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Crime and Deviance Flashcards

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Sociology 101 flashcards
1
Q

What is value consensus

A

The shared norms and values of society that enable us to co-operate together

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2
Q

What are the two key mechanisms according to functionalists that enable us to achieve solidarity

A

Socialisation
Social control

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3
Q

What is socialisation

A

Instils a shared culture into its members. This ensures individuals internalise the same norms and values

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4
Q

What is social control

A

Mechanisms include rewards for conforming and punishment for deviance. This helps ensue that individuals behave in the way society expects

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5
Q

What is anomie in terms of crime

A

Too much crime could be argued to be disruptive to society and could result in social breakdown

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6
Q

What are the two reasons that Durkheim gives for crime being a positive thing

A

Boundary maintenance
Adaption and change

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7
Q

What is boundary maintenance

A

Boundaries that are maintained in society-reinforces what’s right and wrong, so they can reinforce social solidarity

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8
Q

What is adaption and change

A

Crimes tell law enforcements what needs to change

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9
Q

What are the other functions of crime

A

Prostitution and pornography can be beneficial

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10
Q

What are the benefits of prostitution and pornography

A

Safety value - sometimes committing personal crime is the only way to relieve personal tension without causing harm to wider society

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11
Q

Which theorists would have a problem with pornography and prostitution being beneficial

A

Albert cohen and Kai erikson

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12
Q

What does Albert cohen say about deviancy

A

Deviance can be a key indicator that an institution is not functioning properly

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13
Q

What does Kai erikson say

A

If crime and deviance perform positive functions then perhaps society is organised in such a way so as to promote deviance

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14
Q

What is the purpose of the maintenance of crime and deviance

A

From a functionalist perspective it offers people a way to cope with the strains of society, it therefore can have hidden and latent functions

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15
Q

What are 2 criticisms to the functions of crime

A

Functionalists explain the existence of crime but do not explain why it exists in the first place
Crime doesn’t always promote solidarity. It may have the opposite effect, leading people to become more isolated

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16
Q

What is strain theory

A

People engage in deviant behaviour when they are unable to achieve socially approved goals by legitimate means

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17
Q

What elements did Merton combine to create his strain theory

A

Structural factors
Cultural factors

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18
Q

What is the American dream

A

Having the stereotypical life, car, house and nuclear family

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19
Q

What are the 5 types of adaptations to strain

A
  • Conformity - individuals accept goals
  • Innovation - accept goals, use illegitimate means (fraud)
  • Ritualism - give up on trying to achieve goals
  • Retreatism - reject both goals and become dropouts
  • Rebellion - reject societies goals and means and replace them with new ones
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20
Q

What are the strengths of merton

A
  • Shows how both normal and deviant behaviour can arise from the same mainstream goal
  • Lower class crime rates are higher, because they have least opportunity to obtain wealth legitimately
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21
Q

What are the criticisms of merton

A
  • He takes statistics at face value, these overrepresent working class crime
  • It assumes there is value consensus and that everyone strives for money success and ignores the fact that many may not share that goal
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22
Q

What is a subcultural strain theory

A

See deviance as the product of a delinquent subculture with different values from those of mainstream society

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23
Q

How does cohen criticise Merton’s strain theory

A
  • Merton sees deviance as an individual response to strain ignoring that a lot of deviance is committed by groups, especially amongst the young
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24
Q

Who looked at status frustration

A

Albert Cohen

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25
Q

What is status frustration

A

A sense of personal failure or inadequacy

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26
Q

What did Cloward and Ohlin find about illegitimate opportunity structures

A

W/c youths are denied legitimate opportunities to achieve money success, so their deviance arises

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27
Q

What 3 types of of deviant subcultures did Cloward and Ohlin find

A
  • Criminal subcultures - provide youths with an apprenticeship for a career in utilitarian crime
  • Conflict subcultures - high levels of social disorganisation this prevents stable professional criminal networks developing
  • Retreatist subcultures - not everyone who wants to become a professional criminal succeeds just as not everyone gets a good job
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28
Q

