Class, Power and Crime

Question 1

What do Marxists think of crime

Answer 1

Official Stats cant be taken at face value.

Criminal Justice System enforced unfairly to WC

Question 2

Criminogenic Crime

Answer 2

Crime inevitable in capitalist society
Crime only way for some people to survive in cut-throat society (underpaid / in poverty)
Crime only way to obtain consumeristic goods from capitalist advertising. (utilitarian)
Crime only way to relieve frustration from alienation and lack of control in work-life (non-utilitarian)

Question 3

Criminogenic Crime in the rest of society?

Answer 3

Capitalism causes a dog-eat-dog system that encourages greed and self-interest. Need to win otherwise company goes out of business. Gordon - crime = rational response to capitalist society in all social classes

Question 4

State and Law Making

Answer 4

Chambliss- laws made by Government only serve interest of ruling class to protect and maintain capitalist system.

In African Colonies, British introduced tax only payable in cash and only way to earn cash at time was to work for British plantations. Example of how law only served economic interests of capitalist owners.

Question 5

Ideological functions of crime and law?

Answer 5

Pearce- Laws that seem to care for proletariat only benefit ruling class by creating false consciousness because laws not rigorously enforced. 
For example, corporate homicide banned in 2007 but across 8 years only 1 case prosecuted.

Question 6

Media and Criminologists

Answer 6

Portray criminals as disturbed individuals distracting people from capitalism but to blame criminals in midst of their problems.

Question 7

Evaluation

Answer 7

Doesn’t consider ethnic and gender factors.
Deterministic and over-estimates number of crimes committed by poor
Not all capitalist societies have high crime rates (swiss)
Ignore intra-class crimes

Question 8

Neo-Marxism and critical criminology

Answer 8

Believe crime is a conscious decision made by an offender and is voluntaristic, deliberately striving to change society.

Question 9

Fully-Social Theory of Deviance

Answer 9

TAYLOR ET AL
Comprehensive understanding of crime 
1. Wider origin of crime 
2. Immediate origin of crime 
3. Crime
4. Immediate origin of societal reactions
5. Wider origins of societal reactions
6. Effects of labelling.

Question 10

Evaluation

Answer 10

Feminists argue it is male-focused and ignores female crime
Romanticiszes WC crime as “robin hoods” by redistributing wealth from rich to the poor but rlly most crime is poor against poor
Burke- too general to explain crimes and too idealistic to tackle crime

Question 11

Corporate Crime

Answer 11

Sutherland - Crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in the course of his occupation

Question 12

Occupational crime

Answer 12

crime employees commit for personal gain ie stealing from the company

Question 13

Corporate Crime

Answer 13

Crime employees commit for their organisation in pursuit of goals ie tax evasion

Question 14

The scale of corporate Crime

Answer 14

Cost of white-collar crime 10x more than ordinary crime

Question 15

Types of Corporate crime

Answer 15

1. Financial Crime- tax evasion, bribery, money laundering
2. Crimes against consumers - false labelling and selling of unfit goods
3. Crimes against employees - sexual, racial discrimination and wage exploitations
4. Crimes against the Environment - illegal dumping
5. State-corporate Crime-

Question 16

Abuse of Trust

Answer 16

People of respectable status abuse trust of victims

Harold Shipman prosecuted for murders of 15 of his patients (in reality prob 220 more)

Question 17

The invisibility of Corporate Crime

Answer 17

Media - limited coverage, sanitised language to describe crime. The stereotypes that crime is WC only continues.
Lack of Political Will- only focused on tackling street crime
Crimes are often complex- lack of resources and technical expertise to investigate complex crimes
Delabelling- crimes described as civil not criminal, fines rather than jail sentences
Under-reporting - Victim is society, do not realise they are victims and when they do, feel powerless against big organisations.

Question 18

Explanations of Corporate Crime

Answer 18

Strain Theory - Box
Differential Association- Sutherland & Geis & Skyes and Matza
Labelling Theory - Nelken
Marxism - Box

Question 19

Strain Theory

Answer 19

Box argues…

If companies cannot achieve legitimately to maximise profits, employ illegal methods to maximise profit.

Question 20

Differential Association

Answer 20

Sutherland argues…

More we associate with people of criminal attitudes, more likely we are to become deviant

Question 21

Differential Association

Answer 21

Geis argues…
Those who joined companies where illegal activity encouraged become involved in activity as part of socialisation as way to integrate into (subculture’s) norms and values of company.

Question 22

Differential Association

Answer 22

Skyes and Matza argue..
Individuals deviate easily when everyone around them is doing it, normalising deviance “everyone’s doing it”. Learn techniques to blame the victims instead (should have read small print.)