CRIME + DEVIANCE - MARX, CLASS, CRIME, NEO-MARX, JEFF BEZOS

Question 1

MARXISM

How do they view crime?

Answer 1

Marxism is a structural theory which sees society as a structure where the economic base determines the superstructure – this is made of all other social institutions e.g., state, law, CJS.

They believe their function is to serve the bourgeoisie and maintain the capitalist economy.

Question 2

MARXISM

What three explanations of crime do they have?

Answer 2

1. Criminogenic capitalism.
2. State and law-making.
3. Ideological functions of crime and law.

Question 3

MARXISM

1. CRIMINOGENIC CAPITALISM

What does this mean?

Answer 3

Crime is an inevitability because capitalism is criminogenic, which means its nature is very facilitating for crime.

Capitalism is founded on exploitation, and so in the pursuit of profit, the working classes are exploited. This essentially assists crime.

Crime may be the only way for W.C to appease their consumerist desire, and alienation/lack of control, may lead to frustration.

Question 4

MARXISM

1. CRIMINOGENIC CAPITALISM

What does David Gordon argue?

Answer 4

David Gordon argues that crime is a rational response to capitalism, and that it is found in ALL social classes despite ONS and other official stats disproportionately highlighted W.C crime, portraying it to be a W.C phenomenon.

Question 5

MARXISM

2. STATE AND LAW-MAKING

What does William Chambliss argue?

Answer 5

Marxists view law-making and enforcement as serving the interests of the capitalist class.

William Chambliss highlights this through his explanations of how laws protect private property.

E.g., introduction of English Law into Britain’s East African colonies – our economic interests lay in the colonies’ tea and coffee.

This required a large supply of local labour.

At that time, local economy was not a money economy, so, to force the African population to work for them, the British introduced a tax which could be paid in cash.

Non-payment = criminal offence.

The law entrenched the economic interests of the plantation owners because the tax could only be paid through working on the plantation.

Question 6

MARXISM

2. STATE AND LAW-MAKING

Explain the consensus between labelling theorists and Marxists.

Answer 6

SELECTIVE ENFORCEMENT

There is consensus between labelling theorists and Marxists in that they both agree that there is selective enforcement of laws – powerless groups are criminalised, whilst the police and courts ignore crimes of the powerful.

Question 7

MARXISM

3. IDEOLOGICAL FUNCTIONS OF CRIME AND LAW

What does Frank Pearce note?

Answer 7

Frank Pearce notes, that such laws often benefit the ruling classes too – e.g., keeping workers fit and happy for work.

Laws facilitate false class consciousness: laws are also NOT rigorously enforced.

E.g., a law against corporate homicide was passed in 2007, but in its first eight years, there was only one successful prosecution of a UK company despite large numbers of death caused by employer negligence.

Question 8

MARXISM

3. IDEOLOGICAL FUNCTIONS OF CRIME AND LAW

How do we end up blaming the W.C rather than capitalism?

Answer 8

Selective enforcement divides the W.C because it appears to be W.C phenomenon.

Media outlets and criminologists also facilitate this division by portraying criminals as disturbed, which conceals the fact that CAPITALISM is the reason why people commit crimes.

Question 9

EVALUATING MARXISM

Too deterministic

Answer 9

Overly deterministic. Not all poor people commit crime.

Capitalist societies don’t always have high crime rates – Japan only has 1/5 of the crime rate in the USA.

Question 10

EVALUATING MARXISM

CJS protects everyone

Answer 10

The CJS sometimes acts against the corporations and capitalist classes e.g., prosecutions DO happen.

Question 11

EVALUATING MARXISM

Intra-class crimes

Answer 11

Left realists argue that Marxism ignores the intra-class crimes (burglary etc.) where the victims and perpetrators are working class.

Question 12

NEO-MARXISM

What is this approach?

Answer 12

This is a combination between Marxist ideas and ideas from other approaches such as labelling theory.

Question 13

NEO-MARXISM

The New Criminology - who wrote it?

Answer 13

Taylor, Walton, and Young, in 1973.

