Class, Power and Crime Flashcards
Marxist’s approach to crime
Marxists believe crime is inevitable in a capitalist society because it encourages poverty, competition and greed. Although all classes commit crime, the working class are largely criminalised for their actions because the ruling class control the state and can make and enforce laws in their own interests. In this instance, white collar and corporate crimes are often ignored.
Criminogenic capitalism (marxist)
Poverty (caused be capitalism) may mean that crime is the only way the working class can survive. Crime also may be the only way the working class can obtain consumer goods encouraged by capitalist advertising, resulting in utilitarian crimes such as theft. Alienation and lack of control may lead to frustration and aggression, resulting in non-utilitarian crimes such as violence and vandalism.
Selective enforcement (marxist)
Marxists believe that although all classes commit crime, when it comes to application of the law by the criminal justice system, there is selective enforcement. While powerless groups such as the working class and ethnic minorities are criminalised, the police and court tend to ignore the crimes of the powerful
Neo-marxism
They argue that crime often has a political motive (for instance, to redistribute wealth from the rich to poor). Criminals are not passive puppets whose behaviour is shaped by capitalism: they are deliberately striving to change society
Reiman and Leighton - white collar crime
argue that the more likely a crime is to be committed by high-class people, the less likely it is to be treated as an offence. Also, there is a much higher rate of prosecutions for the typical ‘street crimes’ that poor people commit (such as burglary and assault). Crimes committed by the higher classes (such as tax evasion) are more likely to get a more forgiving view from the justice system
Invisibility of corporate crime (5 reasons)
The media - give very limited coverage to corporate, reinforcing the stereotype that crime is a working-class phenomenon
Lack of political will to tackle corporate crime - politicians rhetoric of being ‘tough on crime’ only applies to street crime
Crimes are complex - law enforcers are often understaffed, under-resourced and lack technical expertise
Delabelling - at the level of laws and legal regulations, corporate crime is consistently filtered out from the process of criminalisation
Under-reported - individuals may be unaware they have been victimised
Explanations of corporate crime - differential association (Sutherland)
Sutherland sees crime as behaviour learned from others in a social context. The less we associate with people who hold attitudes favourable to the law and the more we associate with people with criminal attitudes, the more likely we are to become deviant ourselves
Explanations of corporate crime - labelling theory (cicourel)
Cicourel argues that the working class are more likely to have their actions labelled as criminal. The middle class are more able to negotiate non-criminal labels for their misbehaviour
