CHAPTER 1 Flashcards
Crime, Criminals, and Criminology
What is criminology?
Body of knowledge regarding crime as a social phenomenon.
Includes the processes of…
- making laws
- breaking laws
- reacting to the breaking of laws
What is the goal of criminology?
To develop a body of general and verified principles and knowledge regarding law, crime, and treatment
Why should we study crime?
- crime tells us about our society
- to reduce crime, we have to understand it
- crime affects us all –> as victims, taxpayers, and employees
What are the six major areas of criminology?
- The definition of crime and criminals
- The origins and role of the law
- helps us understand why certain acts are considered criminals - the social distribution of crime
- traits of people, temporal and regional trends - Causation of crime
- this is the central focus - Patterns of criminal behaviour
- who are the offenders, victims, environment - Societal reactions to crime
- in Canada and most countries - addressed through a state-run criminal justice system
What are the consequences of the misrepresentation of crime in media?
- Influences public perceptions
- overestimations and fear of victimization - TV violence may contribute to crime
- evidence that it influences people predisposed to violence - TV coverage doesn’t examine the social and structural causes of crime
What Act determines how people charged with crimes are dealt with + what is a main separation?
The Constitution Act of 1867
- federal parliament has exclusive jurisdiction over criminal law and procedure
- the provinces are responsible for the administration of justice
Courts are under both ________ and __________ jurisdiction. Explain when either is used
Federal
Provincial
- two years or less = provincial jails
- more than two years = federal correctional facilities
What is the other word for informal rules?
Folkways
What is the legal definition of crime?
An act or omission that violates criminal law and is punishable
Who proposed that crime should be based on human rights? (and when). Explain
Herman and Julia Schwendinger (1970)
- should be based on human rights rather than legal status
- acts that violate someone’s rights to the necessities of life should be considered a crime
- govt. policies that create harm (ex. poverty) should be considered crimes
- things like sexism, racism, and homophobia are very harmful and so should be considered crimes
Describe Hagen’s (1985) Continuum of Crime and Deviance
Says that crime and deviance should be considered as a continuum from most serious to least serious acts. Based on three dimensions:
- the degree of consensus that an act is wrong
- the severity of society’s response to the act
- the amount of harm caused by the act
What are Hagen’s four major categories of crime and deviance, based on seriousness? Which are the most serious ones?
- Consensus crimes
- Conflict crimes
- social deviations
- social diversions
*consensus crimes and conflict crimes are the most serious ones
Hagen said, “the separation of crime from other kinds of deviance is a _______ & _______ phenomenon
social
political
What are some points that prove the idea that crime is socially defined?
- there are no universally condemned acts (ex. random murder vs. soldier killing)
- Deviance involves the violation of a rule or regulation or law, however, these rules vary across societies and groups
- There is nothing inherent in any act that makes it unlawful –> it is up to a society to decide
What is the consensus approach to law? How is it supported?
Criminal laws represent a consensus within a society about what acts should be prohibited
Laws are a codification of values shared by most members of society
- This theory is supported by polls indicating there is a broad agreement about many laws and the seriousness of various criminal offences
What is the Conflict approach to law? (class vs. group)
Conflict theorists reject the idea that laws reflect a consensus in society
Class conflict theory views laws as a tool used by the ruling class to maintain their privileged position by keeping “common people” under control (law reflects power relationships in society)
Group conflict theory views laws as the result of a political process, which involves conflict between different interest groups
Delete
Explain what terrorism studies is
- become prominent after 9/11
- examines the recruitment and training of terrorists, their organizations, and their links to crime, as well as how to prevent terrorism
- defining terrorism exemplifies how crimes are socially constructed : terrorists to some are freedom fighters to others
what is the social definition of terrorism and how is it socially constructed?
- the deliberate use or the threat to use violence against civilians in order to attain political, ideological, and religious goals
- these interpretations are not unbiased attempts to depict truth but rather conscious efforts to manipulate perceptions to promote certain interests at the expense of others
Describe how the power of the state has expanded since the rise of terrorism studies?
- tough new laws
- widespread surveillance
- ethnic and religious profiling
- suspects are detained and incarcerated without usual due process - have limited rights
Define surveillance
Any systematic focus on personal information in order to influence, manage, entitle, or control those whose information is collected
Explain the significance of the golden state killer and online DNA matching
- DNA collected by a genetic testing service was used to catch the golden state killer
- raised some privacy issues: people submitting their DNA may not envisions it being used to put one of their relatives in jail
What was the issue with ticketmaster partnering with Blink identify to use facial scanning instead of tickets at concerts and sports events?
- it created a massive surveillance database - great risk if hacked
- while a hacked credit card can be cancelled, we cannot be reissued a face
What are three of the newest sub-fields in criminology?