Question 14

NEO-MARXISM

The New Criminology:

what is argued in this

Answer 14

Taylor et al agree with the o.g Marxists that capitalist society is based on exploitation, that the state enforces laws with the interests of capitalist classes only, and that capitalism should be replaced with a classless society (which would reduce the extent of crime and would rid society of it completely).

Question 15

NEO-MARXISM

The New Criminology:

what is their approach described as?

Answer 15

They describe their approach as critical criminology.

Question 16

NEO-MARXISM

A Full Social Theory of Deviance:

what two sources are needed to compose this theory?

Answer 16

The two sources for this theory would be from (1) Marxist ideas of unequal distribution of wealth and (2) ideas from interactionism/labelling theory about the meaning of the deviant act for the actor (and deviant label effects).

Question 17

NEO-MARXISM

A Full Social Theory of Deviance:

what are the six different aspects that need to be studied to establish a unified theory?

Answer 17

1. Wider origins of the deviant act in the unequal distribution of wealth + power.
2. Immediate origins of the deviant act and the particular context in which the individual commits the act.
3. The act itself and its meaning for the actor.
4. Immediate origins of the social reaction – so the reactions of those around the deviant when they discovered the deviance.
5. Wider origins of the social reaction in the structure of the capitalist society – who has the power to define acts as deviant?
6. Effects of labelling.

Question 18

EVALUATING NEO-MARX AND C.C

Gender blind

Answer 18

Feminists criticise this approach because it is gender blind and focuses solely on male criminality, at the expense of female criminality.

Question 19

EVALUATING NEO-MARX AND C.C

Romanticising criminals

Answer 19

Left realists believe that critical criminology romanticises W.C criminals as people who are fighting capitalist through wealth redistribution.

In reality, they prey on the poor. They also claim that Taylor et al don’t take such crime seriously particularly in its effects to W.C people.

Question 20

EVALUATING NEO-MARX AND C.C

Changing beliefs - Taylor, Walton, and Young themselves.

*They define themselves here, but they HAVE changed their beliefs

Answer 20

Walton and Young defend some aspects of their book:

1. They believe that it in calling for greater tolerance of diversity in behaviour, the book proactively combatted the correctionalist bias (the assumption that sociology’s role is to find ways of correcting deviant behaviour.
2. They also believe that the book laid primary foundations for later radical approaches that wanted a greater, more equal society e.g., Feminist theories and Left Realist theories.

Question 21

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Brief introduction

Outline what’s said in The Rich Get Richer, the Poor Get Prison.

Answer 21

There is a much higher rate of prosecutions for the conventional street crimes that W.C are more likely to commit, rather than the crimes committed by M.C people.

Reiman and Leighton’s book highlights how the more likely a crime is to be committed by a higher-class person, the less likely it is to be treated as an actual criminal offence.

Question 22

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

White Collar Crime:

who coined the term?

what were his intentions?

Answer 22

It coined by Edwin Sutherland.

‘Fraud committed by business and government professionals’

He wanted to challenge the stereotype that crime was W.C phenomenon.

Question 23

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

White Collar Crime:

what are the issues with Edwin Sutherland’s definition?

Answer 23

His definition doesn’t differentiate between occupational crime and corporate crime.

A further issue is that many crimes committed by the powerful don’t break any criminal laws e.g., admin offences such as a company failing to comply with codes of practice laid down by govt. regulators.

Question 24

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

White Collar Crime:

what did Pearce and Tombs do?

Answer 24

They widened the o.g definition of corporate crime to ‘any illegal act or omission that is the result of deliberate decisions or culpable negligence by a legitimate business organisation and that is intended to benefit the business’

Question 25

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

White Collar Crime:

who controls the law, as suggested by Tombs?

Answer 25

Tombs argues that the difference between the different offences is that it’s about who has the power to define an act as a crime – not really to do with how harmful the act itself is.

Question 26

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Corporate Crime:

Brief outline - what is the cost of corporate crime?

Answer 26

It has a very disproportionate impact in comparison to street crimes: one estimate suggests that street crime puts the cost of white-collar crimes in the USA at over ten times than that of ordinary crimes.

Question 27

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Corporate Crime:

1. financial crime

Answer 27

E.g., tax evasion, bribery, money laundering, illegal accounting.

