Edited by Vasilis Galis, Helene O.I. Gundhus, and Antonis Vradis

Taking a critical approach, this book advances understanding of the social, legal and ethical aspects of digitalisation in law enforcement and the reliance on data-driven tools to predict and prevent crime. It shows how the proliferation of data analytics challenges citizens’ rights, at a time when what counts as ‘safety’ or ‘policing’ is being fundamentally transformed.

Cheltenham, UK · Northampton, MA; Edward Elgar, 2025.

by Jens Ludwig and Sendhil Mullainathan

Algorithms (in some form) are already widely used in the criminal justice system. We draw lessons from this experience for what is to come for the rest of society as machine learning diffuses. We find economists and other social scientists have a key role to play in shaping the impact of algorithms, in part through improving the tools used to build them.

JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC PERSPECTIVES VOL. 35, NO. 4, FALL 2021, 26p.