MARXISM

Question 1

In a nutshell, how do Marxists feel about crime?

Answer 1

Crime is inevitable in a capitalist society because it encourages poverty, competition and greed. Working class is largely criminalised because the ruling class control the state and enforce law in their own interest

Question 2

For Marxists the structure of capitalism society explain crime. What are the four ways capitalism creates crime?

Answer 2

Criminologic capitalism: causes crime by nature

State and Law making

Selective enforcement

Ideological functions of crime and law

Question 3

According to Marxists, how is capitalism criminogenic?

Answer 3

Capitalism encourages selfishness and is a rational response for all social classes.

Poverty is caused by capitalism and crime is the only way for the w/c to survive.

Capitalist advertising encourages obtainment of consumer goods, crime is the only way for w/c to obtain this

The alienation and lack of control may lead to frustration and agression

Question 4

Who are the sociologists that discuss how the state and law making create crime?

Answer 4

Chambliss and Snider

Question 5

What does Chambliss say about the state and law making and how it creates crime?

Answer 5

Laws to protect private property are the cornerstone of the capitalist economy

The rulling class have the power to prevent the introduction of laws that would threaten their interests, e.g. there are few laws that seriously challenge the unequal distribution of wealth

Question 6

What does Snider say about the state and law making creating crime in a capitalist world?

Answer 6

Capitalist state is reluctant to pass laws that regulate the activity of business or threatened their profitability. Law making and law enforcement only benefit the capitalist class

Question 7

According to Marxists what is selective enforcement and how does this create crime?

Answer 7

Relates to the state and law making
Powerless groups such as the working class and ethnic minoritrd are criminalised, and the police and court tend to ignore the crime of the powerful

Question 8

According to sociologists what are the three ways selective enforcement helps capitalism, and which sociologist comes up with this?

Answer 8

Gordon:
People are labelled as social failures so we ignore the actions of poverty

Imprisonment of specific individuals who are likely to trigger revolution

Imprisonment hides the failures of capitalism

Question 9

What are the ideological functions of crime and the law and which sociologist comes up with this theory?

Answer 9

Pearce:
Laws give capitalism a caring face and created a false class consciousness among workers. This is because the state enforces the law selectively, divides the worker in class by encouraging them to blame criminals for their problems

Question 10

Give an example of laws giving capitalism a caring face according to Pearce.

Answer 10

Workplace health and safety laws appear to benefit the working class but actually benefit capitalism and the rulling class, by keeping workers fit for work. Creates false class consciousness

Question 11

How do laws divide the working class according to Pearce?

Answer 11

Laws are selectively enforced, which makes crime appear to be largely a working class phenomenon. The state engorges working class to blame the criminals for their problems rather than capitalism

Question 12

What is an example of the state creating a law to appear caring and yet failed to enforce it

Answer 12

A law against corporate homicide in 2007, in its first eight years there was only one successful prosecution of a UK company

Question 13

How can you criticise the Marxists explanations of the relationship between crime and capitalist society?

Answer 13

Ignored the relationship between crime and non-class inequality lime ethnicity and gender

Too determinalistic, overproduction the amount of w/c crime

Not all capitalist societies have high crime rate, e.g. homicide rate in Switzerland is about 1/5 of that in the USA

Left realists: ignores interclass crime, when both the criminal and victims are w/c, e.g. burglary

Justice system doesn’t always ignores corporate crime, e.g. Jeffery Epstein

Question 14

Who is Neo-Marxist sociologist in discussion the reason for crime?

Answer 14

Taylor et Al

Question 15

In what way does Taylor et Al agree with the Marixst ideas?

Answer 15

Capitalist society is based on exploration and class conflict

The state makes and enforces laws in the interests of the capitalist class, and criminalised the w/c

Capitalism should be replaced by a classless society

Question 16

In what way does Taylor et Al criticise the Marxists ideas?

Answer 16

Marxists is too determinalisticz it sees workers as driven to commit crime out of economic nessectity

Question 17

How does Neo Marxist, Taylor et Al, view crime that is different to the Marxist view?

Answer 17

Take a voluntaritic view, they see crime a meaningful action and a conscious choice by the actor. Criminals are not passive puppets shaped by capitalism, they deliberately try to change society.

Crime often has a political motive, e.g, to redistribute wealth from the rich to the poor

Question 18

Taylor et Al produced a fully social theory of deviance to understand crime in society, what does it take into account?

