Professor Eugene McLaughlin receives the British Society of Criminology Outstanding Achievement Award 2025

Professor Eugene McLaughlin, leading criminologist at City St George's, University of London, was awarded the prestigious Outstanding Achievement Award 2025 by the British Society of Criminology (BSC) at a ceremony in July.

The award recognises his pioneering role in the development and promotion of academic criminology in the UK in tandem with his commitment to nurturing three generations of colleagues and students.

Professor McLaughlin is best known for his work on the mediatisation of crime and criminal justice and the politics of police reform. His current research explores: institutional scandals, trial by media and contemporary cults. He has authored, co-authored or co-edited numerous books, articles and chapters and influential textbooks and has held academic roles at the University of Hong Kong, the Open University, and the University of Southampton among others.

The Outstanding Achievement Award is decided following nominations from the British Society of Criminology membership and recognises a lifetime of scholarship.

Eugene has made a seismic contribution to British criminology on a number of different fronts.

His scholarship has produced a host of landmark theoretical, conceptual and empirical insights, while he has been central to the development of British criminology more widely, through his textbooks and other popular writings.

Achieving all of this in his own unstintingly modest way, Eugene has always made time to encourage fellow criminologists in the development of their own ideas.

The number of nominees, and the various ways that Eugene is connected with them - supervisor, mentor, co-author, etc. - attest to his kindness and generosity.

He is everything one could ask for in a scholar, colleague and friend.

This is such an immensely well-deserved accolade for a stalwart, hugely respected criminology colleague.

I would like to express my gratitude to the BSC Executive Committee and my proposers for this award. It is an unexpected honour! I am also indebted to colleagues and students that I have worked with, particularly at City St George’s, for their commitment to pursuing imaginative criminological practice.

When I decided to study criminology it was limited to a small number of university research centres specialising in postgraduate training. Criminology’s subsequent spread across UK universities, flourishing at undergraduate and postgraduate level is remarkable. It also holds a central place in the heated public discourse that constitutes a high crime society.

Today criminologists are under pressure to offer quick fix solutions to the ‘wicked issues’ of crime and criminal justice. The ethical challenge is to persuade impatient politicians, policy makers and commentators that ‘wicked issues’ have complex causes, few ‘oven-ready’ answers and unintended consequences.