Midterm II Flashcards
Durkheim and Social Change: Main Intellectual Concern
to analyze the possibilities of securing social solidarity in the face of rapid social and economic change
Durkheim and Social Change: What is Social Solidarity
how people within a society feel connected to one another
Durkheim and Social Change: Major Research Question
What will provide social solidarity in modernity
Features of Modernity: Industrialization
-Increased production by the mechanization of labor
and the use of inanimate energy
-Industrial revolution
—Shift from agrarian to industrial economic
——–Feudalism to capitalism
Features of Modernity: Urbanizations
–Increase in proportion of the total human population living in major cities vs rural areas
–Moving to industrialized areas
Features of Modernity: Secularization
–Social, cultural, and political significance of religion diminishes
–Separation of the church from (state, personal, professional, etc) affairs
–Diminishing of religious authority
–Weber: disenchantment, scientific understanding becomes more important than religious belief, people want evidence
Features of Modernity: Division of Labour
–Increase in occupational differentiation
–Durkheim argues with Adam Smith, the division of labor has increased production
What are the forms of Social Solidarity?
Mechanical & Organic
4 Features of Modernity
Industrialization, Urbanization, Secularization, Division of Labor
Social Solidarity: Mechanical Solidarity
–Characterizes premodern societies
–Some level of worker specialization
–Low degree of occupational differentiation
–Solidarity based on homogeneity
—-People are bound together by ‘commonalities, similitudes, and likenesses’
–Identity of economic interests and pursuits
–Identity of language, customs, and beliefs
Social Solidarity: Organic Solidarity
–High degree of occupational differentiation
–High level of worker specialization
–Solidarity based on heterogeneity
—-People are bound together by functional complementarity and interdependence
—-Society is an organism, everyone has distinct roles that help the society function
–Diversity of language, customs, and beliefs
–Anonymity, superficiality, and segmentation (fractured) of social relations
Durkheim on Anomie: Division of Labour (1883); Anomie is a physical societies:
–Temporary consequence of the division of labor
–Historically specific problems of societies in transition to modernity
–Not a necessary symptom of modernization
–Describes it as a stage of moral or normative deregulation
–Social condition that produces high rates of suicide and crime
Durkheim on Anomie: Division of Labor (1883); Anomie is a psychological state of:
–A malady of infinite aspiration
–Troubling sense of limitless possibility
–Disturbance, agitation, and discontent
–‘Weariness and disillusionment’
–Emotional emptiness and despair
–Sense of futility and a lack of purpose
Durkheim on Anomie: Key Takeaways
–Crime and deviance are, in part, the product of weak moral integration and poor social regulation
–Social change, such as the transition to modernity, can generate anomie and with this an increase in levels of crime and deviance
Merton on Anomie: Book
Merton (1938) Social Structure and Anomie
Merton: Social Structure and Anomie; Research Aims
–Sought to develop a sociological examination for deviant conduct as corrective to biological positivist explanations
–Aimed to demonstrate “how some social structures exert a swiftie pressure on certain persons in the society to engage in a non-conforming rather than conforming conduct”
Merton: Social Structure and Anomie; Arguement
–Argues that high rates of criminal behavior on certain grounds are a normal response to the social situation in which members of the group find themselves rather than indicators of biological pathology
Merton: Social Structure and Anomie; Two Elements of the Social System
Culturally Defined Goals and the Means to achieve those Goals
Merton: Social Structure and Anomie; Merton’s America
the cultural goal is ‘material success,’ ‘financial prosperity,’ and ‘accumulated wealth’
Merton: Social Structure and Anomie; Anomie is the result of:
the lack of symmetry between the cultural and structural components of the social system
Merton: Social Structures and Anomie; Anomie is a symptom of:
–A strain between culturally prescribed aspirations and the socially strucutred avenues for realizing then
–A discrepancy between socially engendered goals and the opportunity structures by which the goals might be achieved
–A contradiction between normative aspirations and lack of access to legitimate means to realize such aspirations
Assessing Merton: Important Features
–Draws attention to the social, cultural, nd economic circumstances that lead to crime
–Points to the necessary relation between forms of social organization and levels of crime
–Highlights the unintended consequences of the overvaluation of individual economic achievement
–Took special interest in the vulnerability of working-class and poorer communities
Assessing Merton: Criticisms
–Exaggerate level of consensus and ‘universal’ normative aspirations
–Tendency to focus on lower-class crime
–Does not explore the structural causes of strain
–Over-predicts lower-class crime
