Recent Strain Theories

Question 1

What do recent strain theories argue?

Answer 1

Young people may pursue a variety of goals other than money success, such as popularity from peers.

Question 2

What does Messner and Rosenfeld’s institutional anomie theory focus on that is similar to Merton’s theory?

Answer 2

The American Dream.

Question 3

What do Messner and Rosenfeld argue about the American Dream?

Answer 3

Its obsession with money success and its ‘winner-takes-all’ mentality, exert pressure towards crime by encouraging an anomic cultural environment in which people are encouraged to adopt an ‘anything goes’ mentality in pursuit of wealth.

Question 4

What do Messner and Rosenfeld argue about societies based on free-market capitalism and lacking adequate welfare provision, such as the USA?

Answer 4

High crime rates are inevitable.

Question 5

What did Downes and Hansen find?

Answer 5

Societies that spent more on welfare had lower rates of imprisonment.

Question 6

What does Downes and Hansen study back up?

Answer 6

Messner and Rosenfeld’s claim that societies that protect the poor from the worst excess on the free market have less crime.