CRIMINALITY IN THE LIGHT OF ERIC VOEGELIN'S WORK:

PROPOSAL FOR A FOURTH CRIMINOLOGICAL PARADIGM

Abstract

This article analyzes the issue of criminality from the perspective of the philosopher and political scientist Eric Voegelin, proposing a fourth criminological paradigm: the paradigm of order through participation. Traditional criminological approaches revolve around three paradigms: the act-transition paradigm, focused on the perpetrator; the social reaction paradigm, centered on society and control instances; and the social interrelations paradigm, which seek to juxtapose the previous two. In the wake of Voegelin’s thought, this article proposes a perspective which goes beyond these historical paradigms. The paradigm of order through participation views criminality as a matter related to culture and civilization, more specifically to the lack of adequate symbolization by a civilization of the transcendent values that structure it. This new paradigm suggests that the problem of criminality can be analyzed from a field historically neglected by criminological studies: the investigation of the presence or absence, in any given society, of a symbolic structure referenced to transcendence. It is argued that this perspective offers valuable insights for understanding and preventing criminality, complementing and expanding existing approaches.