Welcome to the Stockholm Criminology Symposium

Your excellencies, prizewinners, participants, ladies and gentlemen. A sincere welcome to the Stockholm Criminology Symposium 2026.

It is my honour and privilege to welcome you to the Stockholm Criminology Symposium 2026, an annual international meeting place for criminologists, policy-makers and others with an interest in knowledge-based crime policy.

This year we have two main themes, which reflect the work of the two winners of The Stockholm Prize in Criminology 2026. The first main theme, A Better Understanding of Migration, Ethnicity and Crime, is inspired by the work of Professor Charis E. Kubrin. This means that the program includes interesting presentations on for example the relationship between crime and migration and ethnic, cultural or national background, and also on how we can work to reduce the risk for discrimination in the criminal justice process. These are undeniably important issues in our time, but they are also sources of polarization in the public and political debate. This has resulted in discussions about issues such as whether foreign background should be included in statistics and research – and if so, how much and in what form. For me, in my role leading an organization with a high level of criminological research activity, it has been positive to have the opportunity to learn from research in this area and develop a basis for our own strategic choices. And I cannot deny that I fundamentally believe that we all benefit if difficult issues in society are illuminated by open, diverse, and objective data and analyses.

The second main theme, The Power of Crime Prevention Programs, is inspired by the work of Professor Mark W. Lipsey. Under this theme, there will be a large number of presentations focused on both evaluations and other experiences of individual crime prevention programs, and also results and interpretations from so-called meta-analyses. Many children and young people are raised under challenging conditions, which means that well-planned activities and good collaboration are needed to prevent involvement in crime. It is therefore good to have access to carefully tested programs that evaluation research has shown to have positive preventive effects. This is knowledge that can be of great benefit to those who work with crime prevention, including actors like ourselves at the National Council for Crime Prevention, who have the role of advising others on how they can work to prevent crime.

In addition, we also have the ever present and broader theme Contemporary Criminology, with a large number of presentations that will provide us with an overview of the current state of the knowledge in many areas of criminology, crime policy, related fields of research, and experiences of decision making and practice.

The symposium also includes three major plenary sessions. The first is the opening discussion, which we call Prizewinners’ advice to Policy, where the Swedish Minister for Justice Mr. Gunnar Strömmer will pose questions that will be answered by the prizewinners Professor Charis E. Kubrin and Professor Mark W. Lipsey. The second is the Prizewinners’ lecture, which is held on the second day of the symposium, where the laureates will themselves present their work and experiences. In the evening of the second day, this will be followed by the grand prize ceremony, where the prize will be presented by Her Majesty Queen Silvia. The third plenary, lastly, is the Jerry Lee Lecture, which is held on the last day of the symposium. This year it is Professor Cynthia Lum, who will teach us about Field research and the 'special sauce' for institutionalizing evidence-based policing.

I warmly welcome all of you to these events and hope you will have three rewarding and inspiring days that will remain with you for a long time to come.

Jonas Trolle
Director General, the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention