crime Flashcards

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1
Q

what are the 3 types of delinquent subculture ?

A

the criminal subculutre -

the conflict structure -

the retreatist subculture

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2
Q

what is criminal sc

A

the criminal subculutre - this type of subculture tends to develop in areas, where there is well estabilished pattern crime w/c

young men are presented with rolemodels from whom they can learn ffrom e.g blood and crisp - gang
become “succesful” by participating in crime

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3
Q

what is conflict sc

A

the conflict structure - tends to develop in areas where an illegitimate opportunity structure is absent

low level of social coercion prevents estabilished patterns of ault crime from developing respond to situation with gang violence gives opportunity to gain status and respect from gang memebers

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4
Q

what is retreatist sc ?

A

tends to emerge among those who have failed to suceed as member of criminal or conflict sc. these double failures sometimes form retrearist sc based on illegal drug use

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5
Q

what is the eval of this what do clowin and owen ignore ?

A

igmore the overlaps between the sc. e.g gang involved in the conflict sc deal with drugs and make money - some applies to retreast sc memebers succesfuly deal with drugs

  • cloward and owin develop beoth merton theory and cphens sc theory shpws that wc delinquency is not simply concerned with material gain
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6
Q

what is cohens status frustration

A

delinquence crime in lic increasing areas
delinquency refrs to the criminal and anti social acts of young people
cohen agreeed with merton tjat the mainstream value of sucess crears problems for young wc males

they do bad at school and fail to acquire the skill and qualification needed for sucess
young wc when faile at school and defined as failures by the rest of socirty.= they develop status frustration

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7
Q

what do young w/c men deal with ?

A

deal with their status frustration by developing delinquent sc/ which turn mainstream value upside down

sucess in the delinquent sc through criminal and deviance behaviour gives young wc men respect in the eyes of peers

commiting non utillitarian crime - vandalism provides a way for young wc men to get respect from their peers

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8
Q

what is an evaluation of cohen sf ?

A

over predicts wc crime
take statistic at face value
ignores mc crime
ignores women crime

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9
Q

what is a summary of c = o opportunity structure ?

A

criminal sc- opportunity to climb professional criminal career ladder
conflict sc- status and respect through gang violence
retreast sc = those who failure legitamatelyt or illegitamately e.g the rubish gangster retreasits sc are those involved in drug use

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10
Q

what is miller focal concern ?

A

lower class sc is a response to their boring reptitve low skilled dead end jobs and pencils pf unemployment - non utilitarian

lw sc involves focal concern excotment , smartness, outwitting people, toughness, macho masculkintiy

crime is a result of younf wc men acting out their focal concern

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11
Q

what is an eval of miller focal concern ?

A

miller pics lc sc as a distinctive tradition many centutries old. l/c young men are seen to act out this sc, they live in a owrld of their own. l/c sc may exist its unlikely that lc young men are as insulated from the wider socirty

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12
Q

Func approach : subcuktural theory

What was cohen the delinquent subc

A

Cohen was the first sociologist to develop a subcultural theory of working class crime and deviance. He studied delinquent gangs in low-income, inner-city areas. Whilst his work is closely associated to that of Merton’s Strain Theory, in terms of agreeing that the mainstream value of success creates problems for young-working class males, he also develops Merton’s work by focusing on what he sees as two lapses in his theory:
1. Delinquency must be seen as a COLLECTIVE and not an individual problem. Gang members require an audience to gain respect and status amongst their peers

  1. It is important to also account for NON-UTILITARIAN CRIMES (crimes committed out of fun). Merton’s theory does not explain why someone would commit a crime that fails to produce monetary value. Cohen argues that crime on the whole is committed out of fun not out of necessity
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13
Q

What does subculture mean ?

A

A subculture is a group which shares some of the norms and values of mainstream culture, but which adapts and distorts those values in order to symbolise their rejection of mainstream norms and values. Groups develop oppositional subcultures as a response to the problem which they experience

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14
Q

What is status frustration ?

A

For Cohen the explanation lies within STATUS FRUSTRATION.
Working class boys find themselves denied of any kind of status by the education system.
They fail at school which leads to a dead end job and lower status housing.

Cohen the working classes become frustrated by the fact they cannot achieve any goals.
They therefore form delinquent subcultures and make up their own set of achievable goals.

Moreover Cohen believes that they not only make up their own goals but in fact take middle class values and turn them upside down. They replace these values with their own and set out to achieve these instead.

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15
Q

What is Hargreaves’s ( func perspective ) ?

A

HARGREAVES: THE FUNCTIONALIST PERSPECTIVE
Schools fail to integrate some students into mainstream society which resulted in the creation of subcultures. They do this in the following ways:

a) Firstly, the fact that they failed the 11+ exam and had to attend a Secondary Modern school immediately sets them apart from their middle class peers (who by and large attended grammar schools)

b) Their placement in the lowest streams within the school. Children with ‘behavioural problems’, low academic ability and so forth found themselves in a common position within the school - disliked by both those in authority and their conforming peers

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16
Q

What is Willis the Marxist perspective?

A

Subcultures also represented an organised, realistic attempt to come to terms with a wider cultural world that had already by the time they had entered secondary school earmarked the boys as ‘failures’. In this respect subcultural organisation was an attempt to develop a shared set of behavioural guide-lines that stressed the importance of ‘having a laff’ and
‘mucking about’.

