Interactionist Theory Flashcards
Introduction
Labelling theorists take a very different approach to functionalists and Marxists. Instead of seeking the causes of criminal behaviour, they ask how and why some people and actions come to be labelled as criminal or deviant, and what effects this has on those who are so labelled.
Instead of accepting official statistics as a valid picture of crime, they regard the, not as hard facts, but as social constructs. This reflects the signs of labelling theory in symbolic interactionism, which takes the view that individuals construct the social world through their face to face interactions.
What is the Social construction of crime?
Howard Becker - Labelling Theory
Becker argues there is no such thing as crime or deviance - the act only becomes deviant when others label it as such. Instead, it only comes to be so when others label it as such. In other words, it’s not the nature of the act that makes it deviant, but the nature of society’s reaction to the act.
For Becker therefore, a deviant is simply someone to whom the label has been successfully applied, and deviant behaviour is simply behaviour that people so label.
“Deviance is in the eye of the beholder”
Dependent on - time (homosexuality - 1967 made legal)
- place
Entrepreneurs moral crusade to change the law.
Becker said that one constitutes to C and D is based on subjective decisions made by ‘moral entrepreneurs’. These decisions lead to:
- The creation of a new group of ‘outsiders’ - outlaws as deviants who break the new rule.
- The creation or expansion of a social control agency.
Who gets labelled?
- working class
- ethnic-minorities
- youth
- postcodes
Not everyone who commits an offence is punished for it, whether a person is arrested, charged and convicted depends on:
- Their interactions with agencies of social control.
- Their appearance, background and personal biography.
- The situation and circumstances of the offence.
What are the effect is labelling?
Lemert (1951) distinguishes primary and secondary deviance.
Primary deviance: refers to deviant acts that have not been publicly labelled. For Lemert, it’s pointless to seek the causes of primary deviance, since it’s so widespread that it’s unlikely to have a single cause and in any case it’s often trivial.
Secondly deviance: Master status. Secondary defiance is an act which has been publicly labelled as deviant - societal reaction. Such labelling will have an effect on a person’s status and identity and may lead to more criminal or deviant acts. The negative label becomes a master label.
Certain master labels, e.g. criminal, mental patient and drug addict dominate and shape how others see the individual; they tend to override all other views of how we see the individual, e.g. family man.
What is secondary deviance and how can it lead to a deviant career?
Secondary deviance is likely to provoke further hostile reactions from society and reinforce the deviant’s ‘outsider’ status. For example, the ex-convict finds it hard to go straight because no one will employ him, so he seeks out other outsiders for support. This may involve joining a deviant subculture that offers deviant career opportunities and role models, rewards deviant behaviour, and confirms his deviant identity.
Jock Young uses the concepts of secondary deviance and deviant career in his study of hippy marijuana users in Notting Hill. Initially, drugs were peripheral to the hippies’ lifestyle - an example of primary deviance. However, persecution and labelling by the control culture (the police) led the hippies increasingly to see themselves as outsiders. They retreated into closed groups where they began to develop a deviant subculture, wearing longer hair and more ‘way out’ clothes. Drug use became a central activity attracting further attention from the police and creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.
The work of Lemert and Young illustrates the idea that it is not the act itself, but the hostile societal reaction to it, that creates serious deviance. Ironically, therefore, the social control processes that are meant to produce law-abiding behaviour may in fact produce the very opposite.
However, Downes and Rock (2003) note, we cannot predict whether someone who has been labelled will follow a deviant career, because they are always free to choose not to deviate further.
What is the deviancy amplification spiral? Stan Cohen - Folk devils and moral panics
The deviance amplification spiral is a term labelling theorists use to describe a process in which they attempt to control deviance leads to an increase in the level of deviance, in an escalating spiral, as in the case of the hippies described by Young.
Labelling theorists have applied the concept of the deviance amplification to various forms of group behaviour. An example of this is Stanley Cohen’s (1972) Folk devils and moral panics, a study of the societal reaction to the ‘mods and rockers’ disturbances involving groups of youths at English seaside resorts.
Press exaggeration and distorted reporting of the events began a moral panic with growing public concern and with moral entrepreneurs calling for a ‘crackdown’. The police responded by arresting more youths, while the courts imposed harsher penalties. This seemed to confirm the truth of the original media reaction and provoked more public concern, in an upward spiral of deviance amplification.