What is the south and the drug trade

A

South argues that cloward and ohlin draw the boundaries too sharply between the different types of subcultures.
He looked at the drug trade and found it is most often a mixture of ‘disorganised’ crime along side more professional ‘mafia’ style

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29
Q

What are some recent strain theories

A

Young people may pursue a variety of goals other than money success, this can include popularity with peers

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30
Q

What is an institutional anomie theory

A

Messner and Rosenfeld like merton use the american dream for the basis of their theory
They make the point that the obsession with individual monetary success and the ‘winner takes all mentality’ pushes people more towards crime

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31
Q

What is different about labelling theory

A

Labelling theory sees deviant identities as partly created by such interactions with control agents

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32
Q

What do functionalists believe about labelling

A

They are ‘problem takers’ and they take for granted the fact that official statistics give a representation of the real patterns of crime and who commits it

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33
Q

what do interactionists say for labelling

A

Labelling theory focused on the reaction to and the definition of deviance rather than the cause

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34
Q

What are moral entrepreneurs

A

People who have power in society

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35
Q

What is a moral crusade

A

The reason for a rule or law to be made

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36
Q

What are Beckers two effects of a new law

A
  1. The creation of a new group of outsiders - outlaws or deviants who break the new rule
  2. The creation or expansion of a social control agency e.g police etc
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37
Q

What does Platt say about juvenile delinquency

A

Was originally created as a result of a campaign by victorian moral entrepreneurs aimed at protecting young people at risk

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38
Q

Who gets labelled

A

Black and EM young males are 9x more likely to be stopped and searched by the police

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39
Q

What are the 3 factors that depend on whether someone is arrested, charged and convicted

A
  • Their interactions with agencies of social control
  • Their appearance, background and biography
  • The situation and circumstances of the offence
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40
Q

What did Piliavin and briar find

A

That police decisions to arrest a youth is based on mainly physical cues such as dress and manners

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41
Q

What did Cicourel find

A

Police officers typifications led them to concentrate on certain types of offenders. This results in law enforcement showing class bias and led to police officers working more around working class areas

42
Q

What does typifications mean

A

Common sense theories of what the typical delinquent is like

43
Q

What is Cicourel’s commonsense theory

A

Juvenile delinquency was caused by broken homes, poverty and poor parenting

44
Q

What does Cicourel say about official statistics

A

They shouldn’t be used as a resource as they don’t represent facts about crime - they should be used as a topic for sociologists to investigate the processes that created them

45
Q

What are the two types of effects of labelling and who found them out

A

Lemert
- primary deviance
- secondary deviance

46
Q

What is primary deviance

A

Its not publicly labelled and these acts have very little significance for the individuals status

47
Q

What is secondary deviance

A

Where an individual is publicly labelled as a criminal, this will result in the individual being stigmatised and excluded from normal society

48
Q

What did Becker find about the master status

A

Can provoke a crisis for the individuals self concept and one way to resolve it is to internalise the deviant label, which leads to a SFP

49
Q

What more does Lemert say about secondary deviance

A

It can result in a deviant career as the individual may be forced into a deviant subculture

50
Q

What did Jock Young find about drug use in north london

A
  • young studied hippie marijuana users in notting hill
  • labelling by the control culture, led the hippies seeing themselves as outsiders
  • they retreated into deviant subcultures
  • their subcultures were easily identified by dress and drug use
  • this prompted more attention from police creating secondary deviance
51
Q

What is deviance amplification

A

A term used to describe a process in which the attempt to control deviance leads to an increase in the level of deviance

52
Q

What did Stan cohen find about folk devils and moral panics

A
  • ‘mods and rockers’
  • the study illustrates the deviancy amplification spiral in which societal reaction to an initial deviant act leads to further deviance
  • the press exaggerated the events and created a moral panic
53
Q

