Social class and crime Flashcards
What are the reasons for social class differences in crime
- prejudice
- wealth
- w/c crime is easier to spot
Why are white collar crimes underepresented
- lack of labelling of the r/c
- blue collar crime targeted more and they need someone to take the blame
Patterns of social class and offending
- official statistics on convictions show that there are social class differences in the types of crimes committed
- lower social classes are more likely to commit street crimes, burglary, violent crimes etc
- higher social classes commit crimes that are related to finances e.g fraud and embezzlement
-studies of self reported offending shows less differences in offending (riley and shaw 1985)
-self reports tend to elicit more honesty so have increased validity
Marxist theories explaining higher levels of w/c offending
Crimogenic capitalism - its very nature is seen to cause capitalism
- capitalist societies are individualistic and almost selfish - leads to more consumerism which the w/c do not have money to keep up with
- this alienates them from society because they cannot achieve what others are so easily achieving and it leads to frustration of the w/c and can cause non utilitarian crime e.g vandalism, truancy, fighting (crime not linked to money)
Selective law enforcement
- the CJS mainly concerns itself with policing and punishing the marginalised and not the wealthy
- allows r/c to get away with their crimes and continue to stay in power
- puts the w/c at a disadvantage as they are normally powerless minorities
Criticisms of traditional marxism
- tend to be deterministic as they assume all crime is because of class inequality and that those who are apart of the w/c will turn to crime
- ignore the fact that a-lot of crime from the w/c is committed against the w/c
- in many other capitalist societies where there is a clear class division, crime rates are lowered compared to the UK so there must be more factors that influence why people commit crime
Functionalist strain theory - Merton
-believes deviance is the result of strain between structural and cultural factors
- structural = unequal opportunities due to hierarchical structures, cultural = based on consumption where success is measured by status
Strain leads to Anomie which is - not conforming to society’s norms and values
- being blocked from success leads to pressure to deviate and people develop illegitimate means to achieve the goals they cannot achieve legitimately
- however it can be said that this ‘deprivation’ they experience is not only limited to the w/c
- the r/c can experience it to as deprivation can be ‘subjective’ leading them to commit crime that is related to gaining more status and power
Evaluation of the strain theory
Strengths
- explains how stats show most crime is property crime because people want money and material things
Weaknesses
- assumes that crime is only a w/c issue but thats a stereotype
- w/c experience most strain but not all of them turn to crime which is a deterministic view
- not everyone strives for monetary success and some people do not share the same goals as the American dream
Theories explaining higher levels of of w/c offending - status frustration (cohen)
w/c do not have the means to achieve and they lack the skills to conform to mainstream goals - causes them to lead a life of crime because they do not understand how to participate in society
- they dislike the low status they are given so they find an alternative way to gain status and they choose a delinquent subculture that already exists
-subcultures values are characterised by spite, malice, hostility etc and from this they invert the values of mainstream society and what society condemns the subcultures praises
-however the r/c could still commit crime if they feel threatened or challenged in their position e.g corruption like bribery, abuse to maintain their status, fraud to secure their wealth and influence, violence if they perceive a threat to their status
Evaluation of left realism
- deprivation does not explain all types of crime
- w/c crime is the main focus by left realists which could be seen as creating a moral panic
Theories explaining higher levels of working class offending - Left realism (Lea and young)
- want to tackle crime and reduce inequality and believe there are 3 reasons
- relative deprivation - economic because of consumerism and materialism (merton)
-subcultures - join subcultures to deal with frustration and lessen the gap of deprivation - cloward and ohlin expand on this - marginalisation - excluded from society due to social structure so find other ways to be included - can be through labelling
- relative deprivation - economic because of consumerism and materialism (merton)
-crime is a real problem and affects disadvantaged groups because of these 3 reasons however the r/c engage in white collar crimes due to a desire to maintain their status and wealth
- the wealthy can also feel deprivation and commit crime but the crimes they commit just get overlooked which reinforces systematic inequality
Theories explaining higher levels of working class offending - Right realism (murray)
- see crime as a problem within the underclass and it is caused by
- educational underachievement - leads to struggle as they are not very smart
- lack of male role models - leads to incorrect socialisation so boys do not develop the correct norms + values
evaluation - ignores corporate crime so m/c are being taken out of crime statistics
- police have more power so it may lead to stopping and searching
White collar crime ( hughes and langan)
white collar crime has a lower rate of detection and prosecution and it is argued that this is because of :
- low visibility
- do not see much of these crimes within the media and street crimes are more reported as they are crimes of the lower classes
- complexity
- large scale, more difficult to unravel, plenty of deeper issues linked to fraud and can take years to allocate the blame
- diffusion of victimisation
- there is no obvious victim like assault, murder as white collar crimes are more to do with finances
- victims may be more widespread and now show immediate impact
- diffusion of responsibility
- blame is widely spread and organisations blame higher or lower down the hierarchy so it is harder to find who is actually responsible
- marxists would say the reasons are to do with maintaining class divisions, law enforcement and ideology of the r/c
