Completed PhD Theses

Our PhD alumni study crime, order and security from a variety of disciplinary perspectives and theoretical approaches. Use the list below to expore the range of areas our doctoral students have explored over the years.

Where available, theses are linked to TSpace, the University of Toronto's research repository, or else to the U of T Libraries Catalogue.

Theses

Sabeen Kazmi, 2025 (Supv: Professor Beatrice Jauregui):  'Drawing' Out Colonial Threads: Property, Law, and Inequality.

Omowumi Modupe Asubiaro Dada, 2025 (Supv. Professor Kamari Clarke): Mai Kariya (Female Protectors): The Evolving Role of Women in Conflict in Kaduna State, Nigeria.

Daniel Konikoff, 2024 (Supv. Professor Beatrice Jauregui): Automating the Thin Blue Line: Controversy, Knowledge, and the Governance of Police Technology in Canada.

Alexander Luscombe, 2024 (Supv. Professor Akwasi Owusu-Bempah): Digital Footprints of the Policing Web: A Study of Police Economic Crime Investigation using Natural Language Processing and Machine Learning.

Giancarlo Fiorella, 2023 (Supv. Professor Beatrice Jauregui): Spectralities at the Protest Chronotope: Venezuela’s Colectivos and the Opposition Social Imaginary

Serdar San, 2023 (Supv. Professor Matthew Light): Policing and Police Reform in Turkey since 1980: Regime Transitions and Policing Transformations

Fernando Ramon Avila, 2023 (Supv. Professor Kelly Hannah-Moffat): "The Scars Remain." Power, Solidarity, and Punishment in an Atypical Latin American Prison

Grant John Valentine, 2023 (Supv. Professor Paula Maurutto): The Canadian Punitive Paradox: The Evolution of Conservative Political Marketing Practices and the Late Onset of Penal Populism in Canadian Federal Politics

Jihyun Kwon, 2023 (Supv. Professor Audrey Macklin, Professor Kelly Hannah-Moffat): Misconduct Mismanagement: Independent Oversight, Accountability, and the Rule of Law

Erick Laming, 2022 (Supv. Professor Scot Wortley): Police Use of Force: Understanding its Impact on Indigenous and Black Community Members in Ontario

Dikla Yogev, 2022 (Supv. Professor Matthew Light): Religion and Police Legitimacy: the Case of Israel’s Haredi Community

Jacqueline Briggs, 2022 (Supv. Professor Emerita Mariana Valverde): Networks of Colonial Governance: Department of Indian Affairs Legal Aid in Canada, 1870 to 1970

Grace Tran, 2022 (Supv. Professor Audrey Macklin, Professor Emerita Mariana Valverde): Laws of Love: Negotiations of Intimacy and Legitimacy At and Beyond State Borders Through Vietnamese “Marriage Fraud” Arrangements

Luis Valentin Pereda Aguado, 2021 (Supv. Professor Matthew Light): Processes of Violence in Mexico’s Organized Crime Groups: A Study of Los Zetas

Julius Haag, 2021 (Supv. Professor Scot Wortley): A Qualitative Examination of the Impacts of Police Practices on Racialized and Marginalized Young People in Toronto

Zachary P. Levinsky, 2020 (Supv. Professor Kelly Hannah-Moffat): 'Don't Under React': The Limits of Compassion and Risk Management in Toronto School Safety from 1999-2007

Adam Ellis, 2020 (Supv: Professor Scot Wortley): Reconceptualizing Urban Warfare In Canada: Exploring the Relationship Between Trauma, Post-traumatic Stress, and Violence Among Male Combat Soldiers and 'Street Soldiers'

Brenna Keatinge, 2018 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): Growing Land, Growing Law: Race, Urban Politics, and the Governance of Vacant Land in Boston from 1950

Katharina Maier, 2018 (Supv: Rosemary Gartner): Half Way to Freedom: The Role of Halfway Houses in Canada's Penal Landscape

Lysandra Marshall, 2017 (Supv: Professor Scot Wortley): Racial Disparities in Police Stops in Kingston, Ontario: Democratic Racism and Canadian Racial Profiling in Theoretical Perspective

Maria Jung, 2017 (Supv: Professor Rosemary Gartner): The Relationship between Immigration and Crime in Canada: 1976-2011

Meghana Rao, 2017 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): Troubling Suicide: Law, Medicine and Hijr Suicides in India

Holly Pelvin, 2017 (Supv: Professor Rosemary Gartner): Doing Uncertain Time: Understanding the Experiences of Punishment in Pre-trial Custody

Vanessa Iafolla, 2015 (Supv: Professor Matthew Light): Anti-money Laundering and Counter-terrorist Financing Policy in Canada: Origins, Implementation and Enforcement

Alexandra Lysova, 2015 (Supv: Professor Rosemary Gartner): Dynamics of Violence between Intimate Partners in the Narratives of Incarcerated Women in Canada: A Violent Events Perspective

Natasha Madon, 2015 (Supv: Professor Anthony Doob): Intersections of Youths'Perceptions: Youths' Perceptions of Their Treatment by the Criminal Justice System and Other Social Institutions

