The first paper reviews and supplements current knowledge on weapons and violence. It charts trends in personal violence during the last two decades, assesses the evidence on the instrumentality of violence, considers how the general availability of guns influences their use in personal violence, and reviews the evidence on the demand for and usefulness of guns in self-defense. Another essay reviews and assesses recent burglary-relevant theory and research, followed by an essay on sociological perspectives on punishment; the latter offers a framework for analyzing penal institutions that can provide a fuller and more realistic account than the punishment-as-crime- control approach of penological studies or the punishment-as- moral-problem approach of the philosophy of punishment. An essay focuses on drug-control policies in Britain, which are perceived to allow a central role for medical practitioners and treatment philosophies in contrast with the enforcement-driven policies of the United States. The essay reviews and clarifies the background and continuing development of drug policies and drug problems in Britain, both of which often depart from the received understandings of the British system. Other essays address drugs and drug policy in the Netherlands; the motivation of the persistent robber; a historical account of women, crime, and penal responses; and the needs and rights of crime victims. Chapter references