17
Q

What is an evaluation of cohen ?

A

• Cohen explains vandalism, he shows that deviance is a rational response to life and moreover indicates how it can be learnt through peer groups.

• He quite rightly links deviance to status and explains how the working classes and youthful deviance is in fact a collective response

• Short and Strodbeck found little evidence to suggest that gangs reject the middle class values of society. The delinquents would have to be brilliant sociologists to work out middle class values and then turn against them.

• The emphasis on ‘malice’ misses the fact that delinquency is often carried out for fun

° Bordua suggests that working class subcultures are not passed on: each generation creates a new culture relating to society at that time

• What about females? What about the middle classes. Do they never commit delinquent acts? Is crime always a group activity?

18
Q

What did cloward owin do ?

A

Cloward and Ohlin developed the functionalist realm of thought.

They adapted both Merton and A. Cohen’s theories on both subculture and structural.

Merton stressed that the working classes are criminally deviant due to strain

However he fails to explain the different forms of deviance that takes place. What about non-utilitarian crimes such as vandalism and violence? Merton only dealt with half the picture. He portrays deviance in terms of the legitimate opportunity structure but what about the illegitimate?

Cohen failed to explain why delinquent subcultures take different forms. Why are some mainly concerned with theft whilst others are concerned with
violence? Cloward and Ohlin suggest that some members of the working class have easier access to become criminals than others. For example one area may have a high criminal subculture rate whereas another may not, members of society do not all have equal access to become deviants.

Coward and Ohlin also indicate that there is more pressure on the w.c to deviate as the have less legitimate means of reaching their aspired goals.
C and O distinguish these subcultures into three different sections:

19
Q

What is legitimate opportunity?

A

Legitimate opportunity structure = the legal way of achieving the goals set out by society

20
Q

What’s an evaluation of cloward + owin ?

A

Most Sophisticated version of structural and subcultural thoery to date in corporates the good aspects of cohen and Morton’s theory

Explains a variety of reasons as to why people are deviants

V Hobbs suggest that there really is a criminal opportunity structure out there for people to access if they so require

  • Taylor, Walton and Young - not provided a convincing explanation for every type pf deviant subculture. What would they make of the Black Panthers or the Hippies
  • Taylor et al. Merton, Cohen and Clew make nd Ohlin are all still assuming that everyone in society strives for the same goals. What about individualism? People strive for different goals at different times e.g. a man/ woman may refuse a job with higher pay at some point in their lives because it would disrupt their family life.

› Furthermore some groups actually make a conscience effort to reject society’s mainstream goals.
* Does this deviance fall into these three clear patterns

21
Q

delinquency drift- ecal of sc theory

what does matza see a problem in ?

A

sees problem with the idea of criminal and deviant behaviour as being outside the control of the indicidual - trapped by their social postion

reason ppl commit crime its the pressure from the mainstream

crime and v as the resulting from forces outside the control of the indicidual

22
Q

what is delinquents ?

A

delinqunets are not differnet and dont have distinct sc in opposition to mainstream values

23
Q

how is delinquent behaviour guided ?

A

is guided by subtenaneans - underground- value which are expressed in certain situations

delinquent is just another way to express themselves

24
Q

how are young people likely to experience guilt ?

A

they are liekly to experience guilt and shame for there acts- some committment to mainstream n +v

denial of injury
denial of the victtim = jsutify crime

delin is not a way of life = people want to follow the mainstream

25
Q

what are some sc evaluation ?

A

matza- there are no distinct sc values which lead to criminal and deviant behavioir :/

focuses to much on wc crime ignores mc crime wcc

pm points out that the nature of sc has changed

focus on the position of groups in the social structure rather than just an individuals and how these groups adapt in different ways to the strain facing them in achieving social goals- people are not prisoners in the social structure

subcultural theory irrelevant in helping us to understand crime and deviance as sc are more common today than they were in the 1960s they are just normal part of life

expalins why ypung wc commit crime :)

26
Q

what is a problem of these theories

A

they all asume people are prisoners of the social structure the delinquent has no freedom or choice over their actions

assumes deviants are distinct and very different to the rest of society - matza

27
Q

Interactijnalism/ labelling theory (opposite to func, sc, theories &positivist Soc)

What is interactionalim challenges to func

A

No assumptions about what is a deviant act
We create deviant acts by placing definition
No distinct groups of criminals or deviants - link to matza
Search for causes of crime is pointless
We all commit deviant acts - it’s now people respond and respect that creates deviance

28
Q

What did Becker say about deviance ?

A

Deviance is how an act has been defined and labelled rather than the act itself

There are no deviants only those who have been labelled as deviants

29
Q

What is Becker labelling theory ?

A

Social groups create deviants
The deviance is one to whom a label has been successfully applied
Age does of social controls label us ( formal & informal agencies ) - police gov & media

Injecting drugs, murder , assault

Lower levels of society are often targeted

Stop & search police crackdowns

Pic of the typical criminal - gangster , suicide bomber

30
Q

What is the labelling theory diagram

A
  1. Individual commits crime
  2. Act is labelled as deviant
  3. Self fulfilling prophecy the individuals starts to believe the labell is true
    4.Master status the label becomes the main characteristics
  4. Criminal career individual starts to continually act in a deviant matter
  5. The media & police highlight the action as deviant
  6. Deviancy amplification an increase in deviance acts