- green criminology
- terrorism studies
- surveillance studies
How do criminologists try to understand the social distribution of crime?
- consider the characteristics of people who commit crimes
- look at trends in the occurrence of crime over time
- look at how rates of crime vary between neighbourhoods, cities, provinces, and countries
define norms, then define laws
norms: informal rules that regulate social interactions and conduct
laws: formal rules that dictate behaviour
*society relies on law when order cannot be guaranteed through informal rules
What are the three different types of killings according to society’s perspectives
- Praiseworthy
- ex. war heroes - Socially acceptable
- ex. death penalty
3.Condemned
- ex. terrorists
Describe the shifting nature of crime through history
THEN
- courts used to be run by churches and landowners - personal justice - you kind of dealt with it yourself
- king responsible for keeping peace in the land
- fines were given to the victim (eventually the king was like we should take this money)
NOW
- government runs the courts - public justice - system enforced by the state
- fines don’t just go to the victim - they go to the government
How did Henry I’s “King’s Peace” shift crime
Established that certain serious offenses like robbery, arson, murder, and theft were no longer just personal crimes, but violations against the King’s authority and peace
Shifted the understanding of crime from a private wrong against an individual to a public wrong against the sovereign and state
Marginalized crime victims from the legal process that was meant to address the harms done to them –> turned victims into mere witnesses with little say in how the justice was handled
The criminal code dates to _____
1892
What is the max penalty for summary conviction?
2 years less a day imprisonment and/or a $5000 fine
How do Canada’s classification of crimes differ from America’s (and the English)
America –> felonies and misdemeanours
Canada –> summary conviction and indictable offences
What is the escape clause
Clause in the charter that says that provinces have the power to pass laws in a very serious case –> ex. Quebec restricting head coverings for government workers
What is perjury
A witness in a judicial proceeding, with intent to mislead gives false evidence, knowing that the evidence is false
What is “Recklessness” (what determines it)
Whether a reasonable person would have foreseen the consequences of the actions, not whether the accused actually intended those consequences
What is restorative justice and give an example
Advocates of restorative justice want to return the focus of the justice system to repairing the harm that has been done to the victim and the community
ex. Sand Brothers - brothers had a horrible childhood and killed many people - the son of a man they killed became friends with the killer –> it was necessary for them to contact each other for healing
What are 2 theories to predict who will be involved in violent terrorism
- unstable employment
- ties to radical peers
What is the CSI effect?
Crime victims and jury members expect more definitive forensic evidence than is available outside the fictional laboratories of a tv show
What are the consequences of the way the media portrays crime?
- overestimating the amount of violent crime –> and then people expect the govt. to toughen laws
- distorted stereotype of offenders (often actually committed by relatives and people you know)
- influencing people who are predisposed to commit violence
- might provide patterns for criminal acts (ex. school shootings modelled after the 1999 columbine shooting)
RCMP
Federal force that enforces some federal laws
- also acts as a provincial police force in all jurisdictions except Ontario, Quebec, and parts of Newfoundland and Labrador
What did Herman and Julia Schwendinger (1970) advocate for?
They advocated for a definition of crime based on human rights rather than on legal statutes
If an action violated the basic rights of humans to obtain the necessities of life and to be treated with respect and dignity, criminologists should consider it a crime - thus, govt. policies that create poverty and homelessness should be studied as crime along with other practices that cause social harm, including imperialism, sexism, and racism
What do consensus theorists believe?
They believe that law represents the consensus of the people - the law reflects the values shared by most members of a society
- supported by the fact that there is a broad agreement regarding many laws (like murder, burglary, street crimes), but there are many other laws we don’t agree on
What do class conflict theorists believe?
They believe that laws are passed by members of the ruling class to maintain their privileged position by keeping the common people under control
What to group conflict theorists believe?
They recognize that all laws are the result of a political process and that this process typically involves a conflict or a debate among various interest groups
Describe green criminology
Rooted in the environmental and animal rights movements
- meant to contribute to the debate aobut the causes and consequences of environmental destruction
- have introduced the concept of “speciesism,” which refers to discrimination against nonhuman animals
- Believe that crim should study socially harmful actions against nonhuman animals and the environment as well as acts that violate the criminal law
- requires a global perspective because the effects of environmental crimes go far beyond the borders of any single country
- raises questions relating to the destruction of specific environments and resources in ways that are legal but ecologically very harmful to plants, animals, & humans
What is terrorism?
the deliberate use or the threat to use violence against civilians in order to attain political, ideological and religious goal
- actually hard to define though because it is such a socially constructed term - all depends on your perspective and how govt. and media define it
