limit the role of criminal law in some areas, due to its inefficiency and stigmatization, and to increase the role in other areas such as economic crime and environmental offenses. Efforts in penology have focused on alternatives to institutionalization, imprisonment, and capital punishment.