Grenfell: From Crime to Social Harm

Professor Steve Tombs
Tuesday 13th November 2018, 3pm - 5pm, ARC/014

Seminar synopsis

We can of course agree that Grenfell was, remains and will continue to be a tragedy of immense proportions. But what does it mean to say this? Here I examine this question through the lens of social harm, and focus on the aftermaths and consequences of the fire; but in so doing, many of the factors it reveals also help to explain the presence and character of the factors which, in combination, helped to produce a fire which could have such devastating effects. The paper seeks to delineate, largely empirically (though suggestive of lines of conceptual development), the various, discrete ways in which distinct types of harms – physical, emotional and psychological, financial and economic , and cultural and relational – have been and will continue to be produced by the fire. Some of these are these are readily apparent, others of these are opaque and obscured. On the basis of these explorations of the range of social harms produced by the fire at Grenfell Tower, I conclude by asking what criminal justice can provide to the victims, survivors and other affected communities.

Professor Steve Tombs

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Steve Tombs is Professor of Criminology at The Open University. He has a long-standing interest in corporate and state crime and regulation. He works with the Hazards movement in the UK and has recently joined the Board of Inquest.

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