Call for papersScience studies
Subjects
"Judicial" science: Oxymoron or paradigm shift?
Science judiciaire : oxymore ou changement de paradigme?
“Criminologie” Journal
Revue « Criminologie »
Published on Wednesday, June 03, 2026
Abstract
This special issue thus aims to contextualize this reconstruction of forensic science around the central concept of trace evidence, with the goal of identifying its challenges and highlighting its potential for practice, teaching and research.
Announcement
Argument
As early as 1963, Paul Leland Kirk, a chemist and microscopist who participated in the Manhattan Project and, who from 1937, served as director of the criminology program established at Berkeley (CA, USA) by August Vollmer, questioned the foundations of the sciences and techniques mobilized in support of investigations and justice, asking “[where is criminalistics, forensic science, or whatever it may be called, going ?” (Kirk 1963).
In the late 1990s, Pierre Patenaude, a professor of law and prominent Canadian jurist, examined the Quebec term “science judiciaire” (medico-legal science) (Patenaude 1997, 1998, 2000, 2003), which he considered to be close to an oxymoron, insofar as law is not scientific and science is not legal. He thus argued that “the experts in legal sciences are first and foremost judges and jurists” (Patenaude 2001, p. 1), preferring the use of “forensic science” (which while perceived as an anglicism, is actually a latinism) to designate disciplines mobilizing specialized knowledge in relation to “evidence.”
But what exactly are these disciplines, sciences, technologies and techniques ; these forensic science(s), medico-legal sciences, criminalistics, forensics, or “whatever it may be called” ? Regularly described as “junk science” or pseudoscience (Huber 1991 ; Fabricant 2022), they have been seriously challenged by several landmark North American reports, notably those of the National Research Council (2009) and the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (2016), as well as by Canadian contributions (Pollanen, Bowes et al., 2013).
In response to this crisis in the forensic services model (Roux, Crispino et al., 2012 ; Weyermann and Roux, 2021), a community of academics and practitioners proposed the refoundation of a unifying discipline recognizing the centrality of trace evidence, notably via the Sydney Declaration (Roux, Bucht et al. 2022). Early indicators suggest a positive reception to this proposal within both academic and professional communities (Ribaux, Fernandes et al. 2024), contributing to a paradigm shift that opens up new operational and scholarly perspectives (Crispino, Roux et al. 2019 ; Crispino, Weyermann et al. 2021 ; Crispino 2024).
This special issue thus aims to contextualize this reconstruction of forensic science around the central concept of trace evidence, with the goal of identifying its challenges and highlighting its potential for practice, teaching and research.
Topic
We invite contributions on the following topics (the list is not intended to be exhaustive) :
- The state of the field and critical analysis of practice
- Trace evidence as a scientific object
- Semantic or conceptual evolution ?
- Evolution of service models
- Evolution of the discipline
- Forensic science and digital transformations
- Trace evidence and investigation
- Trace evidence and justice
- Standardization, accreditation and certification
- From trace to evidence
- Interpretation or meaning ?
- The future of forensics or traceology
- Institutional and academic challenges
Submission guidelines
To submit a paper for this special issue, please send the authors’ names, affiliations and contact details to frank.crispino@uqtr.ca. Your proposal must also include a title and an abstract of 250 to 500 words.
The deadline to submit your proposal is July 20, 2026. Those selected will be invited to submit the first draft of their full paper by October 19, 2026. The drafts will be peer-reviewed, and the requested modifications will be expected by April 12, 2027. The articles are expected to be published in the Fall 2027 issue.
Guest editors
Frank Crispino, Vincent Mousseau and Maxime Bérubé
The Criminologie Journal
Founded by Denis Szabo in 1968, the Criminologie journal is published by the Presses de ’Université de Montréal. Among the first social-science journals in Quebec, it is today the only French-language criminology journal in North America.
Since 2002, Criminologie has also been available on the Érudit digital platform, where all issues since 1968 have been digitized and are accessible online. Since 2017, Criminologie has offered full open access to all of its publications. In addition, the journal’s online submission platform (http://www.criminologie.ca) allows authors to submit their scholarly articles. Each issue features around ten thematic articles as well as non-thematic contributions.
Subjects
- Science studies (Main category)
- Society > Sociology
- Society > Science studies > Philosophy of science
- Society > Sociology > Criminology
Date(s)
- Monday, July 20, 2026
Attached files
Keywords
- science judiciaire, science forensique, criminalistique, trace, paradigme
Contact(s)
- David Décary-Hétu
courriel : admin [at] criminologie [dot] ca
Reference Urls
Information source
- Lune Wagner
courriel : coordonnatrice [at] criminologie [dot] ca
License
This announcement is licensed under the terms of Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal.
To cite this announcement
« "Judicial" science: Oxymoron or paradigm shift? », Call for papers, Calenda, Published on Wednesday, June 03, 2026, https://doi.org/10.58079/16bzl