Answer 18

1. The wider origins of the act: society it occurred in, capitalist?
2. Immedite origins of the deviant act: where it is, why the place triggered the act
3. The act itself- the meaning/reason
4. Immediate origins of social reaction: reaction of the public
5. Wider society reaction: who has the power to label and decide the punishment and level of deviance
6. Effect of the label: the effect of deivents future actions

Question 19

What does Taylor et Al describe his approach as?

Answer 19

Critical criminology

Question 20

How can you criticise the Neo-Marxist perspective on how to investigate the reason for crime?

Answer 20

Feminists: focuses on male crime

Left realists: romanticism of working class crime as Robin hoods, in relality these crimes prey on the poor, ignore effect on the victims

Burke: critical criminology is too general to explain crime and too idealistic to be useful in tackling crime

Question 21

What is white collar crime?

Answer 21

Crimes committed in the furtherance of an individuals own interest, often gauanst the corporations of organisations within which they work

Question 22

What is corporate crime?

Answer 22

Committed by or for corporatiojs or businesses which act to further their interest and have serious physical or economic impact on employees, consumers and the public. The desire is to increase profit

Question 23

Who are the two sociologists that discuss white collar and corporate crime?

Answer 23

Reiman and Leighton

Tombs

Question 24

What does Reiman and Leighton say about white collar amd corporate crime?

Answer 24

The more likely the crime is committed by a higher class people the less likely it is to he treated as an offence

Here are higher rate of preseuctiok for the typical street crime poor people commit like burglary and assault. Crimes committed by higher classes like tax evasion are more likely to gain a forgiving view

Question 25

What does Tombs say about white collar and corporate crime?

Answer 25

Corporate have enormous costs, physical environmental and economic.

Crimes against employees: sexual or racial discrimination, violate of wage
Financial crimes: tax evasion
Crimes against consumers: false labelling, selling unfit goods
Crimes against environment: illegal pollution

Question 26

What is an example of a crime against consumers?

Answer 26

2011 the French government recommended that women with breat implants from the manufacture, Poly Implant Prothese, should remove them because they were filled with dangerous industrial silicone rather than expensive medical silicone. 300,000 had been sold in 65 countries

Question 27

What is an example of crimes against employees

Answer 27

2013 calculated 1,100 work related deaths a year involved employers breaking the law. 2008 estimates occupational disease cause 50,000 deaths a year in UK

Question 28

According to Marxists, why are corporate crimes invisible?

Answer 28

1. The media: limited coverage of corporate crime, descibe them as ‘technical infringements’
2. Lack of political will: to tackle corporate crime
3. The crimes are often complex: law enforcers are often under-reasouced to tackle them
4. De-labelling: corporate crime is filtered out from the process of criminalisation, usually written off with fines rather than jail
5. Under-reporting: individual may be unaware the crime is happening to them

Question 29

How are Neo-liberal policies such as the marketisation and privatisation of public services partially visible to the public?

Answer 29

They are much more involved in people’s lives and thus are now more exposed to public scrutiny than in the past

Question 30

What sociologists provide the explanations of corporate crime?

Answer 30

Box: Strain Theory
Sutherland: Differential Association
Cicourel: Labelling Theory

Question 31

What is Box’s strain theory in explaining corporate crime?

Answer 31

If a company cannot achieve it’s goal of maximising profit by legal means, it may employ illegal one instead. When businesses become more difficult to gain profit they are tempted to break the law

Question 32

What is Cicourel’s labelling theory to explain corporate crime?

Answer 32

The w/c are more likely to have their actions labelled as criminal the m/c are able to negotiate non criminal labels for their misbehaviour

Question 33

What is Sutherland’s differential association theory to explain corporate crime?

Answer 33

Sees crime as a behaviour learning from others in a social context. The less we accociate with people who hold attitudes favorable to the law and the more we accredited with people with crime attitudes, the more likely we are to become deviant ourselves.

If a company’s culture justifies committing crime to achieve corporate goal, employees with be socials into this criminality

Question 34

How can you criticise the explanations of corporate crime?

Answer 34

Over predicts the amount of business crime

Unrealistic to assume all businesses would offend if it weren’t for the risk of punishment: their is also the need to stay in the goodwill in the eyes of other businesses

Doesn’t explain crime in non profiting making state agencies such as the police, army or civil service