From Research Concept to a Max Planck Partner Group
Balkan Criminology has proven to be not only a scientific, personal and professional success story of its Head Prof. Dr. Getoš Kalac, but also a success story of international research cooperation between the MPICC and the Zagreb Faculty of Law, and via the Balkan Criminology Network towards all states of Southeast Europe. Balkan Criminology is a pioneering effort to establish a centre of criminological and criminal justice excellence focused on Southeast Europe and the Balkan region. It was originally developed by Prof. Dr. Anna-Maria Getoš Kalac as a criminological research concept for Southeast Europe, and presented to the scientific community back in 2012 at the conference of the European Society of Criminology (ESC) in Bilbao/Spain. In early 2013 Balkan Criminology was entrenched at the Zagreb Faculty of Law as a Max Planck Partner Group together with the, based on the decision of the President of the Max Planck Society – Germany’s most successful research organisation.
During the past 6 years Prof. Dr. Getoš Kalac and her team have conducted a total of 20 research projects, hosted or organised 5 conferences and 5 one-week intensive courses, held 15 panels at ESC conferences with a total of 65 BC presentations, issued 13 newsletters and by end-2019 will have published a total of 8 volumes in the BC book series (eds. H.-J. Albrecht & A.-M. Getoš Kalac). Balkan Criminology has thus generated 5 successful PhD projects, out of which 2 completed cotutelle PhDs between the Zagreb Faculty of Law (2015) and the MPICC, 1 completed PhD via the MPICC’s doctoral research school (2018), 1 submitted PhD by BC staff (2019), and 1 to soon be submitted PhD by BC ex-staff (2019).