–Overlooks barriers to achievement other than lack of opportunity
–Definition of Anomie changes
–Not well-tested
–Atomistic and individualistic
Durkheim and Criminology: Crime is:
actions that offend against collective feelings or sentimental
Not something that is unchanging
Nation of irm reflect particular social convention which vary according to time and place
Best understood as violation of moral life (conscience collective of society)
Durkheim and Criminology: Crime is:
Actions that offend against collective feelings or sentimental
–Not something that is unchanging
–Reflect particular social convention which varies according to time and place
–Best understood as a violation of moral life (conscience collective of society)
Durkheim and Criminology: Function of Crime
Adaptive function
Introduces new idea and practices in society ensuring that there is change rate htn stagnation
Boundary maintenance
Reingificing social values and norms, crudely through its stimulation of collective action against deviance, it helps to reaffirm the difference between right and wrong
Crime should be considered as a normal element in any properly functioning society
Durkheim and Criminology: Function of Crime
Adaptive Function
–Introduces new ideas and practices in society ensuring that there is a change rate in stagnation
Boundary Maintenance Function
–Reingificing social values and norms, crudely through its stimulation of collective action against deviance, it helps to reaffirm the difference between right and wrong
–Crime should be considered a normal element in any properly functioning society
Durkheim and Social Change: What is an Ideal type of Social Formation?
–Attractions designed to help identify and explain patterns that appear in the real world, rather than a straightforward, factual description of that world
–Used to help understand particular social phenomena by looking at core characteristics
Durkheim and Social Change: The Division of Labour was written after:
the aftermath of the Industrial Revolution
— Research question: What is it that will provide great social solidarity and coherence in these new times?
Durkheim, Suicide, and Anomie: The use of Suicide
Sought to explain how patterns of suicide might be explained by reference to such social cake phenomena in a region. Social, structure, economic conditions, so on
Durkheim, Suicide, and Anomie; Four Ideal Types of Suicide
Type 1: Altruistic (Excessive Integration)
Type 2: Egoistic (Lack of Integrations)
Type 3: Anomic (Lack of Regulation)
Type 4: Fatalistic (Excessive Regulation)
Durkheim, Suicide, and Anomie; Four Ideal Types of Suicide explained by Two degrees of Social Solidarity
–Integration: social cohesions brought about by shared beliefs and practices; the forces of attraction that bring people together
–Regulation: the constraints that limit human behavior and desires
Assessing Durkheim: Criticism of his work
–Underplays the ways in which systems of punishment are shaped by the nature and distribution of power within society
–The assumption of consensus which underpins the notion of conscience collective is precisely that, an assumption
Merton and Anomie: Anomie results:
from the absence of alignment between socially desired aspirations, such as welt, and the means available to people to achieve such objectives
Anomie and The American Dream: What is Stran to Merton
product of the contradiction between the cultural emphasis on pecuniary ambition and the social bars to full opportunity
Anomie and the American Dream: Four Deviant Adaptations
Innovation, Ritualism, Retreatism, and Rebellion
Anomie and the American Dream: Innovation
–The application of legitimate means to the achievement of socially approved ends
–Relatively ineffectual means are rejected (dead-end, low-paying, etc)
–Promising legitimate means are explored
–Many crimes against property are clear examples of innovation in Merton’s sense
eg.) burglaries, robberies, larcenies
Anomie and the American Dream: Ritualism
The cultural goals are rejected but legitimate means are accepted
“The abiding or scaling down of the city corals goals of great pecuniary success and rapid social obesity to the point where one’s aspiration can be stastfied’
Playing by the rules but having no desire to get ahead
Low-level office workers who realize they will never get a promotion but decide to work hard
Anomie and the American Dream: Retreatism
–The cultural goals and legitimate means are both rejected
–Concerts people that are in the society but not of it
—-Psychotics, autists, pariahs, outcasts, alcoholics, drug addicts, tramps, vagrants
–Private, not public, adaptation
–Become a subcultural style in the 1960s with the advent of the hippie movement
—-Turn on, tune in, drop out
Anomie and the American Dream: Rebellion
–Rejecting, and seeking to replace, dominate normative aspiration and oppourtunitic stretches
–Concerns political debates and criminal
–A collective, public adaptation
Later Strain Theory: Albert Cohen: suggests
Instead of anomie, competition and frustration around status are the key to understanding youthful delinquency
Later Strain Theory: Cloward and Ohlin, Delinquency and Opportunity: Main Question/Answer
Q) Under what conditions will people experience stains and tensions that lead to delinquent solutions?