Tara Marie Watson, 2014 (Supv: Professor Kelly Hannah-Moffat): Risks Inside and Beyond Institutional Walls: Organisational Responses to Substance Use in Canadian Federal Prisons

Akwasi Owusu-Bempah, 2014 (Supv: Professor Scot Wortley): Black Males' Perceptions of and Experiences with the Police in Toronto

Nicole Myers, 2013 (Supv: Professor Anthony Doob): Creating Criminality: The Intensification of Institutional Risk Aversion Strategies and the Decline of the Bail Process

Rashmee Singh, 2012 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): Grassroots Governance: Domestic Violence and Criminal Justice Partnerships in an Immigrant City

Olena Kobzar, 2012 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): Networking on the Margins: The Regulation of Payday Lending in Canada

Sarah Turnbull, 2012 (Supv: Professor Kelly Hannah-Moffat): Reconfiguring Canadian Penality: Gender, Diversity and Parole

Allyson Lunny, 2011 (Supv: Professor Rosemary Gartner): Victimhood and Socio-legal Narratives of Hate Crime against Queer Communities in Canada, 1985-2003

Carolyn Greene, 2011 (Supv: Professor Anthony Doob): Creating Consensus: An Exploration of Two Pre-charge Diversion Programs in Canada

Anita Lam, 2011 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): Making Crime TV: Producing Fictional Representations of Crime for Canadian Television

Myles Leslie, 2011 (Supv: Professor Ron Levi): Speaking for the Dead: Coroners, Institutional Structures and Risk Management

Prashan Ranasinghe, 2009 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): The Refashioning of Vagrancy and the (Re)Ordering of Public Space

Michael Mopas, 2009 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): Imagining the Internet and Making it Governable: Canadian Law and Regulation

Sara Thompson, 2009: The Social Ecology and Spatial Distribution of Lethal Violence in Toronto, 1988-2003

Randy Seepersad, 2009 (Co-Supvs: Professor Scot Wortley, Professor Anthony Doob, Professor Rosemary Gartner): Mediators and Moderators in the Relative Deprivation - Crime/Counter-normative Actions Relationship

Annmarie Barnes, 2007: Transnational Dislocations: The Use of Deportation as Crime Control

Dawn Moore, 2005 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): To Cure the Offender: Drugs, Users and the Canadian Criminal Justice System

Mary Lynn Young, 2005 (Co-Supvs: Professor Carolyn Strange, Professor Anthony Doob): Crime Content and Media Economics: Gendered Practices and Sensational Stories, 1950-2000

Carla Cesaroni, 2005 (Supv: Professor Anthony Doob): The Stress and Adjustment of Youth in Custody

Bryan Hogeveen, 2003: Can't You Be a Man? Rebuilding Wayward Masculinities and Regulating Juvenile Deviance in Ontario 1860-1930

Cheryl Webster, 2003 (Supv: Professor Rosemary Gartner): Working for 'Good Order and Discipline': The Impact of Mandatory Convict Labour on the Maintenance of Orderly Prison Life in Contemporary Portugal

John Deukmedjian, 2002 (Supv: Professor Clifford Shearing): The Evolution and Alignment of RCMP Conflict Management and Organizational Surveillance

Phil Mun, 2002 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): Calculated Risk-taking: The Governance of Casino Gambling in Ontario

Renisa Mawani, 2001 (Supv: Professor Carolyn Strange): The "Savage Indian" and the "Foreign Plague": Mapping Racial Categories and Legal Geographies of Race in British Columbia, 1871-1925

Kimberly-Jo White, 2001 : Negotiating Responsibility: Representations of Criminality and Mind-State in Canadian Law, Medicine and Society, 1920-1950

Jennifer Wood, 2000 (Supv: Professor Clifford Shearing): Reinventing Governance : A Study of Transformations in the Ontario Provincial Police

Kirsten Kramar, 2000 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): Unwilling Mothers and Unwanted Babies: 'Infanticide' and Medico-Legal Responsibility in 20th Century Canadian Legal Discourse

Kim Varma, 2000: Exploring Age and Maturity in Youth Justice

Stephane Leman-Langlois, 2000 : Constructing Post-Conflict Justice: The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission as an Ongoing Invention of Reconciliation and Truth

Anna Pratt, 2000 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): A Political Anatomy of Detention and Deportation in Canada

Voula Marinos, 2000 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): The Multiple Dimensions of Punishment: 'Intermediate' Sanctions and Interchangeability with Imprisonment

Jane Sprott, 1999 (Supv: Professor Anthony Doob): Views of the Punishment of Youth: The Dimensions of Punitiveness

Benedikt Fischer, 1998 (Supv: Professor Philip Stenning): "Community policing" : a study of local policing, order and control

Kelly Hannah-Moffat, 1997 (Supv: Professor Mariana Valverde): From Christian maternalism to risk technologies, penal powers and women's knowledges in the governance of female prisons

Willem De Lint, 1997 (Co-Supvs: Professor Clifford Shearing, Professor Mariana Valverde): Shaping the subject of policing, autonomy, regulation and the police constable

Tammy Landau, 1994 (Supv: Professor Anthony Doob): Policing and security in four remote aboriginal communities: a challenge to coercive models of police work