Question 28

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Corporate Crime:

2. crimes against consumers

Answer 28

E.g., false advertising, labelling, selling unfit goods.

in 2011, French Govt recommended women with breast enlargements from Poly Implant Prothese to have them removed because they were filled with dangerous industrial silicone and not medical silicone. 300,000 implants were sold in 65 countries.

Question 29

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Corporate Crime:

3. crimes against employees + work-related deaths

Answer 29

e.g., sexual, and racial discrimination, violations of wages, rights to join unions restricted, industrial action restricted.

Tombs believes that up to 1,100 work-related deaths annually happen because of employers breaking the law. This is greater than annual total of homicides.

Question 30

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Corporate Crime:

4. crimes against environment

Answer 30

e.g., illegal pollution, toxic waste dumping.

2015 – Volkswagen admitted to installing software in 11 millions of its diesel vehicles globally which could detect when the engines were being tested – it disguised emissions levels that were 40 times above the legal US limit.

Question 31

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Corporate Crime:

5. state corporate crimes

Answer 31

e.g., harms committed when govt. institutions and businesses cooperate to pursue their goals.

This is increasingly important because private companies often work alongside the government now. Examples include in education, war on terror, and in winning contracts (coronavirus).

Question 32

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Abuse of trust:

Carrabine et al

Answer 32

Carrabine et al notes how high-status professionals occupy positions of great trust.

We trust them with our finances, health, security, and personal information. But they can easily abuse this trust.

Question 33

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Abuse of trust:

Health professionals - Harold Shipman

Answer 33

Respected status of health professionals to means they can afford scope for criminal activity.

2000, Harold Shipman was convicted of the murder of 15 of his patients.

Over the course of 23 years, he has been said to murder 200 +.

He was able to do this in 1976, through obtaining powerful opiate pethidine through deception and forgery.

He also had enough morphine to kill 360 people – he only received a warning from the GMC and was allowed to continue practising as a GP.

Question 34

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Abuse of trust:

Sutherland’s input on the impact on abuse of trust

Answer 34

Sutherland believes this is far more than W.C street crime because it protects cynicism and encourages distrust in basic institutions and undermines our society.

Question 35

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Invisibility of corporate crime:

MEDIA

Answer 35

There is a limited coverage of corporate crime, reinforcing the stereotypes of crime being a W.C phenomenon.

Corporate crime is sanitised, using technical language, rather than real-life, relatable language. E.g., Defrauding customers = mis-selling.

Question 36

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Invisibility of corporate crime:

LACK OF POLITICAL WILL

Answer 36

Politicians want to be tough on crime, but primarily focus on street crime and nothing else.

The Home Office use crime surveys to discover extent of ordinary crime but not does implement the same methods for corporate crime.

Question 37

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Invisibility of corporate crime:

COMPLEX CRIMES

Answer 37

Law enforcers are usually understaffed and so lack technical expertise to investigate efficiently.

Question 38

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Invisibility of corporate crime:

DE-LABELLING

Answer 38

Corporate crimes are consistently filtered from the process of criminalisation e.g., offences are often defined as civil and not criminal and even in criminal cases, penalties are often fines and not jail.

This can be seen in 2010, when the French authorities provided their British counterparts with a list of 3,600 UK citizens holding secret bank accounts with the Swiss subsidiary of the UK-based bank HSBC. This was used for tax evasion but only one prosecution was secured in the UK.

Question 39

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Invisibility of corporate crime:

UNDER-REPORTING

Answer 39

Individuals may be unaware they have been victimised (you may not realise you have been illegally duped into buying the wrong mortgage), and even when individuals are aware, they may not regard it as a real crime… they may feel powerless against such a large organisation.

Question 40

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Invisibility of corporate crime:

Why it’s not all doom and gloom

Answer 40

Since 2008 global financial crisis, the activities of people have made corporate crimes more visible.

E.g., campaigns against corporate tax avoidance, investigative journalists, whistle-blowers inside companies, and the media.

Neo-liberal policies such as marketisation and privatisation mean that large corporations are more involved in people’s lives and are more exposed to public scrutiny than in the past.