What are the key differences with functionalism

A

Lemert makes the point that functionalist theories beliee deviance leads to social control whereas labelling theorists argue that social control leads to deviance

54
Q

What is the dark figure of crime

A

Is about unlabelled, unrecorded crime that is ignored by the public and police

55
Q

What did Triplett find about young offenders

A

There’s an increase tendency to see young offenders as evil and to be less tolerant of minor deviance

56
Q

What are the two types of shaming that Braithwaite found

A
  • disintergrative shaming
  • reintergrative shaming
57
Q

What is disintergrative shaming

A

Where both the crime and the individual label is labelled as bad

58
Q

What is reintergrative shaming

A

Where just the act is labelled but the social actor is not

59
Q

What are interactionists particularly interested in

A

Mental illness and suicide which are widely regarded as deviant

60
Q

Who studied suicide

A

Durkheim

61
Q

Who disagrees with Durkheims study of suicide

A

Interactionists, instead they rely on official statistics as they argue we must study meanings for those who chose to kill themselves

62
Q

What did Douglas find about suicide

A

-Looked at how coroners label death as suicide
-He found the decision made about the death is influenced by many social factors (friends,family etc)

63
Q

What measures did Douglas find that should be taken for a death

A

Douglas argues we must use qualitative methods to get behind the labels coroners attach to deaths and discover the true meaning

64
Q

What did Atkinson say about official statistics

A

OS are just a record of the labels that coroners attach, however he argues we can never properly know the meanings individuals give to their suicides

65
Q

What AO3 goes with Atkinson’s study

A

But if all we have is interpretations rather than real facts then Atkinson’s theory is no more than an interpretation

66
Q

What did Lemert find when he studied paranoia

A

Not everyone fits into groups easily, as a result of this primary deviance occurs and people begin to exclude the individual as being odd, this starts the secondary deviancy, which can lead to them becoming labelled negatively

67
Q

What is institutionalisation and what did Goffman say about it

A

He studied asylum showing the effects of being admitted to a total institution
On admission, the patient undergoes a mortification of the self where their identity is lost and replaced by a new on ‘inmate’

68
Q

What are 3 evaluation points for topic 2

A
  • determinism (once someone is labelled, a deviant career is inevitable)
  • assumes offenders are passive victims of labelling
  • it tends to focus on less serious crime such as drug-taking
69
Q

What does Miller say about working class crime

A

Working class have their own subcultural values which clash with the mainstream

70
Q

What does Merton’s strain theory say about working class crime

A

Lower classes are more likely to feel the strain and pursue illegitimate opportunities because they are fed societies cultural goals of money

71
Q

What does Cohen’s subcultural theories say about working class crime

A

Working class are culturally deprived and at the bottom of the status hierarchy and as such feel status frustration

72
Q

What does Cloward and Ohlin’s subcultural theories say about working class crime

A

Use the concept of illegitimate opportunity structures to explain why a range of different crimes are more prevalent within the working class

73
Q

What ways does the labelling theory criticise working class crime

A

Other theories are problem takers and assume that the stats are correct
Labelling theories are problem makers, they challenged OS and seek to investigate

74
Q

What are the marxists 3 main elements of their view of crime

A
  • criminogenic capitalism
  • the state and law making
  • ideological functions of crime and law
75
Q

What does criminogenic mean

A

It is the marxist idea that capitalism by its very nature causes crime

76
Q

What are the 3 reasons that the capitalist system is particularly damaging

A
  • poverty (may mean that crime is the only way the w/c can survive)
  • consumer goods (crime may be the only way they can contain consumer goods-leads to utilitarian crime)
  • alienation (results in a lack of control over their lives which can lead to aggression-resulting in non-utilitarian crime)
77
Q

What does marxists say about the law

A

They take the view that the law and agencies of social control such as the police serves only the interests of the ruling class

78
Q

What does Snider say about the state and law making

A

Argues that it is still the case that the capitalist state is still always reluctant to pass laws that regulate businesses and threaten their profitability

