Theoretical perspectives on crime Flashcards
Explain Durkheim’s approach to crime.
Durkheim suggests that every society shares a set of core values, which he called the collective conscience. The more behaviour differed from these core values, the more likely it was to be viewed as deviant.
According to Durkheim, a strong collective conscience, backed up by a fair legal system that compensated those harmed by deviant behaviour and punished offenders, formed the basis for social order.
Durkheim believed that some level of crime and deviance in a society was inevitable, as there will always be differences between people.
However, Durkheim, perhaps surprisingly, identified two different sides of crime and deviance influencing the functioning of society: a positive side; and a negative side, which saw too much crime leading to social disruption.
What aspects of crime does Durkheim view as being positive?
Reaffirming the boundaries – Every time a person breaks a law and is taken to court, the resulting court ceremony, and the publicity in the newspapers, publicly reaffirms the existing values. This is particularly clear in societies in which public punishments take place – for example, where a murderer is taken out to be executed in public or an adulterer is stoned to death.
Changing values – On occasion some individuals or groups deliberately set out to defy laws that they believe are wrong. Sometimes, these people are ahead of their time and defy laws that will eventually be seen as outdated. Such groups are known as functional rebels because they help to change the collective conscience, and laws based on it, for the better, anticipating and helping to produce changes that will help society to function more effectively and fairly. Examples?
Social cohesion – Durkheim points out that when particularly horrific crimes have been committed, the entire community draws together in shared outrage, and the sense of belonging to a community is thereby strengthened.
What did Durkheim say about a society in which there is no crime?
That a ‘society of saints’ would be undesirable as people would be punished heavily for even the most minor offences.
What do other functionalists see as being positive aspects of crime?
Kingsley Davis (1937) suggested that crime could be useful as a safety valve which allowed minor criminality or deviance to avoid bigger problems. For example, the institution of marriage could be stabilised by some married men buying the services of prostitutes.
Albert Cohen (1993) suggested that crime could boost employment and the economy by creating jobs for police officers and others who work in criminal justice, not to mention criminologists. He also believed that crime can act as a kind of early warning mechanism showing that society, or institutions within it, are going wrong.
What did Durkheim view as being the negative aspects of crime?
While a certain limited amount of crime may perform positive functions for society, according to Durkheim, too much crime has negative consequences.
Excessive crime could be the result of two problems with the collective conscience – anomie and egoism.
Anomie occurs when there are periods of great social change or stress, and the collective conscience becomes unclear- e.g. during a revolution or rapid economic and social change.
Egoism occurs when the collective conscience simply becomes too weak to restrain the selfish desires of individuals. It occurs in industrial societies where there are many specialist jobs so that people have very different roles in society. Hedge fund managers and nurses, for example, have to have very different values to carry out their jobs successfully. If individuals are not successfully socialised to accept collective values, for example, through the education system, they can end up putting their own selfish interests before those of society as a whole and committing crime.
Egoism and anomie can be countered, according to Durkheim, by a strengthening of the collective conscience (for example, by teaching moral values in education). If this is not done effectively, crime rates can become excessive, preventing the healthy functioning of society.
Evaluate Durkheim’s views on crime.
(+) Durkheim’s work has been really influential in terms of sociological thinking on crime- e.g. he was the first to suggest that some level of crime is normal. He has influenced other approaches, including strain theory.
(+) Durkheim understood that crime was linked to the particular values of a society and that these values could change.
(-) Durkheim paid little attention to how the powerful could have undue influence on what acts were seen as criminal- and exaggerated the extent of value consensus in society.
(-) Some critics claim that some crimes can never be ‘beneficial’ for society.
Outline strain theory.
For Merton, crime and deviance were evidence of a poor fit (or a strain) between the socially accepted goals of society and the socially approved means of obtaining those desired goals. The resulting strain led to deviance.
Merton argued that all societies set their members certain goals and, at the same time, provide socially approved ways of achieving these goals. Writing in the USA, Merton saw the main goals as wealth and power, as represented in the ‘American dream’, which claimed that even the poorest had opportunities to reach the highest levels of society.
However, Merton was aware that not everyone had the same opportunity to achieve these goals. In an unequal, class-based society, those in the higher classes had more opportunity to succeed than others Merton believed that the system only worked well as long as there was a reasonable chance that a majority of people were able to achieve their goals.
