Midterm Flashcards
Criminology
Scientific study of crime trends, the nature of crime, and explanations for why persons commit crime
Crime
Those acts that are prohibited by the laws of a country, state, city
Socialization
Process by which individuals learn a society’s or culture’s norms and also learn to conform to them
Deviance
Refers to any departure from bx’s that are typical, acceptable, or excepted
Social Control
The process by which society controls individual and group ex’s. The term is now often used to refer to the ways deviant ex’s are controlled, both informally & formally.
Criminal Justice System
The ways criminal justice agencies (the police, courts, and corrections) work together to process a case
Pragmatist
- if the results are beneficial then what happened was good.
- Believes the goal of the system are important, but equally so is info & evidence about how the system actually works & how that in turn informs discussion about strategy, tactics, and discretion
Social Norm
Societal judgments about what individuals should or should not do
Legal Moralism
The law should enforce public morality
Critical Theories of Law
**Rich People
The law was created by powerful individuals to help them remain in power, the law favors those with wealth & power & exploits those lacking wealth & power
Legal Naturalism
A legal theory espousing a belief in the concept of natural law.
** gravity applies to everyone
Legal Positivism
A philosophy that views the law solely as a human creation rather than as an attempt to discover, confirm, or enforce higher moral standards. This was the perspective held by H. L. A. Hart. in the Hart-Devline debate.
Deinstitutionalization
A movement in the 60’s & 70’s in which persons were released from mental hospitals in favor of community based, often therapeutic, social control.
Medical Model of Deviance
Defines deviance as a disease and advocates for treatment rather than punishment
Effective Criminal Justice System
Fair, Equitable, and Effective
Heroin Symptoms
Constricted pupils, lethargic
Cocaine Symptoms
Dilated pupils, rapid pulse (used to be made in coke soda)
Meth Symptoms
Dilated pupils,excessive activity, poor hygiene
Organized Social Control
Religion, Family, laws, not social norms,
Internal Social Control
a.k.s.: “Self-control”
is like one’s conscience–one’s” “internalized norms, beliefs, morals, and self-concept”.
Primary Socialization
takes place at homier early childhood when social norms are taught to children by family members, especially parents.
Social Norms
- Societal judgments about what individuals should or should not do
- societal rules