79
Q

What is selective enforcement

A

The working class and ethnic minorities are criminalised, but the criminal justice system tends to ignore the crimes of the powerful

80
Q

What does Reiman say about selective enforcement

A

The criminal justice system has a tendency to focus on ‘street crime’, they are typically committed by the lower classes. Yet crimes committed by the higher classes, such as tax evasion tend to be ignored

81
Q

How does the law, crime and criminals perform an ideological function for capitalism

A

Laws are occasionally passed that appear to be for the benefit of the subject class rather than the ruling class, for example health and safety laws

82
Q

What does Pearce say about health and safety laws

A

They benefit the ruling class, for example keeping workers fit for work.

83
Q

Evaluation points for the marxist views

A
  • it ignores the relationship between crime and important non-class inequalities such as gender and ethnicity
  • it is too deterministic - not all poor people commit crime despite the pressures of capitalism
84
Q

What is the neo-marxist view

A

They are influenced by the ideas of marxist and ideas from interactionists who focus on the process of labelling

85
Q

Neo-marxism points of agreement with marxism

A
  • the state selectively enforces and makes laws that criminalise the w/c
  • capitalism should be replaced by a classless society as this would reduce crime and even rid society of crime in the long term
86
Q

Neo-marxism points of disagreement with marxism

A

Taylor et al argue marxism is too deterministic arguing workers are driven to commit crime out of economic necessity

87
Q

What are two sources that make up the neo-marxist view

A
  • traditional marxist ideas about unequal distribution of wealth and who has power
  • ideas drawn from interactionists and labelling theory about the meaning of a deviant act and the effects of labelling
88
Q

What are the 6 elements that complete the neo-marxist view

A
  • the wider origins of the deviant act
  • the immediate origins of the deviant act
  • the act itself
  • the immediate origins of societal reaction
  • the wider origins of societal reaction
  • the effects of labelling
89
Q

Evaluation points for the neo-marxist view

A

Burke says that criminologist’s explanations are too general and idealistic so are of no use in terms of crime reduction strategies

90
Q

What do Marxists say about crimes of the powerful

A

They say that crimes committed by the higher-classes, are less likely than working-class people to be prosecuted

91
Q

What is white collar crime

A

A crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in the course of their occupation

92
Q

What is corporate crime

A

An illegal act or omission that i the result of deliberate or culpable negligence by a legitimate business organisation that is intended to benefit the business

93
Q

What does Tombs say about the scale and types of corporate crimes

A

Corporate crime has enormous costs; physical(deaths), environmental(pollution) and economic

94
Q

Corporate crimes include…

A
  • financial crimes - tax evasion
  • crimes against consumers - false labelling
  • crimes against employees
  • crimes against the environment
  • state-corporate crime
95
Q

What are some reasons for crime being committed by the powerful become invisible

A
  • the media - limited coverage
  • crimes are often complex - law enforcements are often understaffed and under resourced
96
Q

What is the strain theory explanations of corporate crimes

A

Box says that if employers don’t gain enough profit themselves, so they employ illegal means

97
Q

What is the marxism explanation of corporate crimes

A

Box argues that capitalism has created a mystication - idea that corporate crime is less widespread and harmful than w/c crime

98
Q

What is the differential association explanation of corporate crimes

A

Sutherland sees crime as behaviour learned in a social context, this links to two concepts ;
- deviant subcultures - employees face problems of achieving corporate goals and may adopt deviant means to do so and socialise new members into them
- techniques of neutralisation - individuals deviate more easily if they are able to justify their actions

99
Q

What is the labelling theory explanations of corporate crime

A

Whether an act is criminal depends on if a label has been successfully applied
The powerful are able to negotiate easier to get rid of their negative labels

100
Q

What are evaluation points for corporate crimes

A
  • Both strain and marxism’s theories over-predict the amount of business crime
  • law abiding could actually be more profitable

Sociology (4 decks)

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