A) In a system that stresses ability as the basis of advancement, the failures who view themselves as equal in ability to those who succeed tend to feel unjustly deprived
-Argue that there are numerous means of resolving the adjustment of strain problems
General Strain Theory: Robert Agnew: Four Reasons why Strain Theory has declining popularity
1)It has tended to focus on lower-class delinquency.
2)It has neglected all but the most conventional goals (middle-class status and wealth).
3)It overlooked barriers to achievement other than social stratification (these might include gender, race, intelligence, and many others).
4)It has found it difficult to explain why some people who experienced strain didn’t turn to criminal activity. Arguably, strain and frustration are experienced by many who continue to conform.
General Strain Theory: Robert Agnew: Two Types of Strain that occur as a result of the failure to achieve one’s goals
First arises from the actual or anticipated loss of positively valued stimuli from an individual
The second form of strain is the result of the actual or anticipated presentation of negative or noxious stimuli such as relationships in the home, workplace, or elsewhere theater abusive
General Strain Theory: Robert Agnew: 5 Factors that increase the likelihood that strain will lead to Crime and Delinquency
1) Where the strain is perceived to be ‘unjust’; where people feel that they have been treated unfairly, they are more likely to become angry, and anger, according to Agnew’s strain theory, is linked with an increased likelihood of offending.
2) When strain is high in magnitude, it is more difficult to ignore and manage in ways that are legitimate.
3) Where the strain is caused by or is associated with, low social control, it is more likely to result in a deviant adaptation.
4) Strains may also lower levels of social control.
5) Where the strain creates pressure to engage in ‘criminal coping’ – such as strain induced by criminal victimization leading to a desire for revenge.
General Strain Theory: Robert Agnew: Strains that are Conducive to Crime
–Parental rejection – Parents who reject their children do not express love or affection for them, show little interest in them, provide little support to them, and often display hostility toward them
–Supervision/discipline that is erratic, excessive, and/or harsh (use of humiliation/ insults, threats, screaming, and/or physical punishments).
–Child abuse and neglect, including physical abuse; sexual abuse; and the failure to provide adequate food, shelter, medical care, and affection/attention (neglect).
–Negative secondary school experiences, including low grades, negative relations with teachers, and the experience of school as boring and a waste of time.
–Abusive peer relations, including insults, ridicule, threats, attempts to coerce, and physical assaults.
–Work at jobs in the secondary labor market
–Unemployment, especially when it is chronic and blamed on others.
–Marital problems, including frequent conflicts and verbal and physical abuse.
–The failure to achieve selected goals, including thrills/excitement, personal autonomy, masculine status, and the desire for much money in a short period of time.
–Criminal victimization
–Residence in severely deprived communities, which is associated with exposure to a host of strains – including criminal victimization and economic problems
–Homelessness
–Discrimination based on characteristics such as race/ethnicity, gender, and religion.
General Strain Theory: Messner and Rosenfeld: Main Idea
an anomic society has been created that privileges success over all other clinically approved goals
General Strain Theory: Messner and Rosenfeld: 4 Specific Features that privilege economic goals over others
–the emphasis on achievement and on the winner-takes-all mentality;
–the individualism that focuses attention on rights rather than responsibilities;
–the materialism that fetishizes wealth;
–the fact that these values permeate the whole of society – which they call universalism
Assessing Strain Theory: Important Features
1) They draw our attention to the social, cultural, and economic circumstances that lead to crime.
2) They point to the necessary relationship between particular forms of social organization and particular levels of crime.
3) Merton’s formulation drew attention to the unintended consequences of the social goal of individual economic achievement. Critics of the market society and of consumer capitalism are in many respects working in a similar tradition.
4) Anomie and strain theory’s predominant concern with the vulnerability of working-class or poorer communities sits comfortably with the liberal sensibilities of much sociological criminology and, undoubtedly, accounts for some of its intuitive appeals.
Assessing Strain Theory: Criticisms
-tendency to rely on official statistics as an indicator of the nature and distribution of crime
-fails to look closely enough at the socio-political circumstances of crime
-over-predicts lower-class crime
-tends to focus on structural conditions and, consequently, pays relatively little attention to human agency – Agnew’s general strain theory endeavors to deal with this criticism.
