5. Labelling Theories Of C&D

Question 1

What are social actionists mostly concerned with?

Answer 1

Who is labelled as deviant or criminal and why they are

Question 2

What do labelling theorists argue?

Answer 2

-C&D socially constructed
-Society creates deviance by creating rules: formal & informal
-Gov & CJS responsible for deciding what acts are criminal (moral entrepreneurs)
-Deviant label only applied to some people and an action only becomes deviant when the label is successfully applied.

Question 3

Why are labelling theorists not interested in explaining the reasons for criminal behaviour?

Answer 3

-Labels can be applied wrongly ie false accusations
-Some criminals are not labelled at all

Question 4

What did Becker say about police?

Answer 4

-The way the police operate leads to someone being criminal or not
-Police have preconceived ideas about who is ‘trouble’
-Inevitable that targeted areas expose more crime

Question 5

Becker: What does a criminal label contain and the process?

Answer 5

-Criminal labels contains an evaluation of a person
-The label is internalised affecting there self concept which may lead to them acting deviantly, the label is reinforced
-Strong label becomes there master status
-They may turn to deviant subcultures to be accepted
-Deviant label leads to a deviant career and the label becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.

Question 6

What does Lemert distinguish between?

Answer 6

Primary and secondary deviance as a way to identify a criminal acts that have been committed but not labelled and criminal acts which have been labelled.

Question 7

Define Primary deviance

Answer 7

Deviance that has not been publicly labelled as such.

Question 8

Define secondary deviance

Answer 8

Deviance that follows once a person has been publicly labelled as deviant

Question 9

What does Stan Cohen say about the media?

Answer 9

The media through exaggerated and sensationalised reporting of crime can whip up a moral panic through process of labelling folk devils

Question 10

Define Folk Devil

Answer 10

People that present a threat to society and a reminder of what we should not be

Question 11

Define Deviancy Amplification

Answer 11

The way the media creates / makes worse the very problems they condemn

Question 12

Strengths of labelling theory (3)

Answer 12

-Provides insights into nature of deviance not provided by structural theories.
-Challenges idea deviants are different to normal people
-Shows importance of stereotyping in understanding deviance

Question 13

Weaknesses of labelling theory (3)

Answer 13

-Assumes an act isn’t deviant until its labelled as such
-Tends to remove the blame of deviance onto those who define him/her as deviant
-Too deterministic

Question 14

Incestuous Tribe and public shaming case study (Malinowski)

Answer 14

-Incest between cousins seen as deviant but day to day was ignored
-One young man was publicly accused of it by rivals in front of whole community
-Suicide seen as only course of action

Question 15

Negotiation of justice (Cicourel) case study

Answer 15

-Process of dealing with potential deviants involves the police etc making judgements which are often based on pre-conceived ideas
-Decision to arrest suspect is partially based on appearance , manner and replies given to police

Question 16

The Naughty Jury (Box) case study

Answer 16

-Box selected for a jury trail for a women accused of theft
-Money stolen was small amount but she was found guilty.
-After the jury started discussing how they were going to fiddle out of pocked expenses by inflated amounts
-He pointed out memebers of the jury ended up fiddling more money than women they has just convicted.

Question 17

The Saints and the Roughecks Case study (Chambliss)

Answer 17

-Saints were lads from white M/C backgrounds, constantly involved in deviant behaviour
-Roughnecks were lads from W/C backgrounds who were constantly in trouble with the police even though their rate of delinquency was similar.
-Saints used status/reputation to get themselves out of classes, homework etc
-Roughnecks percieved as typical gang members, police looked for oppotunity to arrest then
-Selective perception and labelling results in s,e people seen as deviant and not others