Corrections Compilation Brainscape Flashcards
What theory functioned to expand and solidify the rationale of decentralization efforts?
Labeling theory
What does labeling theory argue?
Interaction with the CJS can create, intensify, and perpetuate criminal behavior.
What is idea behind labeling theory?
The CJS labels and stigmatizes offenders, giving them criminal associations that make them more likely to become career criminals.
When was labeling theory popularized?
1960s and 70s.
What are the fundamental assumptions of Labeling Theory?
- Agencies of social control type and categorize people according to race, class, and demeanor, and then focus attention on them.
- Through this process of differential selection, these agencies can unintentionally, or unwittingly create, intensify, or perpetuate secondary deviance.
What book did Frank Tannenbaum write?
Crime in Community (1938)
What idea did Frank Tannenbaum create (and is the main focus of “Crime in Community” (1938)?
Dramatization of Evil
What is “Dramatization of Evil”?
Theory that states that all youth engage in youthful misbehavior which results in interaction with the CJS, leading to the youth seeing themselves as “labeled”.
What initiates the “Dramatization of Evil”?
Responses to acts of normal, youthful misbehavior.
What are the consequences of the “Dramatization of Evil”?
Youth entering the CJS are subjected to ‘forced companionship’ with other similarly defined children, resulting in a ‘new set of experiences that lead directly to a criminal career’.
What was Tannenbaum’s proposed solution to the “Dramatization of Evil”?
“A refusal to dramatize the evils.”
We should use decentralization and other community based programs to avoid labeling and the introduction of the CJS.
What book did Edwin Lemert write?
Social Pathology (1951)
What were Edwin Lemert’s theories in ‘Social Pathology’?
Primary and Secondary Deviance
What were the Edwin Lemert’s theories of Primary and Secondary Deviance?
- Primary Deviance - Refers to the range of deviant or criminal acts committed for a variety of situational or personal reasons.
- Secondary Deviance - Occurs when the actor no longer detaches their deviant behavior from their identity.
Society in the 1960’s focused their attention from _____ to _____?
‘The Offender’ to ‘Societal Reaction’
What caused labeling theory to take hold in the 1960’s?
- Social upheaval
- Turbulence
- Riots
- War
- Questioning of American Institutions
What was Lyndon B. Johnson’s idea to combat rising crime rate (1963-1969)?
- Use science to try and solve the rising crime rates.
- Put together a group of leading criminologists and scientists and enacted a series of presidential crime commissions
What was the policy that emerged from labeling theory?
- Reduced CJS intervention.
- Young Offenders should be diverted from CJS whenever possible.
- All offenders are to be dealt with in ways that keep them out of reformatories and prisons.
Where were the findings of the presidential commission published?
200 Recommendations were published in “The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society”
What were the findings of the Presidential Crime Commission?
- CJS was NOT effective and was doing more harm than good.
- Arresting, labeling, and incarcerating people was intensifying crime rather than reducing it.
What did the Presidential Crime Commission suggest to make the CJS more effective?
Decentralization
- The 3 D’s: Diversion, Decriminalization, Deinstitutionalization
What were The 3 Ds?
- Diversion: Minimize contact withe the CJS
- Decriminalization: Rethink the laws
- Deinstitutionalization: Discharge (a long term inmate) from an institution, replacing long term stays at pyschiatric hospitals with less isolated community mental health services.
How did Pres. Johnson go about accomplishing decentralization?
Passing:
- The Safe Streets Act
- The Omnibus Crime Bill
What was the Safe Streets Act?
Nation-wide implementation of decentralization.
What is LEAA?
- The Law Enforcement Assistance Administration
- Created by the Omnibus Crime Bill
Before the 60s, what was the belief concerning the CJS? How did the 60s change that?
- The CJS operated with disinterested professionalism (the system did its job the way it was supposed to)
- The 60s made people more critical of the CJS and more aware of what was actually going on.
What did Blomberg publish?
“Critical law and Action” (Dissertation)
What is “Critical Law and Action” about?
Agency goal displacement
What did diversion start with?
- LEAA
- Juvenile diversion programs (individual, family, and group services)
What were the negative effects of diversion?
- Contributed to overcrowding (net-widening)
- Disrupted families
- Drew kids and parents into the CJS that shouldn’t have been there
What are the 3 types of diversion?
- Legal - Formal/Informal, administered by CJS
- Paralegal - Operated outside of CJS but run by CJS
- Nonlegal - Client-focused, voluntary
What did Blomber’s study on North County focus on?
The efficacy of the diversion program they created.
What were the four major components of North County’s diversion program?
- Youth House
- Drug Abuse unit
- Community Outreach centers
- Family Intervention Unit (major component)
What was the North County Youth House?
Intended as an alternative to juvenile detention. When family disputes couldn’t be resolved, kids would live here.
- In the neighborhood of the children, allowed them to still go to public schools.
What was the North County Drug abuse unit?
Primary function: education regarding drug abuse.
Would help call-ins with referrals to specialists.