Crime & Deviance: Interactionism & Labelling theory

Question 1

Labelling theorists focus

Answer 1

-Ask why people’s actions are labelled as deviant and the effects this has.
-Do not accept OS as valid picture of crime and regards them as social constructs.
-Argue that crime is the product of interactions between suspects & police.

Question 2

The social construction of crime (Becker 1963)

Answer 2

Argue no act is inherently criminal, but only becomes it due to labels and the nature of society’s reaction to the act.
-A deviant is someone who’s been labelled.
-Becker studies moral entrepreneurs (people who lead moral campaigns to change the law).
-This new law invariably has 2 effects:
1. Creation of ‘outsiders’ (outlaws or deviants breaking new rule.
2. Creation of expansion of a social control agency (police/courts) to enforce the rule & impose labels on offenders.

Question 3

Juvenile delinquency: Platt (1969)

Answer 3

-Argues this was created as a result of a campaign by Upper class Victorian moral entrepreneurs, aimed at protecting young people at risk.
-Established ‘juveniles’ as a separate category of offender with their own courts, enabling state to extent its powers into ‘state offences’ (behaviour is only an offence due to age), such as truancy and sexual activity.
-Gave state control over punishing children and ethnic minorities.

Question 4

Social control agencies campaigning for change

Answer 4

-US Federal Bureau of Narcotics campaigned for passing of Marijuana Tax Act 1937, to outlaw marijuana use.
-Supposedly, on grounds of its bad effects but Becker argues it was to extend Bureau’s influence.
-So, it’s not the harmfulness of behaviour leading to new laws, but rather the efforts of powerful individuals to redefine behaviour as unacceptable.

Question 5

Who gets labelled?

Answer 5

Not everyone who commits an offence is punished - selective enforcement.
Depends on:
-Their interactions with agencies of social control.
-Appearance, background & personal biography.
-Their situation & circumstances of the offence.

Question 6

Implications of labelling

Answer 6

-Piliavan & Briar found police decisions to arrest a youth were mainly based on physical cues (dress/manner), from which they made judgements.
-Black people/W/C are likelier to be labelled as deviant.
-Means they will be over represented in crime rates & rates will be inflated for these groups, undermining Durkheim’s use as OS for ‘social facts’.

Question 7

Implications of labelling: Immigrants

Answer 7

-Overpolicing
-Dehumanisation
-Hate crimes

Question 8

Cicourel: Typifications (1968)

Answer 8

Typifications: expectations of what a criminal should look like.
-Impacts who is labelled a ‘criminal’ and who is policed, based on stereotypes of a typical delinquent.
-CJS has these, where W/C youth is seen as repeat offenders & were less likely to offer non-custodial sentences.
-More formal police action against W/C, meaning more arrests, confirming their stereotypes.

Question 9

Cicourel: Negotiation of Justice

Answer 9

-Justice is not fixed, but negotiable.
-When a young M/C male was arrested, he was less likely to be charged.
-This is because his background doesn’t fit the ‘typical delinquent” so his parents were able to convince control agencies he was sorry.
-M/C can negotiate through; better barristers, more CC, connections etc.

Question 10

Cicourel & Crime stats

Answer 10

-OS do not give valid patterns of crime and cannot be used as ‘facts’ or a resource.
-Instead, they should be used as a topic to investigate activities of the police & control agencies labelling.

Question 11

The social construction of crime

Answer 11

-Interactionists say stats are socially constructed and at each stage of the CJS, agents of social control make decisions about whether or not to proceed to the nect.
-Outcome depends on labels attached to suspects.
-Therefore, stats RELL us about activities of police/prosecutors rather than amount of crime or who commits it.
-At each ‘decision gate ’ or stage, less and less people are prosecuted.
-Dark figure of crime: unsure of how much crime goes undetected, unreported and unrecorded.
-Alternative statistics: some sociologists use victim surveys or self-report studies to gain an accurate picture, but people may forget, conceal or exaggerate crime statistics.

Question 12

Stages in the social construction of crime

Answer 12

1. Suspect stopped by police
2. Arrested
3. Charged
4. Prosecuted
5. Convicted
6. Sentenced

Most ethnic minority groups, dropped by stage 4, due to limited evidence.

Question 13

Stop and searches

Answer 13

-Black person is 9X more likely to be stop and searched.
-Inquiry into Lawrence’s murder led to Metropolitan police being labelled as “institutionally racist.”
-Since 2014, proportion of stop & searches leading to an arrest has doubled.

