Marxist Theories

Question 1

Introduction to Marxism

Answer 1

Based off of Karl Marx’s socio-economic theory, often described as the base of communism.
Used the idea that Capitalism is the cause of all crime, since it leads to exploitation, opression, alienation of the proletariat by the bourgeoisie. The capitalist ideology is maintaining a set of shared ideas/beliefs/norms that social inequality is normal.

Question 2

The opressive capitalist state

Answer 2

The Government are the ultimate oppressors, excersising their control over the people to maintain power. Police/military are the state armory, enforcing the opressors.

Question 3

Traditional Marxist views on Crime

Answer 3

Capitalism is the main cause of crime. There is a ‘hidden agenda’ behind most laws that protect the rich and keep Capitalist interests at heart. Snybody can break the law, but only the poor get caught. The rich use their cultural and social capital to get put of trouble. Crime will dissapear once Capitalism crumbles.

Question 4

Grenfell Tower 2017

Answer 4

An apartment building burnt down after many pleas and complaints from residents to make safer installations. 80 people died, there was no suitable health and safety equipment.

Question 5

Marxism Criticisms

Answer 5

Capitalism can’t be blamed for non-utilitarian crimes. Marxism is also quite deterministic - not every working class person commits crime. Some capitalist countries (a lot of Scandinavian countries) have low crime rates. Some communist countries (Cuba, China, Russia) have crime too. Over £1.3 billion has been spent by the UK government in recent years to regenerate the poorest areas in the country.

Question 6

The Saints vs. the Roughnecks

Answer 6

The saints were 8 promising young men from good, stable, upper-middle class white families, and some of the most delinquent boys in Hannibal High School, often commiting their deviant acts out of town and not getting into any trouble. They were loved by their community, 7/8 graduated college, became doctors, lawyers, researchers and took up managerial and executive positions. The roughnecks were 6 boys of the same age as the saints, but coming from poorer, rougher families. They committed the same amount of deviant acts as the saints, but were doing so in their own town. They got in trouble often, and their community had a poor view on them. 2/6 of them became teachers since they were skilled at football, and the rest became serious criminal offenders or simply ‘bum around’ on the margines of trouble.

Question 7

Ernest Burgess - The Zone of Transition

Answer 7

The working class live in the zone of transition, cloest to the central buisness zone. the ZoT usually has run down buildings, buildings taken over by companies, ‘slumhousing’. Its socially disorganized and over-political. Recorded offences are highest in urban low-income council estates; they have the most bulgary, most violent crime, most vehicle crime. The majority of bulgary offences happen within 2 miles of d’s home. This is because this is where d has the confidence zone and have cognitive mapping. Crime is not committed in the suburbs, as there is strong informal social control that helps keep crime away, eg. neighbourhood watch.

Question 8

Ernest Burgess - Criticisms

Answer 8

Whilst there are some similarities, most major cities dont follow exactly the same crime mapping as Burgess suggested, like London. The richest live in the inner city (ZoT).

Question 9

Marx’s predicitions

Answer 9

Working-class people’s dissatisfaction will spiral out of control, creating a Proletariat Revolution. Anti Capitalist protests will occur.

Question 10

Marx’s predicitions - events

Answer 10

Occupy 2011 - defeated by the repressive state apparatus.
Luigi Mangione - December 2024, ‘assasinated’ Brian Thompson, an American healthcare insurance CEO. Mangione was potrayed as a strong anti-capitalist by the media, but the response was primarily in favour of him.

Question 11

White collar crime

Answer 11

A nonviolent crime often characterised by deceit or concealment to obtain or avoid losing money.

Question 12

Sutherland - white collar crimes

Answer 12

Usually committed by the more affluent in society, who abuse their positions within their middle class occupations or use their higher social standing for criminal activity, for personal benefit and to escape detection.

Question 13

White collar criminals

Answer 13

• Harvey Weinstein
• Jeffery Epstein
  White collar crime is usually non violent, but by using social standing, power and reputation to get away with it, that’s what makes it white collar crimes.

Question 14

White collar criminals don’t fit the image of a usual offender

Answer 14

Dr Harold Shipman was found guilty of 15 murders on the 31st of January, 2000, however, possibly killed around 250 patients in total. 80% of his victims were women, and he used a very fine needle to inject his patients with diamorphine. This crime was very specialised and he managed to escape detection for a long time.

Question 15

White collar criminals don’t fit the image of a usual offender 2

Answer 15

11th November 2022, during the second lockdown, Shaun Bailey of the Tory party had a work Christmas party - following no safety Covid guidelines.

Question 16

Hazel Croall - ‘typical crime’

Answer 16

White collar crime doesn’t fit the social construction of what ‘typical’ crime is. They are under-represented in official crime statistics because:
- they are hard to detect, ‘invisible’, with no ‘blood on the streets’
- indirect victimisation
- hard to investigate
- lack of awareness that crime has taken place
- companies often ‘cover up’ white collar criminals.
Capitalism benefits from white collar crime, since it keeps people’s attention firmly on the poor, therefore keeping them in their place.

Question 17

The ‘millionaire’ win!

Answer 17

August 1st, 2002, an army major, his wife, and a third party, were charged with deception and conspiracy after cheating on ‘Who wants to be a millionaire?’ and winning the jackpot prize.

Question 18

Janice Goldstraw - White - “It’s not like I’m a real criminal!”

Answer 18

Conducted interviews with convicted, white collar criminals - a sample of 41 offenders (32 men and 9 women), who had committed crimes such as conspiracy, defraud, false accounting, tax evasion and theft from an employer. White collar criminals occupy a fine line between perfectly legal business practices and criminal activity.
One solicitor flatly denied inflating invoices to his clients - complex knowledge of the legal system does not make it easy for a jury to make sense of what they experience during a trial. Many offences are ‘invisible’.
Victims are not always readily identifiable. In many cases, the victim is a business or a company rather than an individual. This only makes detection even harder. Some offenders felt morally justified in committing white collar crimes, claiming that no one had actually been harmed.
White collar offenders consider themselves a ‘breed apart’ from ‘proper criminals’. “It’s not like I’m a really criminal,” one senior bank manager pointed out.

Question 19

Janice Goldstraw - White - criticisms

Answer 19

Social desirability effect, interviewer effect, makes the findings less accurate and less valid. Quite a small sample-doesn’t represent all white collar criminals.