Law with Criminology
Law and criminology address two dimensions of the same fundamental social question: how do societies define, respond to and manage deviance, harm and wrongdoing? Law provides the formal rules, institutions and processes through which those responses are organised; criminology asks why crime and deviance occur, what the social and individual factors are that shape criminal behaviour and whether the criminal justice system achieves the goals it sets itself. At the University of Liverpool, studying law with criminology means you develop both the rigorous analytical skills of legal reasoning and the social scientific perspective that criminology brings to understanding crime and punishment.
This three-year full-time programme includes a year abroad, giving you the opportunity to study law and criminology in a different national context and to develop a comparative perspective on both the legal system and crime policy. You will cover the core areas of English law, including criminal law, contract, tort, constitutional and administrative law and the legal system itself, alongside criminological theory, the sociology of crime and deviance, policing, the criminal justice system, victimology and penology. You will develop skills in legal analysis and argument alongside the research and critical thinking skills that social science demands.
Graduates from law with criminology move into a wide range of careers. Those who want to qualify as solicitors or barristers will need to complete the relevant professional training, and this degree provides a strong academic foundation for those pathways. Others move directly into the criminal justice system, working in probation, prisons, youth justice, police, victim support and community safety.
Social work, policy research, the third sector and a range of public sector roles are also common destinations, and the analytical skills developed transfer widely across professional contexts. Postgraduate study in law, criminology or social policy is also a natural pathway.