The Contribution and Significance of ProfessorNoriyoshi Takemura’s Theoretical Work on AstroGreen Criminology

In 2019, Professor Noriyoshi Takemura published a seminal research article in the Toin University of Yokohama Research Bulletin entitled “Astro-Green Criminology: A New Perspective Against Space Capitalism.” In this paper, Takemura explains the importance of developing an astro-green criminology which would bring outer space environmental issues within the domains of both criminology broadly, and green criminology specifically. Creating the astro-green criminological perspective has since led to the development of the area by both Takemura, and other interested scholars. While astro-green criminology is still at a nascent stage, researchers publishing in this area have achieved notable early successes. Without Takemura’s radical and ground-breaking publications on astro-green criminology, it is unlikely that these areas of research would have developed so quickly. This article aims to celebrate the early achievements of astro-green criminology and to afford credit to the thought-leading work of Professor Noriyoshi Takemura. While Takemura’s work on astro-green criminology is often cited in literature on space-based environmental harms, his work has not yet received proper exposition and recognition. The present article seeks to fill that void and finishes by exploring how astro-green criminology has traversed into the fuller discipline of space criminology.