Both policy oriented and context oriented historical statistical techniques used in criminal justice study usually focus on ill-defined global concepts based on incomplete understandings of society. Analysis of crime and criminal justice data should consider that all consistent indexes of criminal offenses are products of the criminal justice system. In addition, historical data sources are often inconsistent, and there is considerable inconsistency within some sources. Data collection often represents the largest portion of a research budget. Historical research also requires increased sensitivity to the creation of typologies. Five major models of quantitative historical research have been developed: (1) the evolutionary perfectability scheme, (2) the modernization hypothesis, (3) the urbanization thesis, (4) the industrialization thesis, and (5) the community to society thesis. Two less global models are the social control model and the constancy of punishment thesis. Although considerable interdisciplinary research has been done in the past, additional interdisciplinary research is needed. Areas requiring additional historical research include relationships between criminal justice institutions and other institutions, the effects which different criminal justice organizations have had on criminal and noncriminal behavior, the development of rural policing, the relationships between bureaucracies in the criminal justice system, the effects of political differences on the behavior of criminal justice systems, and the relationship between arrests and jail and prison capacities. Notes which include references are included.