Question 14

The effects of labelling: Primary deviance (Lemert 1951)

Answer 14

Primary deviance: acts that have not been publicly labelled. Argues that it’s so widespread that it’s unlikely to have a significant cause.
-Not significant for an individual’s self-concept/status & will not internalise a deviant label.
-These crimes are normalised.
-E.g. fare dodging.

Question 15

Secondary deviance & Master status (Lemert)

Answer 15

Secondary deviance: result of societal reaction and is labelled.
-Once someone is labelled, others will come to see them only in terms of their label as this becomes their master status.
-Becomes a controlling identity, overriding all others (parent,teacher).
-Individual may accept this label and this leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy where they live up to their label, leading to further deviance.

Question 16

Secondary deviance & Deviant career (Young 1971)

Answer 16

-SD may provoke further hostile reactions from society & reinforce a deviant’s outsider status.
-Ex-convicts may find it hard to be employed so they may seek jobs from deviant subcultures, confirming their deviant identity.
-Young’s study of marijuana users: where marijuana was a peripheral part of a hippie identity, but due to the labelling and control culture (police), hippies saw themselves as outsiders.
-They then developed a deviant subculture with longer hair and drug use became central to their identity, due to self-fulfilling prophecy.

However, Downes & Rock argue that we cannot predict o someone who’s labelled will follow a deviant career.

Question 17

The effects of labelling: Deviance amplification spiral (Cohen & Folk devils)

Answer 17

Deviance amplification spiral: process in whcih attempt to control deviance leads to an increase, leading to more control, and more deviance in a declaring spiral.
-Cohen studied societal reactions to the ‘mods & rockers’ disturbances against English seaside resorts in 60s.
-Press exaggeration created a moral panic with concern and people calling for a crackdown.
-Police responded by arresting more youths and imposing harsher penalties.
-This supported media reaction leading to an upward spiral of DAS & mods and rockets were seen as folk devils leading to greater deviance.

Question 18

How does this show the DAS?

Answer 18

-Societal reactions to initial deviant act leads not to successful control, but to further deviance, to greater reactions.
-Folk devils vs Dark figure: falk devils are the opposites of dark figure of crime. Their actions are over-labelled and over-exposed to public view and authority attention.
-Pursuit of folk devils draws resources from detecting crimes making up the dark figure such as crimes of the powerful.

Question 19

The effects of labelling: Labelling & criminal justice policy (Triplett 2000)

Answer 19

-Notes an increasing tendency to see young offenders as evil and to be less tolerant of minor deviance.
-CJS has relabelled status offences such as truancy as more serious offences leading to harsher sentences.
-Negative labelling pushes offenders towards a deviant career.

Question 20

Labelling & Criminal justice policy: How to control crime

Answer 20

-By decriminalising soft drugs, might reduce no. of people with criminal convictions and labels, reducing secondary deviance and master status.
-This will prevent them being ostracised from society & will discourage secondary deviance reducing deviant careers and crime rates.
-Reduces risk of master status since they won’t be controlled with a criminal identity for petty crime and will not internalise the primary level deviance.

Question 21

Labelling & criminal justice policy: Reintegrative shaming (Braithwaite 1989)

Answer 21

Disintegrative shaming: where not only the crime, but also the criminal, is labelled as bad and offender is excluded from society.
Reintegrative shaming: labels the act, not the actor as ‘bad’.

-Reintegrative shaming avoids stigmatising the offender as evil while making them reflect on the negative impact of their actions, but encouraging forgiveness.
-Makes it easier for offender to re-enter mainstream society & avoids pushing them into SD.
-Braithwaite argues crime rates are lower in societies where reintegrative rather than disintegrative shaming is the dominant way of dealing with offenders.

Question 22

Strengths of Labelling theory

Answer 22

-Provided insight into deviance nature not provided by structural theories.
-Challbges idea deviants are diff from normal people.
-Highlights importance of stereotyping.
-Highlights role of moral entrepreneurs in creating more crime.
-Reveals OS are a product of bias in law enforcement.

Question 23

Limitations of Labelling theory

Answer 23

-Removed blame for deviance away from individual and victimises them, IFNORING real victims of deviance.
-Doesn’t explain diff types of crime committed.
-Deterministic and doesn’t explain why there is diffeent reactions to being labelled (not always deviant career).
-Doesn’t see an act as deviant until it’s labelled as such, but certain behaviour is morally wrong and doesn’t need a label to be considered wrong.
-Some people actively choose deviance.