Crime and punishment in modern Britain c1900-present

Question 1

What were the key crimes in the modern period?

Answer 1

• Hate crimes
• Violent crimes and sexual offences
• Car crime
• Murder
• Terrorism
• Computer crime
• Theft, burglary and shoplifting
• Smuggling and drug offences
• Homophobic crime
• Race crime

Question 2

What were the key aspects of continuity in the modern period?

Answer 2

• murder

Question 3

What were the key aspects of change in the modern period?

Answer 3

• crime increased homever;
• more people reporting crime
• technology e.g telephones made it easier to inform police
• more people report burglaries and theft for insurance purposes
• violent and sexual crimes reported more as police better trained and more sympathetic
• crime reporting by police more consistent

Question 4

What was law enforcement like in the modern period?

Answer 4

• increased numbers
• longer and more specialised training
• better transport due to cars and motorbikes rather than walking
• more equipment
• improved crime detection tools e.g dna, fingerptints, cctv
• highly improved record-keeping
• increased duties

Question 5

What were the key aspects of continuity in punishment in the modern period?

Answer 5

• use of prison as a punishment continued and still seen as deterrent

Question 6

What were the key aspects of change in punishment in the modern period?

Answer 6

• use of prison as a punishment continued to increase
• ideas about purpose of prison and treatment of prisoners changed
• more people believe prisoners especially young offenders should be given a chance to change
• modern courts often use alternative punishments that focus on reform and rehabilitation
• capital punishment abolished

Question 7

What were conscientious objectors?

Answer 7

• men aged 18-51 who refused to participate in compulsory service in armed forced because their conscience wouldnt allow it e.g religious or political reasons

Question 8

What were tribunals?

Answer 8

• appearance infront of a special court where men were allowed to ask for exemption on grounds of conscience, made by around 16,500 men

Question 9

What was the treatment of CO’s like?

Answer 9

• over 6,000 COs refused tribunal and were put in prison where they faced solitary confinement, hard labour and a long sentence
• even after war, all COs stripped of right to vote until 1926

Question 10

Why were COs treated so harshly?

Answer 10

• casualty rates were high, authorities determined to stop pacifist ideas spreading to prevent growth of resistance to war
• government propaganda presented fighting as man’s duty
• refusing to fight seen as traitorous and unmanly
• press spread views of COs as cowardly, harsh punishments publicised to deter and make treatment widely accepted
• public felt COs unfairly avoiding duty
• much of public had family members killed or injured in war
• families of COs isolated

Question 11

What were attitudes to COs like in the second war?

Answer 11

• conscription started again 1939 and 59,162 including women registered COs
• authorities treated them much better
• tribunals held but no longer with ex-soldiers, much more fair
• greater effort to give COs alternative work e.g farming or industries that were vital to war effort
• public slower to change attitudes, many accused of cowardice and treason
• COs continued to be attacked in newspapers and many sacked from jobs