This is similar to Lemert’s idea of secondary deviance. In both cases, the societal reaction to an initial deviant act leads not to successful control of the deviance, but to further deviance, which in turn leads to a greater reaction and so on. It also illustrates an important difference between labelling theory and functionalist theories of deviance. As Lemert (1967) puts it, these theories:
‘rest heavily on the idea that deviance leads to social control. I have come to believe the reverse idea i.e. social control leads to deviance’.
Cohen is regarded as explaining what a moral panic is in the best way.
Folk devils are in a sense the opposite of dark crime. Folk devils and their actions are ‘over-labelled’ and over-exposed to public view and the attentions of the authorities.
What is the negotiation of justice (Cicourel)?
Police officers are influenced by stereotypes of offenders. Cicourel found that officers used ‘typificsfions’ - common sense theories or stereotypes about the typical delinquent.
This resulted in law enforcement focusing on the WC and patrolled their areas more closely. More police in these areas led to more prosecutions of the WC thus confirming original stereotypes.
It is not just the police. Cicourel says that other agents of social control also reinforce this bias. For example, probation officers held the common sense theory that juvenile delinquency was caused by broken homes, poverty and lax parenting.
Cicourel says that justice is not fixed but negotiable e.g. middle-class youth, is less likely to be charged because they don’t fit the stereotype.
What is disintegrative and reintegrative shaming?
Most labelling theorists see labelling as having negative aspects. However, John Braithwaite (1989) identifies a more positive role for the labelling process. He distinguishes between two types of shaming:
- Disintegrative shaming, where not only the crime, but also the criminal, is labelled as bad and the offender is excluded from society.
- Reintegrative shaming, by contrast, labels the act but not the actor - as if to say, ‘he has done a bad thing’, rather than ‘he is a bad person’.
Evaluation
✅ The role of agencies of social control. They show that in some circumstances the abuse of police discretion in deciding who to stop and search is often discriminatory against certain social and ethnic groups. It also shows actions of law enforcement agencies towards criminal behaviour can be counterproductive and exasperate the deviancy (e.g. the prohibition era in the USA, and the contemporary attempt to treat cannabis as a legal rather than medical issue), as well as affecting the public perception of what constitutes a ‘typical’ criminal.
✅ Further research into the effects of labelling. In education, Rist has shown his negative teacher expectations placed on working class pupils leads to underachievement and anti-school subcultures.
✅ Careful interpretation of criminal statistics. Cicourel and Becker have shown certain types of people are singled out for labelling and persecution, more so than others. Therefore, other theories of crime based on statistical evidence or prison populations, such as the subcultural theories, may not be as valid as the statistical evidence the theories are based on is misleading.
❌ Deviance and crime is not socially constructed. Taylor, Walton and Young (1973), argue the labelling theory is mistaken in suggesting deviance is created by a societal reaction and the agencies of social control (e.g. Becker). Some acts, such as premeditated killings for personal gain, will always be regarded as deviant in most societies regardless of the reaction of society, suggesting societal reaction is less important than the actual act itself.
❌ Origins of crime. The interactionist theory fails to explain why individuals commit deviant acts in the first place (primary deviance); from where did deviant or criminal behaviour originate before labelled as such. Biological (genetic) and psychological theories may provide a better possible reason than a sociological one. Furthermore, interactionists fail to distinguish between crimes with different level of seriousness (e.g. murder, rape, violent assault and armed robbery).
❌ Too deterministic. Acker argues that such a view ignores the fact some individuals might simply choose to be deviant, regardless of whether you have been labelled as such.
❌ Marxists question the interactionist view on selective labelling. It fails to account adequately or in detail for the relationship between those in power and crime. It assumes certain social or power groups can impose their definition of crime and evidence but fails to explain why some groups can, and others cannot. The interactionist theory also fails to analyse the distribution of crime according to Marxist thinkers - who controls the power, who makes the rules, and who benefits from them.
❌ Left realism - the real reason for crime. Lea and Young (1984), argue the interactionist view of crime and deviance as a consequence of societal reaction and labelling is fundamentally flawed. Working class people and Afro-Caribbean’s do commit more crime, and there are real social reasons for it. They suggest working class and Afro-Caribbean crime can be understood as a response to marginalisation, relative deprivation and subcultures. Left realists argue the interactionist approach is too sympathetically focused on the deviant individual, ignoring the victim. Moreover, interactionist lacks any practical social policy to deal with crime e, whereas leftist realists have put forward practical solutions to attempt to reduce crime, especially in inner-city areas.
