The emergence of criminology in Britain: A systematic review of the Journal of the Statistical Society of London, 1838–57

British crime research expanded significantly from the mid-1830s. Much of this first wave of empirical research was published in the Journal of the Statistical Society of London (JSSL), which had been launched in 1838. Following Radzinowicz and Hood’s (1986) tentative count of crime content in this journal, we analyse the first twenty volumes of the JSSL (1838–57). We use a systematic approach to describe the content of crime research published in this forum in the chosen period. We report findings on the number and share of crime related articles in the journal, who the authors were, the degree to which their work focused on crime, and their citation practices. In doing this, the article provides important new insights into the emergence of British criminology as well as a replicable approach that could be applied more widely in research on the origins and development of criminology.