Deviance and Crime Flashcards
1
Q
Deviance
A
- violation of social norms
- when people engage in behaviours that are not necessarily breaking the law, but are problematic
Informal social control - Invisible, often don’t see it until a norm is violated
Constrains what we do
2
Q
Crime
A
- violation of law
- Formal social control
- criminal justice system
3
Q
Sociologist Perspective
A
- socially constructed
- crimes are forms of deviance
- suggest that in order to define it, you need to have power to do it
- Less power = less able to resist labels
4
Q
Louis Reil
A
- Leader of the Metis
- Executed for treason
5
Q
Hagan’s Typology (1991)
A
- Norm violations can be broken down in how harmful they are to people
- Severity
- How harmful the act is
- How much agreement there is that the behaviour is wrong
- Severity of the punishment imposed
6
Q
Cross National Variation in Homicide
A
- Access to firearms
- How criminal justice systems may operate
7
Q
Consensus Crimes
A
- Greater agreement, harsher penalties
- “Mala in se” = evil in themselves
- Most severe punishments
- Ex. homicide
8
Q
Conflict Crimes
A
- “Male prohibita” = wrong by definition
- Societal disagreement about whether it’s harmful, about - if it should be punished
- Public disorder offences, chemical offences, political crimes, property offences, right to life offences
9
Q
Social Deviations
A
- Non criminal forms of deviance
- Informal social control
- Adolescence (delinquency)
- Interpersonal (mental illness)
- Vocation (non criminal violations of public and financial trust) things that happen on the job
10
Q
Social Diversions
A
- Fads
- Can be harmless
- Non criminal
- Sexual (particular sexual practices)
- Symbolic (bodily adornment)
11
Q
Methodological
A
- Social construction of deviance and crime tied to methodological issues
12
Q
How are police stats limited?
A
- Lots of crimes are underreported
- Family violence
- Domestic abuse
- Elderly abuse
- Criminalization of Intimate partner violence
13
Q
Structural Functionalism
A
- Crime is functional = social solidarity, reinforcing standards through societal reactions = people coming together to decide what is acceptable and not
- Social relations to crime and deviance to help define values and norms
- ex. prostitution
14
Q
Symbolic Interactionism
A
- micro level interactions
- Deviance is an ongoing creation = Constantly being negotiated
- we use symbols to create meaning
- subjectivity
15
Q
Conflict Theory
A
- Economic resources of groups form important definitions of deviance and crime
- How some activities/behaviours come to be defined as criminal/deviant and how some aren’t
- If you have economic/political power, you can avoid these labels of criminal/deviant
- Economic power allowed them to avoid being criminalized/sanctioned
