This need was the impetus for the establishment of the Criminological Research Unit. In the atmosphere of the regime of the time, marked by the ideologisation of the basic issues of crime, the establishment of an organisational base for criminological research represented an undeniable advance and, from a professional point of view, a breakthrough in the understanding of crime, which could once again be conceived as a complex and permanent social problem. The creation of this modest base was, however, driven more by a recognised need than by an affection for a field that is always by its nature a critical field. 

Thus, in 1960, the Scientific Research Institute of Criminalistics was constituted, initially as an institute of three departments - the Attorney General's Office, the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of the Interior. Criminological research began to develop within its framework. After 1966, with the change of the name of the institution to the Research Institute of Criminology at the General Prosecutor's Office (VÚK), the focus was exclusively on criminological research. The beginning of the Institute's activity was connected with the search for answers to basic theoretical and methodological questions, and already at this time the Institute, for example, made a decisive contribution to the introduction of the system of post-penitentiary care in Czechoslovakia. Among the research carried out at the Institute, which in many ways positively influenced the repressive criminal policy of the time, were findings from research on offender personality, delinquent youth, pre-recidivism, criminal recidivism, non-alcohol toxicomania and statistical analyses of crime. 

The first director of the Institute was Professor Ladislav Schubert, DrSc. (*1912 +1990). In 1967, Professor JUDr. Oto Novotný (*1928 +2020) took the position of Director and despite the relatively small staff of the Institute, which amounted to about 12 to 14 employees, the suggestions and research activities of the VÚK were worth proposing specific solutions, e.g. This was also the case for the transfer of the prison system to the Ministry of Justice, the development of post-penitentiary care and the establishment of social probation officers. Under the leadership of Prof. Novotný, the VÚK was also significantly involved in the social trends of the time; in 1968-1969, the VÚK acted in support of the Prague Spring. 

During the period of so-called normalisation after 1970, ideological pressure intensified significantly, the Institute was accused of non-Marxist practices and procedures, and some researchers were forced to leave. This also concerned the director, Prof. Novotny. In 1971-1973, the Institute was headed by JUDr. Oldřich Suchý (*1892 +1973) and after him for a long time by Prof. JUDr. Jiří Nezkusil (*1928 +2013). However, thanks to the efforts of several researchers, the tradition of empirical research was maintained even at that time and interesting findings were produced. Research on the dynamics and structure of crime, crime forecasts, social legal consciousness, offender personality, repeat offenders and juvenile offenders were set as the main directions at that time. Crucially, crime continued to be interpreted as a complex socially conditioned phenomenon; there was therefore no complete return to gross ideological simplifications as in the 1950s. 

The Institute for Criminology and Social Prevention (IKSP) is therefore the successor to the Research Institute of Criminology. This tradition and continuity make it one of the oldest criminological research institutes in Europe. Among the significant achievements in which IKSP was involved in the early 1990s was the formulation of the Czechoslovak Helsinki Committee's call for citizens' right to security, which analysed the development of the crime situation and proposed a number of concrete short-term and conceptual measures to protect against, control and prevent rising crime. In the early 1990s, IKSP's research activities focused more on short-term research projects in an effort to provide rapid insights on current issues. Gradually, however, there has been a move to link this research with longer-term research projects, which form the backbone of the current IKSP research programme. 

In the years 2000-2020, PhDr. Miroslav Scheinost, held the position of Director; the current Director of IKSP is JUDr. Petr Zeman, Ph.D.