2.3 Flashcards
what are the sociological theories of crime?
- Durkheim’s functionalist theory
- Merton’s strain theory
- Cohen: status frustration
- Cloward and Ohlin: three subcultures
- interactionism: labelling theory
- marxism
- right realism and crime
- left realism and crime
- surveillance theories: Foucault.
name the 2 functionalist theories
Durkheim’s functionalist theory.
Merton’s strain theory.
describe Durkheim’s functionalist theory
- functionalists see society as a stable structure based on the shared norms, values and beliefs about right and wrong (value consensus)
- however, crime is inevitable:
some individuals are inadequately socialised and are likely to deviate from the shared norms and laws.
society also contains many social groups each with different values, so shared rules of behaviour become less clear.
Durkheim called this ’anomie’ - where shared norms become weakened.
- believes crime performs 4 functions:
1. Boundary maintenance:
crime produces a reaction that unites society’s members against the wrongdoer, reminding them of the boundary between right and wrong and reaffirming their shared rules.
2. social change:
all social change starts with deviance - crimes are testing whether the laws are in step with society - if not, they can change.
e.g. Nelson Mandela was seen as a terrorist and jailed in south Africa for opposing racial segregation - this was over thrown and he became South Africa’s first black president.
3. safety valve:
crimes prevent worse crimes, so benefit society
e.g. prostitution acts to release men’s sexual frustration and prevents worse crimes from occurring (rape)
4. warning light
deviance/ crime can indicate that an institution isn’t functioning properly; e.g. increased truancy rates could indicate problems with the education system.
evaluate Durkheim’s functionalist theory
strengths:
- Durkheim was the first to recognise that crime can have positive functions for society: e.g. reinforcing boundaries between right and wrong by uniting people against the wrongdoer.
limitations:
- claims society requires crime to function but offers no way of knowing how much is the right amount
- crime might be functional for society as a whole but it’s certainly not for the victims.
describe Merton’s strain theory
- cause of crime lies in the unequal structure of society
- Americans are socialised to achieve the goal of the ‘American dream’ and ‘money success’ - but are socialised to achieve this goal through legitimate means such as hard work at school and in a career.
- however, not everyone had an equal chance to do this. opportunities for the working class are often blocked due to poverty and inadequate schools. this creates a ‘strain’ between the goals and the means, which creates crime.
- conformists achieves their goals in legitimate ways
- merton sees 4 ways of adapting to the strain:
innovators
accept goals but find illegal means of achieving it - usually lower classes where legitimate opportunities are blocked.
ritualists
give up striving for success - stay in dead end jobs - don’t accept goal but do accept means.
retreatists
reject both goals and means
merton included ‘vagrants, drunkards and drug addicts’ in this.
rebels
reject existing goals and means and replace with new ones with the aim of changing society. e.g. political radicals and hippies.
evaluate Merton’s strain theory
strengths
- shows how both deviance and normal behaviour arise from the same goals.
(conformists and innovators both pursue money success but by different means)
- explains the crime patterns shown in official statistics- most crime is properly crime as society values wealth so highly; working class rates are higher as they have less opportunity to obtain wealth legally.
limitations
- ignores the crime of the wealthy and over predicts the amount of working class crime.
- sees crime solely as an individual response, ignoring the group deviance of delinquent subcultures.
- focuses on utilitarian crime (e.g. theft) ignoring crimes with no economic motive -e.g. vandalism.
what are the 2 subcultural theories?
- Cohen: status frustration
- Cloward and Ohlin: 3 subcultures
describe Cohen’s status frustration theory.
- crime is a result of individuals feeling they can’t gain a status, so suffer from status frustration and feeling worthless. so they turn to criminal subcultures such as gangs and gain a status with them instead.
- it inverts society’s values (e.g. of respecting property, whereas boys gain status in groups by vandalising property)
- (diff from merton) sees subcultural deviance as a group response to failure, not just an individual one and focuses on non-utilitarian crimes -e.g. vandalism.
describe Cloward and Ohlin’s 3 subcultures theory.
- different neighbourhoods give rise to diff types of deviant subcultures:
- criminal subcultures:arise in areas where there’s a professional criminal network (e.g.mafia). they select suitable youths and socialise them into their own criminal career.
- conflict subcultures:gangs organised by young people themselves - violence provides a release for frustration and a source of status earned by winning territory from rival gangs in so called ‘turf wars’
- retreatist subcultures:made up of dropouts who’ve failed in both legitimate and illegitimate means - often based on drug use.
evaluate the subcultural theories
strengths:
- shows how subcultures perform a function for their members by offering solutions to the problem of failing to achieve goals legitimately and gives an opportunity for success.
- C + O show how subcultures differ in different neighbourhoods
limitations:
- ignore the crimes of the wealthy and over-predict the amount of working class crime.
- assume everyone starts with the mainstream goals and turn to a subculture when they fail to achieve them. some people don’t share those goals in the first place and they may be attracted to crime for different reasons.
- actual subcultures aren’t as simple as C+O suggest. some show characteristics of all three types; criminal, conflict and retreatist.
describe interactionism - the labelling theory
- no act is criminal, it only becomes so when we craters rules and apply them to others. e.g. smoking cannabis only counts as a crime if society decides to make it one.
- therefore a criminal is a label that some people (police, judges) have the power to attach to others, making them social constructions.
