This book offers an exhaustive and original look at the phenomenon of criminality as part of the political and social reality in Poland, the largest country in Central Europe, whose political post-war path has been similar to that of other countries in this region. The book fills a gap in the English-language criminological literature on the causes and determinants of criminality in Central Europe, and presents the views of criminologists from Central Europe in the debate over state policy on the problems of criminality and how to control it.