15  (i10-index 19)

I'm a criminologist working at the Applied Criminology and Policing Centre (ACPC) at the University of Huddersfield. My research interests concern violence in its different manifestations; political violence (i.e. ‘terrorism’) ‘radicalisation, extremism and hate crime’ and also the impacts of social media use on serious youth violent crime/knife crime.

I hold an ESRC funded MA in Criminology from Keele University, an MA in Philosophy & Social Theory from Warwick University, and a BSc. in Psychology from Oxford Brookes. My doctorate (Huddersfield University) examined the policing of international summit meetings in the UK (the G20, G8 and NATO) and the interplay of strategic and tactical innovations between transgressive protests groups and the police.

I have undertaken research in the counter-terrorism/security and crime prevention fields for UK Government Departments (Home Office, OSCT, YJB, DfE) The European Commission (Landsec), The European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) and a range of other funders (CREST, and for various Police Forces and research councils) and have personally helped generate in excess of £3,433,000 (GBP) in research grant income since 2005. I have acted as an ‘Expert Evaluator’ for the European Commission on Preventing and Countering Violent Radicalisation (€5 million budget) and I sit on the Critical Information and Infrastructures Security (CRITIS) Program Committee (HQ Offices, Paris). I have acted as a reviewer for the Campbell Collaboration (Criminal Justice evidence synthesis) and I also sit on the Editorial Board for The British Journal of Community Justice and am an Article Editor for the journal.

OTHER ONGOING RESEARCH includes:

Contact zones: Understanding Recruitment Processes to Violent Extremism Across Comparative Domains

I am working with Professor Paul Thomas (PI) and colleagues at Deakin University, Melbourne (Professor Michele Grossman (PI), Dr Vanessa Barolsky and Dr. Vivian Gerrand) on a new international study examining contemporary recruitment processes to violent extremism, which is also being funded by the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation at Deakin. The aim is to develop a new model that updates our understanding of how terrorist recruitment works across different ideological and technological platforms.

Social Media and Youth Violence Research

I am currently investigating the ways in which young people's social media use can shape and facilitate youth violence and other types of youth crime (with Maria Ionnaou). I am PI on this project, and working with our five YOT partners throughout West Yorkshire, funded by the West Yorkshire PCC's Office. Myself and colleagues at Kirklees YOT have recently set up the West Yorkshire YOTs Social Media and Violence Research Group. I have also assisted BBC Panorama on background research for A Social Media Murder: Olly's Story (see also BBC).  

Offender desistance and resettlement

Other strands of my work are more methodologically quantitatively based, for instance, I have used survival analysis (Kaplan-Meier curves) and formal concept analysis (with non-Euclidean spaces) to examine the effectiveness of short-term prison inmate enhanced resettlement on release ('re-entry') programmes (Christmann, 2007; Christmann & Wong, 2016).

TEACHING

I teach the second-year undergraduate module ‘Approaches to Policing’ on the BSc. Policing & Investigation course. I also teach on our MSc in Criminology and International Security course, where I am also the Module Leader for Master’s students dissertations. I also contribute to teaching on other BSc. criminology modules, covering violent crime and research methods.  I am currently supervising one doctoral student (with colleagues) in the following area: How does the formulation of trust factor in the offender practitioner relationship, and can it be mobilised more effectively to reduce recidivism?

Recent publications include:
Thomas, P, Grossman, M., Christmann, K & Miah, S. (2020) Community reporting on violent extremism by 'intimates': Emergent findings from international evidence, Critical Studies on Terrorism 13(4): 638-659.

Wong, K., Christmann, K, Rogerson, M & Monk, N, (2020) "'Reality Versus Rhetoric': As-sessing the Efficacy of Third Party Hate Crime Reporting Centres" International Review of Victimology 26(1): 79-95.