Question 41

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Why does white-collar crime and corporate crime happen?

1. STRAIN THEORY

Answer 41

Box building on Merton’s ideas:

If a company cannot achieve its goal of maximising profit, then it has to use illegal means to achieve this goal. When business conditions get tough, companies turn to break the law.

There is strain between a company’s fiscal goals and the legal means to achieve them.

Question 42

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Why does white-collar crime and corporate crime happen?

2. DIFFERENTIAL ASSOCIATION

Answer 42

Sutherland sees crime as learned behaviour from others.

So, if a company’s culture justifies committing crimes to achieve corporate goals, employees will also hold a criminal mindset.

1. New employees are socialised into adopting deviant means to achieve their company’s corporate goals. This culture of business encourages competitiveness, aggressive personalities, and greed.
2. Techniques of neutralisation - individuals deviate easily if they can justify their behaviour from moral objections.

E.g., white-collar criminals may say they were carrying out orders from above, they may blame the victims, they may normalise their deviance etc.

Question 43

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Why does white-collar crime and corporate crime happen?

3. LABELLING THEORY PERSPECTIVE

Answer 43

De-labelling sociologists applied this to white-collar and corporate crime… this is called De-labelling, stated by Nelken.

Businesses and professionals often have the power to avoid labelling – they can afford expensive experts to help them avoid consequences of their activities such as tax avoidance.

Reluctance of law enforcement = reduces number of offences officially recorded as such.

Question 44

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Why does white-collar crime and corporate crime happen?

4. MARXIST PERSPECTIVE - mystification of crime

Answer 44

Because capitalism’s goal is to maximise profits, it causes harm e.g., deaths, injuries etc.

Coinciding with this, capitalism has created what Box calls a mystification – it has spread its ideology that corporate crime is less widespread or harmful than W.C crime.

Question 45

CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Why does white-collar crime and corporate crime happen?

4. MARXIST PERSPECTIVE - government cooperation

Answer 45

Pearce argues that the support the govt gives to capitalism means that the illusion that it is the exception rather than the norm is sustained, and that avoids the crisis of legitimacy of capitalism.

Companies only comply with the law if they see it being upheld strictly.

Question 46

EVALUATING CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Nelkson - don’t generalise!

Answer 46

He believes it is unrealistic to assume that all business would offend were it not for the risk of punishment.

Having a good status with other companies would prevent them from pursuing crime etc.

Question 47

EVALUATING CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

Braithwaite - profitable to abide by the law

Answer 47

Law abiding may be more profitable than law breaking:

Braithwaite found that US Pharmaceutical companies that complied with the FDA regulations to obtain licenses for their products in America were able to access lucrative markets in poorer countries.

This is because these poorer countries couldn’t afford their own drug-testing facilities, so they relied on the FDA licencing as a benchmark for quality.

Question 48

EVALUATING CRIMES OF THE POWERFUL

What about state agency crimes?

Answer 48

Regardless of capitalist pursuit of money being a cause of corporate crime, what about the crime in state agencies where pursuit of profit is irrelevant e.g., police, army, civil service.

Question 49

Voluntaristic

Answer 49

Humans have free will and can exercise choice in how they act, rather than their behaviour determined via external forces such as social structure.

Question 50

Deterministic

Answer 50

Humans have no free will and external forces shape human behaviour and thoughts.

Question 51

White Collar Crime

Answer 51

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

Question 52

False Class Consciousness

Answer 52

Inability to recognise exploitation and oppression because of how society legitimises the W.C position.

Question 53

Anti-Determinism

*A neo-marxist idea

Answer 53

Taylor et al argue that Marxism is deterministic, and that it sees workers as driven to commit crime because of economic necessity.

The neo-Marxists reject this along with any other theories that suggest crime is caused by external factors. Taylor et al are voluntaristic in that they believe that crime is meaningful action that has a political motive. Criminals are not puppets – they are deliberately trying to change society.

Question 54

Corporate crime

Answer 54

Committed by employees for their organisation in the pursuit of its goals.

Question 55

Occupational crime

Answer 55

Committed by employees for their own personal gain, often against the organisation they work for.