Zemiology

Explanation

Zemiology (from the Greek zemia, meaning harm) is a field within critical criminology that examines the broader range of harms experienced in society—such as poverty, inequality, environmental destruction, and corporate wrongdoing—that often fall outside traditional legal definitions of crime. Zemiologists argue that many serious social harms are not recognized as criminal due to political and economic power structures. The goal is to shift the focus from individual deviance to structural injustice and to highlight how law itself can obscure or legitimize harm.