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Of the approximate one million people who are registrable as blind or partially sighted nine out of ten are over the age of 60. One in seven of all older people over the age of 75 are registrable as blind or partially sighted. The vast majority will not be totally blind but will have some degree of residual vision. In the first of a series of articles highlighting the needs, difficulties and problems faced by older visually impaired people, Mark Davis, Community Care Officer - Older People, RNIB Social Services Development Unit, reviews the status of older visually impaired people through a series of official reports and outlines the problems they still face.

"Criminology, the discipline that informs our understanding of crime and justice, is facing an identity crisis. Long dominated by sociology's view of crime and its causes, criminology has recently witnessed the rise of a new cadre of academics who feel free to explore other explanations. Fairness and Crime: A Theory offers a comprehensive new perspective on criminal behavior that will reinvigorate the field and help us understand why we consider some acts criminal as well as why and how society should respond to those acts. In this book, Mark S. Davis connects the challenges of understanding crime and administering justice to common norms that guide behavior in everyday life. He contends that the exchanges society defines as criminal work basically the way as all other exchanges, and when offenders rob banks, bilk investors, or fabricate scientific data, they engage in a violation of fairness norms. Davis offers a theory that is informed by insights from game theory research, anthropology, law, organizational/industrial psychology, personality/social psychology, and sociology. He utilizes examples drawn from everyday life to illustrate the theory's concepts in detail. Fairness and Crime: A Theory provides a platform from which to explore the purposes of the criminal justice system. What are we trying to accomplish when we prosecute criminal suspects? While one answer is that we are trying to vindicate the moral order and deter future offending, another is that we are attempting to restore equity for victims caused by offenders' exploitative or retaliatory behavior. Davis contends that addressing unfairness is what the criminal justice system should be about. In rehabilitation we should be trying to inculcate fairness norms where they are absent or where they have been compromised"--

This Brief discusses the role of state-level criminal justice organizations in the prevention and control of crime and delinquency. State agencies play an important role in translating criminological knowledge into criminal justice policy and practice. Their unique position enables them to help bridge the divide between the academic and federal agencies, and local communities that need the knowledge. Using several examples, the author shows how state agencies have facilitated translation with varying degrees of success. The agencies covered include: state police/patrol, attorneys general, adult and juvenile corrections, and state criminal justice planning agencies. To a lesser extent they also include statewide organizations representing law enforcement, prosecutors, judges, probation and parole officers, crime prevention professionals, and victim advocates. Most statewide criminal justice organizations are in an excellent position to translate criminological theory and research into policy and practice. Some, like those administering federal monies, to an extent are forced into the translation role for their constituents. Others, such as departments of corrections, do so out of necessity or because of enlightened leadership. Still others, such as state criminal justice planning agencies, provide leadership in translation because of the broad umbrella of their responsibilities and the incentives their pass-though dollars represent. Regardless, state agencies provide an important link between academic institutions and the federal government on one hand, and local criminal justice agencies on the other. This Brief provides and important resource for navigating that link.