Colleagues in the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice have been at the forefront of developing economic criminology as a distinct sub-discipline — and the Journal of Economic Criminology, founded in 2023, has been a key tool in that intellectual endeavour. Designed as an open-access, interdisciplinary outlet, JEC was created to give researchers studying fraud, corruption, cybercrime, money laundering, and illicit finance a dedicated home — connecting criminology, law, economics, and business rather than sitting within any single one.
In April 2026, JEC received its first SCImago global ranking — Q1 in both Law and Economics & Finance, in its debut rated year. When ranked by citation impact per article, the journal sits 25th out of 1,155 law and criminology journals worldwide. It has published 175 articles, accumulated over 800 citations, and 95% of all published work has been cited, and well over 1million downloads — a clear signal that this research is being read and used.
Criminology Experts contribute to White Paper on Incels and the Manosphere.
The University of Portsmouth have been JEC's institutional home from the start, with many SCCJ colleagues among the journal's most active and most cited contributors. Co-Editor-in-Chief Branislav Hock leads the journal alongside Professor Nick Ryder at Cardiff University, supported by 58 editorial board members across 18 countries and many dedicated reviewers.
Beyond publishing, JEC is a regular financial sponsor of conferences and events in the field and offers editorial training to early career researchers. Colleagues interested in joining the early-career editorial board or submitting a paper are welcome to get in touch with Branislav Hock.