-underplays the importance of social control (and self-control) in the production and molding of deviance,
The Chicago School
–Established in 1892, first major sociology department in the US
–From the end of WW1 to the mid-1940s, criminology was heavily influenced by the sociological thought of scholars trained at the department
The Chicago School: Objects of Analysis
–Sociology at Chicago meant urban sociology: the study of social life and human interaction in the modern city
–Chicago sociologists are concerned about the consequences of modernization on patterns of social organization in metropolitan areas
–Chicago became the laboratory in which they studied the customs, beliefs, social practices, and general conception of life among urban peoples
–Extended research on the nature of social bounding in the modern, fragmented city
–Division of labor was most elaborate and developed, thus it was best studied in Chicago
Why Chicago was the perfect laboratory
–Girth in size and population
—-From 200 people in 1833 to 3.3 million in 1930
–Industrialization
—-Key manufacturing center and transportation hub
——Steel, meatpacking, shipping (Lake Michigan, Mississippi river, etc)
–Urbanization and immigration
—-Huge waves of migrants from small towns, Europe, and the South
—-In 1900, half the cities population was foriegn born
The Social Ecology of Chicago: Concentric Ring Model
–Suggests that a city evolves through a series of centric circles, and developing into a distinctive zone of social and cultural life that resembles the character and qualities of its inhabitants
–Influenced by the field of biological ecology, the study of patterns and organized changes that are produced by different species living together in the same physical territory
-Ernest Burgess
Concentric Ring Theory: Zone 1
1) Central Business District
–Few residential homes
–Mostly industrial
Concentric Ring Model: Zone 2
2) Transition
–Most important
–Transient peoples
–Most susceptible to the forces of invasions/modernization
–May abandoned building
–Instapak - threatened by encroaching business district
–Park and burgess (1925) - The Growth of a City: An Introduction to a Research Project
Concentric Ring Model: Zone 3
3) Working-Class Homes
–Family homes
–People who have just left zone 2
Concentric Ring Model: Zone 4
4) Residential
–Middle class
–More affluent than zone 3
–Spatially removed from the forces of social change
–Levels of crime and deviance are lower
Concentric Ring Mode: Zone 5
5) Suburban/Commuter
–Low-rise residential area
–Upper class
–Force of stability against change
–Crime should be almost non-existent
The Social Ecology of Delinquency: Shaw and McKay (1942) - Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas
–Considered the spatial location of juvenile delinquency in the context of the CZM
–Data: 55 988 juvenile court records copied in the city of Chicago over a period of 30 years
–Method: mapping, by hand, the location of all the homes of the delinquent boys and girls in their sample
The Social Ecology of Delinquency: Shaw and McKay (1942) - Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas: Findings
–Spatial distribution of crime and delinquency was uneven but patterned
—-Uneven: concentrated in zone 2
—-Patterned: rates decreased proportionally with distance from Central business district
–Spatial distribution of crime and delinquency was stable over time despite population turnover
—-Suggested that crime rates were a reflection of ‘kinds of places’ not ‘kinds of people
The Social Ecology of Delinquency: Shaw and McKay (1942) - Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas: Structural Factors that lead to Social Organization
–low socioeconomic status
–residential instability
–ethnic heterogeniety
The Social Ecology of Delinquency: Shaw and McKay (1942) - Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas: Social Disorganization as a property of neighborhood with low levels of:
–Solidarity: consensus among norms and values
–Cohesion: strong bonds among residents
–Integration: organizational participation
–Outcome: weak informal social controls
The Social Ecology of Delinquency: Shaw and McKay (1942) - Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas: Informal Social Controls
–Reactions of individuals and groups that reign about conformity to norms
—-Informal sanctions: shame, ridicule, sarcasm, disapproval, exclusion
—-Informal rewards: praise, compliments
–Major agents: family, school, church, work
The Social Ecology of Delinquency: Shaw and McKay (1942) - Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas: Cultural Transmission of Delinquency
young boys in socially disorganized areas lean to value delinquent lifestyles through routine and exposure to adult criminal role models
The Social Ecology of Delinquency: Shaw and McKay (1942) - Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas: Process
Low socioeconomic status, residential instability, and ethnic heterogeneity
Social disorganization
Weak informal social controls and Cultural transmission
Delinquency
Assessing Shaw and McKay: Important Features
–Overcomes individualistic bias of biological positivist perspectives on crime
–Criminal behavior is seen as a normal response to living in socially disorganized areas
–Draws attention to the importance of space and location in explaining crime
–Paved the way for control theory, learning theories, and subcultural theories of crime
Assessing Shaw and McKay: Limitations
–Use of official data
—-Higher posting in some areas —> limits of crime statistics/data (last midterm)
–Ecological Model
—-More complex/more unplanned
—-Directed by the government, not as natural/biological
–Neglect of upper and middle-class crimes
–Over-predicts crime i socially disorganized areas
–Inattention to issues of power and social stratification
Social Ecology: What is Ecology
the studies of the city itself - a biological metaphor pointing to the importance of natural patterns produced by different species within some form of the overall ordered universe
Differential Association: Shaw, McKay, Sutherland
Shaw and McKay’s ideas were modified by Sutherland
Explored how different forms of the organization led to different cultural inferences and mechanisms and sought to understand criminal behavior as learned behavior
Argued that criminal conduct is learned in interaction what others, being communicated between groups and generations
Influenced by the work of Gabriel Tarde and his ‘laws of imitation’ and Geroge Mead’s work on symbolic interactionism
What is Differential Association?
