Jonathan Simon

Jonathan joined the Berkeley Law faculty in 2003 and teaches criminal law, an advanced criminal law seminar on mass incarceration, sociology of law, and several classes in the undergraduate legal studies program (foundations of legal studies; prisons; punishment, culture and society).

Jonathan’s scholarship concerns the role of crime and criminal justice in governing contemporary societies. His past work includes two award winning monographs Poor Discipline: Parole and the Social Control of the Underclass (University of Chicago1993, winner of the American Sociological Association’s sociology of law book prize, 1994), and Governing through Crime: How the War on Crime Transformed American Democracy and Created a Culture of Fear (Oxford University Press 2007, winner of the American Society of Criminology, Hindelang Award 2010). His most recent books are The Sage Handbook of Punishment and Society (Sage 2013) (edited with Richard Sparks) and Mass Incarceration on Trial: A Remarkable Court Decision and the Future of Prisons in America (New Press 2014). Jonathan has served as the editor-in-chief of the journal, Punishment and Society, and is a reviewer for numerous law and society and criminology journals. He blogs at prawfsblawg and governingthroughcrime, and you can follow him on twitter at @jonathansimon59.

Education

A.B., UC Berkeley (1981)
J.D., UC Berkeley (Boalt Hall) (1987)
Ph.D., UC Berkeley (Boalt Hall) (1990)