Undergraduate Module Descriptor

SOC2124: Surveillance, Security and the State

This module descriptor refers to the 2021/2 academic year.

How this Module is Assessed

In the tables below, you will see reference to 'ILO's. An ILO is an Intended Learning Outcome - see Aims and Learning Outcomes for details of the ILOs for this module.

Formative Assessment

A formative assessment is designed to give you feedback on your understanding of the module content but it will not count towards your mark for the module.

Form of assessmentSize of the assessment (eg length / duration)ILOs assessedFeedback method
Essay plan (students will submit plan of summative essay)500 words1,2,3,4,7,9Written and oral (peer review with guidance)

Summative Assessment

A summative assessment counts towards your mark for the module. The table below tells you what percentage of your mark will come from which type of assessment.

CourseworkWritten examsPractical exams
10000

...and this table provides further details on the summative assessments for this module.

Form of assessment% of creditSize of the assessment (eg length / duration)ILOs assessedFeedback method
Blog post (web page)301000 words1-9Oral
Essay703000 words1-5,7-9Written
0

Re-assessment

Re-assessment takes place when the summative assessment has not been completed by the original deadline, and the student has been allowed to refer or defer it to a later date (this only happens following certain criteria and is always subject to exam board approval). For obvious reasons, re-assessments cannot be the same as the original assessment and so these alternatives are set. In cases where the form of assessment is the same, the content will nevertheless be different.

Original form of assessmentForm of re-assessmentILOs re-assessedTimescale for re-assessment
Blog post (web page)Blog post (web page) 30% 1000 words1-9August/September Reassessment Period
EssayEssay 70% 3000 words1-5,7-9August/September Reassessment Period

Indicative Reading List

This reading list is indicative - i.e. it provides an idea of texts that may be useful to you on this module, but it is not considered to be a confirmed or compulsory reading list for this module.

Green, P. J., & Ward, T. (2000). State crime, human rights, and the limits of criminology. Social Justice27(1 (79), 101-115.

Lubbers, E. (2012). Secret Manoeuvres in the Dark. London: Pluto Press.

Lubbers, E. (2015). Undercover Research: Corporate and police spying on activists. An introduction to activist intelligence as a new field of surveillance. Surveillance & Society13(3/4), 338-353.

Marx, G. T. (1988). Undercover: police surveillance in America. Univ of California Press.

Marx, G. T. (2016). Windows into the soul: Surveillance and society in an age of high technology. University of Chicago Press.

Powell, A., Stratton, G., & Cameron, R. (2018). Digital criminology: Crime and justice in digital society. Routledge.

Smith, G. J., Bennett Moses, L., & Chan, J. (2017). The challenges of doing criminology in the big data era: Towards a digital and data-driven approach. The British journal of criminology57(2), 259-274.

Woodman, C. (2018). Spycops in context: A brief history of political policing in Britain. Centre for Crime and Justice Studies.