the notion that if an individual is exposed to more ideas that promote law-breaking than they are as ideas that act as barriers to such conduct, then criminal conduct becomes likely
Differential Reinforcement: Akers
sought to expand Sutherland ideas using social learning theory to explore how criminal learning is undertaken
What is Differential Reinforcement?
–Takes Sutherland’s idea of ‘definitions’ and distinguishes between the general (overall beliefs about what is good and bad) and the specific (particular conditions under which things are considered to be good or bad right or wrong))
—-Introduces the possibility that certain forms of criminal behavior might be wrong but permitted under certain circumstances
What is Culture?
systemized traditional ways of solving problems transmitted across time
What is Subculture?
emerge as means of solving problems created by the incompatible demand of structure and culture
Subcultural Theory: Emergence
Emerged in the US during the 19500s and 60s during the response to the weakness of Merton’s Anomie theory
Subcultural Theory: Three Weaknesses
1) Did not offer any account of the determinants of specific adaptations to strain
2) Depicted adaptation ot strain as individual isolate responses
3) Neglected ‘expressive’ or ‘nonutilitarian’ crimes
—Couldn’t explain why youth delinquency was characterized as expressive of non-financial related crime
Subcultural Theory: Major Research Questions
-Why are there delinquent gangs?
-How do young boys come to join them?
Subcultural Theory: Albert Cohen - Delinquent Boys, The Culture of the Gang (1955): improvement of anomie theory
-The pressures of strain experienced in the institution of schooling
-Adaptation to strain are shaped by an actor’s immediate interactional context
Subcultural Theory: Albert Cohen - Delinquent Boys, The Culture of the Gang (1955): Strain in Schooling
–In the school, youth are judged according to the same criteria (Middle class measuring rods)
–The socialization of working-class boys poorly prepares them to succeed them in the education system (they are being measured at the wrong level, their needs aren’t being met by the system)
–Universal cultural goal: educational achievement
–Unequally structured means: class differential in the organization of child-rearing and parental aspirations
–Why the goal can be achieved
—-Kids from middle-class background learn habits, skills, and attitudes conducive to educational achievement
—-Kids from working-class families learn habits, skills, and attitudes that ar not conducive towards educational achievement
Subcultural Theory: Albert Cohen - Delinquent Boys, The Culture of the Gang (1955): Strain in Schooling
–In the school, youth are judged according to the same criteria (Middle class measuring rods)
–The socialization of working-class boys poorly prepares them to succeed in the education system (they are being measured at the wrong level, and their needs aren’t being met by the system)
–Universal cultural goal: educational achievement
–Unequally structured means: class differential in the organization of child-rearing and parental aspirations
–Why the goal can be achieved
—-Kids from middle-class backgrounds learn habits, skills, and attitudes conducive to educational achievement
—-Kids from working-class families learn habits, skills, and attitudes that are not conducive to educational achievement
Subcultural Theory: Albert Cohen - Delinquent Boys, The Culture of the Gang (1955): Strain in Schooling, Outcome
Status frustration
—Those who fail to succeed according to the middle-class evaluative criteria of the school will experience ‘feelings of tension, frustration, resentment, guilt, bitterness, anxiety, ioir hopelessness’
—Faced with such a ‘problem of adjustment’ they will search for a solution
Subcultural Theory: Albert Cohen - Delinquent Boys, The Culture of the Gang (1955): Three Adaptations of Status Frustration
College Boys, Corner Boys, Delinquent Boys
Subcultural Theory: Albert Cohen - Delinquent Boys, The Culture of the Gang (1955): Three Adaptations of Status Frustration, College Boys
-accept the goals and the means
—desire to get good grades in school, want to be better
Subcultural Theory: Albert Cohen - Delinquent Boys, The Culture of the Gang (1955): Three Adaptations of Status Frustration, Corner Boys
-accept the goal but not the means
—no desire to work hard towards good grades, want to be better but lack motivation