- social control agencies such as the police label certain groups as criminal which leads to differential enforcement of the law- where the law is enforced more against one group than the other.
police’s decisions to arrest are based on stereotypes about a persons dress, class, gender, ethnicity.
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self fulfilling prophesy:
by labelling certain people as deviant, society encourages them to become more so.
primary deviance - acts that haven’t been publicly labelled - e.g. travelling on public transport without paying.
secondary deviance - results from labelling, people treat offender solely on their label. they may be rejected from society and forced into the company of other criminals joining a deviant subculture, so more likely to offend.
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deviance amplification spiral:
attempt to control deviance leads to it increasing which prompts even greater attempts to control it which also increases it.
Mods and Rockers:
media exaggeration caused growing public concern
moral entrepreneurs called for a ‘crackdown’ - police responded by arresting more youths, provoking more concern
negative labelling of them as ‘folk devils’ marginalised them further, resulting in more deviance.
Jock young’s study of hippy cannabis users also found an amplification spiral.
initially drug use wasn’t central to their lifestyle and went undetected by law. (primary deviance)
increased police attention, labelling them as addicts with raids and arrests lead them to retreat into closed groups. there, they developed a deviant subculture where hard drug use was a central activity (self fulfilling prophesy)
- interactionists reject use of crime stats as they measure what police do rather than the criminals.
e.g. police stereotype working class males as typical criminals so will spend more time perusing this group than others. this means that the stats will be full of working class men simply by the police’s stereotypes making the statistics a social construction and not a true measurement.
cicourel - police and judges hold stereotype people who are typifications (typical criminals)
evaluate interactionism/ labelling theory
strengths:
- doesn’t just consider the law as a fixed set of rules but also explored the construction and meanings of these rules.
- shifts the focus onto how the police create crime by applying labels based on their stereotypes of the typical criminal. this selective law enforcement may explain why the working class and minority groups are over-represented in the crime statistics.
- shows how attempts to control deviance can lead to more crimes by triggering a deviance amplification spiral.
**limitations: **
- deterministic as it wrongly implies that once someone is labelled they will live up to the label - not always the case.
- it’s emphasis on the negative effects of the labelling gives a ‘victim’ status, ignoring the real victims.
- doesn’t explain the initial deviant act (primary deviance) - only the further deviance committed after the label.
- doesn’t explain why the labels are applied to certain groups but not to others, or where the power to label comes from - focuses on officials such as police rather than the capitalist class who make the rules.
describe marxism
argue that crime is caused by the unequal structure of capitalist society
there are 2 classes; ruling capitalist class (Bourgeoisie) and the working class (proletariat)
crime is inevitable in capitalist society as capitalism is a criminogenic (crime causing) system
the exploitation of the working class drives many people into poverty, meaning crime may be the only way to survive.
capitalism pushes consumer goods at people through advertising, resulting in utilitarian crimes (theft).
inequality causes feelings of frustration resulting in non-utilitarian crimes (violence, vandalism).
law making and enforcement serves the interests of the capitalist class.
Chambliss states that laws are made to protect the ruling class, e.g. there are rules against the homeless squatting in empty houses but not against the rich for owning several houses.
law is selectively enforced against the working class.
police are directed to patrol poor areas so poor people are much more likely to be arrested.
out of 200 companies who’d broken safety laws, Carson found that only 3 were prosecuted.
Corporate crime is often punished less severely (fines rather than jail) even though it often causes great harm.
ideas about crime are an ideology- set of ideas that conceal the inequality of capitalist society.
selective enforcement makes it look as if crime is the fault of the working class and shifts the attention away from more serious ruling class crimes.
some laws do benefit workers to a limited extent - health and safety laws, however these also benefit capitalism by giving it a ‘caring’ face. capitalists also often ignore these laws.
evaluate marxism
strengths:
- shows how poverty and inequality can cause working-class crime (blue-collar) and how capitalism promotes greed and encourages upper-class crime (white-collar)
- shows how law making and enforcement are biased the working class and in favour of the powerful - e.g. corporate crime is rarely prosecuted.
limitations:
- focuses on class and ignores the relationship between crime and other inequalities such as gender and ethnicity
- over-predicts the amount of working-class crime: not all poor people turn to crime.
- not all capitalist societies have high crime rates -e.g. Japans homocide rate is only about the fifth of the USA’s. this shows that capitalism can’t be the only cause.
describe right realism and crime
the causes of crime
argue that crime is the product of 3 factors; biological differences between individuals, inadequate socialisation and offending being a rational choice.
biological differences between individuals:
biological differences make some individuals more likely to commit crime - in their view, personality traits associated with criminality, such as aggression, risk-taking or low IQ are innate.
inadequate socialisation:
right realists see the nuclear family as the best agency of socialisation.
Murray says there is a moral breakdown in society due to parents not socialising their children effectively and not living in nuclear families.
there is a growing underclass of non-workers who are dependent on benefits and the state.
absent father’s mean young boys lack a male role model and turn delinquent - gain status through crime rather than through supporting their families.
communities are breaking down, which allows crime to happen (broken windows)
Rational choice theory:
deciding to commit a crime is a choice based on rational calculation of the consequences. if the rewards are greater than the costs, the individual will continue to behave in a criminal way.
right realists argue that the crime rate is high because the perceived costs of crime are low.
Felson’s routine activity theory - for crime to occur, three factors are necessary; a motivated offender, a suitable target and the absence of a ‘capable guardian’ -e.g. police, neighbour.
