"Coward’s-punch" manslaughter provisions; paperless arrest warrants; hooligan-party-crasher offences; bikie consorting laws; new bail provisions for domestic violence perpetrators; ever-extending applications to complicity and more: the use of the criminal law to respond to social and moral panics is as prevalent and as concerning as it is longstanding. From the doctrine of necessity to the Royal Commission on Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, this Special Issue covers a wide range of challenging contemporary criminal legal problems, drawn from those presented at the annual Criminal Law Workshop in 2015, all focusing on the perennial issue of the boundaries of the criminal law. Is society really being plagued by new forms of offending which demand contemporary legal responses, or are we being subjected to heightened levels of over-reach in order to shore up our "tough on crime" credentials? Contemporary Issues in Criminal Law is a special issue (Volume 34 No 2) of the journal Law in Context. You can purchase a single copy of this issue through this page, or subscribe to the journal from the journal page.