Subcultural Theory: Albert Cohen - Delinquent Boys, The Culture of the Gang (1955): Three Adaptations of Status Frustration, Delinquent Boys
-reject the goal and the means
—don’t want to do better and don’t try to do better
—value everything the middle class rejects
—most common response as thought by Cohen
Delinquent Subculture emerges through:
Collective Reaction Formation
Collective Definition
the crucial condition for the emergence of new cultural forms is the existence, in effective interaction with one another, of a number of actor with similar problems of adjustments
Reaction Formation Definition
denying the abnormal intensity that is desired but cannot be had
–Embraces standards of status that represent an inversion of middle-class values
–Value the opposite of the middle-class
Six Features of Delinquent Subcultures
Nonutilitarianism
Malice
Negativism
Short-Run Hedonism
Versatility
Group Autonomy
Six Features of Delinquent Subcultures: Nonutilitarianism
economic rational is absent, not deviant for financial reasons
Six Features of Delinquent Subcultures: Malice
-the threat of destruction, extreme vandalism
-no motive other than to express a rejection of middle class values
Six Features of Delinquent Subcultures: Negativism
Delinquent behaviour is an inversion of middle class valies
Six Features of Delinquent Subcultures: Short-Run Hedonism
-not long-term planning, no long goal
-immediate gratification, similar to addiction
Six Features of Delinquent Subcultures: Versatility
not specialist criminal, do whatever is available to them
Six Features of Delinquent Subcultures: Group Autonomy
for members of delinquent gangs, primary allegiance and loyalty is to the gang
Subcultural Theory: Cloward and Ohlin - Delinquency and Opportunity: Improved on Merton and Cohen by;
–Specifying how adaptation to strain is shaped by illegitimate opportunity structures
–Show how the degree of neighborhood social organization shapes the from of the delinquent subculture that enlarges in response to strain
Subcultural Theory: Cloward and Ohlin - Delinquency and Opportunity: Illegitimate Oppourtintiy Structures
-Each individual occupies a position in both legitimate and illegitimate opportunity structures
-Deviant adaptation to strain is mediated by the availability if illegitimate means in a given neighborhood
-The major strucural factor is the presence or absence of stable recruitment into adult criminal enterprises in the local community
Subcultural Theory: Cloward and Ohlin - Delinquency and Opportunity: Criminal Subculture
-Merges in areas where an established adult criminal tradition exists
-Offer apprenticeship-style training in utilitarian crime
—Criminal role models and opportunity
—‘Career’ progression
-Oriented toward the curiosity of material gain through illegitimate means
—Theft, robbery, burglary, fencing (buying stolen goods, selling them for a profit)
Subcultural Theory: Cloward and Ohlin - Delinquency and Opportunity: Conflict Subculture
-Emerges in socially disorganized area where there are few adult criminal role models and few illegitimate opportunities for economic gain
-Oriented toward the protection of territory and intergang warfare
-Violence is regarded as a means of gaining respect and status
-Challenges to one’s honor are expected to be met with physical force
Subcultural Theory: Cloward and Ohlin - Delinquency and Opportunity: Retreatist Subculture
-Emerges as collective pollution to the status dilemma faced by youths who:
—Have no access to legitimate and illegitimate opportunities to achieve success
—Failed to achieve stats in the conflict subculture
-Chartered by the abandonment of cultural goals and efforts to achieve them through legal and illegal means
-Oriented toward the consumption of drugs and alcohol
Subcultural Theory: Walter Miller - Lower Class Culture and Gang Delinquency (1958): 6 Focal concerns of lower class culture
-Trouble
-Toughness
—Value knowing how to fight well,
commanding respect of others, a form of masculinity
-Smartness
—Street smarts over book smarts, witty,
independent and assertive in social situations, recognizing if you are being conned
-Excitement
—Leisure time as a way of compensating for work life, nights out on the town, looking for fights, getting arrested
-Fate
—Referring to the tendency to view the future as something that is predetermined/cannot be manipulated or controlled