What are the five different forms of behaviour/ adaptations that Merton identified as being a response to the strain between goals and means?
Conformity – The individual continues to adhere to both goals and means, despite the limited likelihood of success. This was typical of most people.
Innovation – The person accepts the goals of society but uses different ways to achieve those goals. This was more common in lower social classes because they had less chance of succeeding than higher classes, partly because they did not have the same chances of success in education as middle- and upper-class children. (Kidnapping)
Ritualism – a ritualist is a person who immerses him- or herself in the daily routine and regulations of their job but has lost sight of the goal of material success.
Retreatism – The individual fails to achieve success and rejects both goals and means. (Drugs)
Rebellion – Both socially sanctioned goals and means are rejected, and different ones substituted. (Terror offences)
Evaluate Merton’s strain theory.
(+) Merton’s work has been very influential and to some extent has stood the test of time- e.g. is still learnt about by Sociology students and still employed by criminology scholars- e.g. Reiner (2015) sees strain theory as useful for explaining a range of crime including the 2011 riots and the parliamentary expenses scandal.
(-) Merton has been criticised by Valier (2001), among others, for his stress on the existence of common goals in society. Valier argues that there are, in fact, a variety of goals that people strive to attain at any one time. For example, people might prioritise altruism or a happy family life or leisure over financial success and power.
(-) Some sociologists, such as Taylor, Walton and Young, think that he underestimates the amount of middle- and upper-class crime while overestimating working-class crime.
(-) It may be an over-simplistic explanation as some people way fit into several groups at the same time. For example, people might conform but still commit crime using drugs.
Outline labelling theory of crime and deviance.
Labelling theory suggests that most people commit deviant and/ or criminal acts but that only some people are caught and stigmatised for it.
Becker (1963)- the sociologist most associated with this approach- argued that “deviance is not a quality of the act the person commits, but rather a consequence of the application by others of rules and sanctions to an ‘offender’. The deviant is one to whom that label has been successfully applied; deviant behaviour is behaviour that people so label.”
What are the key points of labelling theory.
Crime is socially constructed – an act which harms an individual or society only becomes criminal if those in power label that act as criminal.
Not everyone who is deviant gets labelled as such – negative labels are generally (deviant/ criminal) are generally given to the powerless by the powerful.
Labelling has real consequences – it can lead to deviancy amplification, the self-fulfilling prophecy and deviant careers.
Labelling theory has a clear ‘value position’ – society should aim to promote policies that prevent labelling minor acts as deviant.
Explain the claim of labelling theory that crime is socially constructed.
Rather than taking the definition of crime for granted, labelling theorists are interested in how certain acts come to be defined or labelled as criminal in the first place.
Interactionists argue that there is no such thing as an inherently deviant act – in other words there is nothing which is deviant in itself in all situations and at all times, certain acts only become deviant in certain situations when others label them as deviant. Deviance is not a result of an act or an individual being ‘uniquely different’, deviance is a product of society’s reaction to actions.
Labelling theorists argue that laws are a reflection of the activities of people (moral entrepreneurs) who actively seek to create and enforce laws- either because they benefit them personally or because they believe that they will genuinely benefit society.
Explain Becker’s example of the outsiders in illustrating the labelling argument.
A young man killed himself because he had been publicly accused of incest. When Malinowski inquired about it, islanders expressed their disgust. However, on further investigation, it transpired that incest was common on the island, and wasn’t really frowned upon as long as those involved were discreet. However, if an incestuous relationship became public, the islanders reacted with abuse, and those involved were ostracised and often driven to suicide.
What factors impact who gets labelled?
Their interactions with agencies of social control such as the police and the courts
Their appearance, background and personal biography
The situation and circumstances of the offence.
What are the stages in what Becker describes as the deviant career?
Rule breaking occurs- also known as primary deviance.
The individual is publicly labelled as a deviant, which may lead to rejection from several social groups.
This may encourage further deviance- secondary deviance, which is the consequence of the response of others.
A deviant career may emerge. The deviant career is completed when individuals join an organised deviant group. This is the stage when an individual confirms and accepts their deviant identity.
This is the stage at which the label may become a master status, overriding all other forms of relationship outside the deviant group.
