In September 2026 I had the enormous honour of being awarded the European Society of Criminology ‘Early Career Award’ for ‘Outstanding scientific achievement’. It was a huge honour. The awards ceremony happened at the annual conference in Warsaw, Poland.
Here is what the award committee said;
It is my pleasure to inform you that you have been awarded the European Society of Criminology (ESC) 2026 ESC Early Career Award, which recognises the outstanding scientific achievement of an early career European criminologist.
The award committee consisted of Letizia Paoli (chair, KU Leuven, Belgium), Anna Di Ronco (University of Bologna, Italy), and Ineke Haen Marshall (Northeastern University, Boston, United States of America). In their recommendation to the ESC Executive Board, they stated:
Jade Levell is an outstanding early career scholar who has contributed substantially to criminology, and more specifically to research on youth violence, domestic violence, and the intersection between the two. In particular, her work has been instrumental in demonstrating that many young people involved in criminal networks and serious criminal activities have experienced domestic violence and abuse in childhood without timely identification or support. These findings have impacted public debates and policy choices, not only in the UK, her home country, but also in Sweden, Spain, and Albania.
Dr Levell’s work has also been methodologically innovative. She has pioneered the use of music elicitation as both a data collection method and an intervention tool for ‘at-risk’ young people in the UK and Albania, and has also delivered training to practitioners in this approach. Another of her projects, focusing on knife crime, was centred on a participatory arts initiative involving more than 150 young people who had been directly or indirectly affected by serious violence.
Dr Levell has sole-authored two monographs and co-edited a collection, in addition to publishing several articles in renowned international journals. She has been involved in externally funded research in the UK, Italy, Romania, Cyprus, Greece, and Albania, and has been an invited speaker to the Parliaments of the UK and Sweden. Her work has been repeatedly cited in government reports and has appeared in the international press, including in the UK, Germany, Sweden, Spain, and the Balkans.
For an early career scholar only six years after the award of her PhD, Dr Levell’s track record is extremely impressive. She has demonstrated both theoretical and methodological originality, significantly advancing our understanding of serious (youth) violence and its frequent roots in childhood domestic violence and abuse, and has shaped public debates and governmental responses to these serious problems. The jury is thus convinced of Dr Levell’s outstanding scientific achievements and is unanimous in its decision to grant her the 2026 Early Career Award.