—Leads to short-term hedonism described by cohen
-Autonomy
—Strong resentment of outside interference in the lower-class culture
—Resentment of authority figures/LEAs/LEOs
—Loyalty to members of the lower class
Subcultural Theory: Cloward and Ohlin - Delinquency and Opportunity: Conflict Subculture
-Emerges in socially disorganized areas where there are few adult criminal role models and few illegitimate opportunities for economic gain
-Oriented toward the protection of territory and intergang warfare
-Violence is regarded as a means of gaining respect and status
-Challenges to one’s honor are expected to be met with physical force
The Freedom Convoy: Things that happened (7)
-Surprising, why can’t the police do more, why was there late action, etc
-Occupation of physical space in an attempt to extort the federal government
-Noise levels causing distress, sleep disturbance, and hearing loss
-Desecration of symbols of Canadian national identity
-MOU (memorandum of understanding) calls on Governor -General to dissolve the elected government and form a new one
-Hateful symbols on display (white supremacy - swastika, confederate flags)
-Hate crime complaints skyrocket
Canada’s Far-Right Problem: Convoys not Convoy (4)
-Makeup of many different groups of people what mah different issues
-Largest groups: ordinary people upset about public health restrictions, with legitimate nonextreme grievance led to socioeconomic concerns
-Mixed ideological groups: anti-government, anti-science, racist, xenophobic, homophobic
-Key group: leaders and organizers who are veteran far-right activists with a history of spreading discriminatory views, misinformation, and conspiracy theories online
Canada’s Far-Right Problem: Convoy as ‘PR event’ for Canadian far-right groups
Secure press coverage and maximization of visibility
Organizing existing supporters, reaching new audiences, and recruiting new members
Push a political agenda and raise financial and human resources
Spread and create new dis-, mis-, and mal- information
Canada’s Far-Right Problem: Unprecedented but not Exceptional
Part of several overlapping trends, including:
–Growth in the number and visibility of Canadian far-right groups since 2010
–Surge in officially recorded and self-reported, hate crimes in Canada over this period
–Revival of militant right-wing extremist groups, networks, and incidents in the US and Europe
–Rise of radical right parties internationally
—-Emboldens citizens to share their unsavory opinions
Right-Wing Extremism: Non-Violent Participation
-Spreading messages and narratives that incite violence and hatred
-Funding and expressing support for RWE groups
-Joining RWE groups and recruiting new members
Right-Wing Extremism: Ideologically Motivated Violent Participation
-Threat to national security
-Using violence to advance ideological goals
-Xenophobic, anti-authoritarian, gender-driven
-Threats can be motivated by more than one grievance and shift from one to another
Four RWE Clusters
-Anti-Government/Anti-Authority
-Anti-Immigration
-Anti-Women
-Neo-Fascist/Accelerationist
Four RWE Clusters: Anti-Government/Anti-Authority
-Belief that the government is illegitimate and that they are not required to follow laws (especially in regard to taxation and gun control laws)
-Use pseudo-law documents and arguments
—Not real/made up
-Some have attacked and killed police officers, and government employees in defense of what they see as their rights
-Sovereign citizen movement/Freeman on the land
Four RWE Clusters: Anti-Immigration
-The Great Replacement Theory
—White identity and western culture is under attack by multicultural forces
-Immigrants as a threat
—Cultural, economic, and security
-Groypers
—Activists and internet trolls who attempt to introduce far-right politics into mainstream conservatism
Four RWE Groups: Anti-Women
-Manosphere
—Refers to the constellation of websites/forums dedicated to prompting male supremacy, heteronormative masculinity, misogyny, and opposition to feminism
-Male victimhood narrative
—Believe women, feminists, and gender equality movements are to blame for the perceived loss of status of (mostly white) men today
Four RWE Groups: Neo-Fascist/Accelerationist
-Advocate for the violent overthrow of governments and the creation of white ethno-states
-Believe that they can accelerate the inevitable decline of Western democracies through assassinations, murders, and terrorist attacks
