The explanations of State Crime Flashcards
What are the five explanations of state crime
State crime and the culture of denial (Cohen)
Neutralisation theory (Matza)
State crime and Human Rights (Schwendinger and Schwendinger)
Crimes of Obedience (Green and Ward)
State crime is a crime of Modernity (Bauman)
What is the culture of denial according to Cohen?
Dictatorships just deny HR abuses
Democracies have a 3 stage ‘spiral of denial’
What is the 3 stage ‘spiral of denial’ that democracies use?
- Claim events didn’t happen
- When proof comes: ‘not what it looks like’
- When further evidence makes it undeniable ‘it is justified as a way to protect national interests etc’
Why might Cohen’s theory lack contemporary relevance?
Social media means that evidence and accusations can be spread globally in a matter of minutes (harder for government to hide/reject/deny)
What does Matza mean by ‘neutralisation’?
How the state neutralises or justifies its crimes
What are the 5 neutralisation techniques that provide excuses for the state?
- Denial of the Victim (they’re not really a victim)
- Denial of Injury (they started it, we’re the victims)
- Denial of Responsibility (Only obeying orders)
- Condemning Condemners (the whole world is picking on us)
- Appeal to Higher loyalties (it was for the good of the nation)
How can you counter Matza’s neutralisation theory?
Global political agencies can punish those who commit state crime
e.g. Slobodan Milosevic tried for war crimes
What is ‘transgressive criminology’?
We should look outside of the ‘legal’ definition of crime as law breaking acts, and include things like HR abuses that aren’t considered ‘criminal’
Rob White argues this is how we should approach crime
How is Schwendinger and Schwendinger’s explanation that the state commits crime against human rights a transgressive approach?
They define crime based on the violation of HR not just laws
What do Schwendinger and Schwendinger say about the state and crime?
The can be perpetrators of crime not just the authority that defines it
If we accept the legal definition of crime we become subservient to the state (e.g. Nazi Germany made genocide legal just by passing laws)
How can you evaluate Schwendinger and Schwendinger’s theory?
(3 reasons)
There’s only a limited global consensus of Human Rights: UDHR 1948, which is criticised for being too westernised
Cohen: Yes HR abuses like genocide are gross violations of the law, but other crimes such as economic exploitation aren’t as obviously criminal even though morally wrong
Ideological factors can be more important than the power of the state e.g. Nazi Germany> racist propaganda more influential in motivating certain crimes
What are crimes of obedience according to Green and Ward?
People commit crimes as they obey authority
How does the state overcome the norms against the use of cruelty?
It has to resocialise torturers to see their victims as sub-human (dehumanisation)
What did Kelman and Hamilton’s study on the Mai Lai Massacre find?
3 features that produce crimes of obedience: Authorisation, Routinisation, Dehumanisation
Authorisation: people feel they have a duty to obey
Routinisation: once the crime is committed, there is strong pressure to turn the act into a routine the person can perform detached
Dehumanisation: the enemy is sub-human so the principles of morality don’t apply
How do Marxist’s support the explanation that the state uses crimes of obedience?
The RC state brainwashes/manipulates the WC to obey them and commit these crimes on their behalf
