Theories And Perspectives Crime, Deviance, Social Order And Social Control Booklet Sociologists And Stats

Question 1

Feminists
Social control

Answer 1

A mechanism of patriarchal ideology - men reminding women of their subordinate position through responses to crime and deviance

Question 2

West and Fred
Patriarchal ideology

Answer 2

When women stray from expected female nurturing and caring behaviour they are regarded as doubly deviant and often given a harsher punishment.

Question 3

Newburn
The social construction of crime

Answer 3

Crime is a label attached to certain forms of behaviour prohibited by the state.
Crime seems easy to define there is no act that is criminal in itself.

Question 4

Newburn
Crime is socially constructed

Answer 4

The fact criminal law varies from country to country and changes over time this reinforces the idea that nothing in itself is criminal.
Crime is socially constructed as it is not the act but how members see and define it which makes certain things crimes.

Question 5

New domestic abuse offence created in 2015

Answer 5

The Home Secretary announces a new domestic abuse offence of coercive and controlling behaviour carrying a penalty of up to 5 years in prison.
The governments definition of domestic violence recognises the impact of coercive, controlling and threatening behaviour this as T been reflected in law before.

Question 6

Downey’s and Rock
The social construction of deviance

Answer 6

Ambiguity is a key feature of rule breaking as people are often unsure whether something is deviant. Judgement depends on the context, the person and their motives.
What is defined as deviant also depends on social expectations of normal behaviour.

Question 7

Societal deviance

Answer 7

Act seen by most of society as deviant

Question 8

Situational deviance

Answer 8

Act defined as deviant in a particular context

Question 9

Situational deviance examples

Answer 9

• Since July 2007 it has been illegal to smoke indoors.
• Attitudes to homosexuality pre 1967 illegal however 2013 introduced gay marriage.

Question 10

Durkheim
Explanation of crime and deviance

Answer 10

• To a certain extent crime was inevitable - not everyone can be integrated into the norms and values of society.
• Crime is normal and an integral part of healthy societies - deviant individuals remind others of the importance of social solidarity.
• Without boundary maintenance crime rates might increase leading to anomie or normlessness.

Question 11

Durkheim
Positive functions of crime

Answer 11

1. Boundary maintenance - unites society in condemnation of the wrongdoer reinforcing shared norms.
   The purpose of punishment is to reaffirm society’s shared rules not to punish which may be done through rituals of a court room and public shame of the offender.
2. Adaptation and change - All change starts with acts of deviance what challenges social norms.

Question 12

Cohen
Positive functions of crime

Answer 12

Examined the role of the media in the dramatisation of evil

Question 13

Davis
Other functions of crime and deviance

Answer 13

Prostitution acts as a safety value for mens sexual frustrations without threatening a monogamous nuclear family.

Question 14

Polsky
Other functions of crime and deviance

Answer 14

Pornography safely ‘channels’ a variety of sexual desires away from alternatives e.g. adultery which would threaten the monogamous nuclear family.

Question 15

Cohen
Crime and deviance acts as a warning to society

Answer 15

Deviance acts as a warning that an institution isn’t functioning properly.

Question 16

Merton
Strain theory

Answer 16

Crime occurs as a result of tensions or strain arising from people trying but failing to attain goals society has set for them.

Question 17

Merton
Modes of adaptation

Answer 17

When people cant achieve goals by socially acceptable means they look for others ways which might be criminal.

Question 18

Hirschi
Control theory

Answer 18

1. Attachment - the extent to which we care about other peoples opinions and desires.
2. Commitment - personal investment we put into our lives.
3. Involvement - how integrated we are so that we neither have the time nor inclination to behave in a deviant/ criminal way.
4. Belief - how committed individuals are to upholding society’s rules and laws.

Question 19

Cohen
Deviance

Answer 19

• Deviance is largely a lower-class phenomenon resulting in many from the lower classes unable to achieve mainstream success goals.

Question 20

Cohen
Criticisms of Merton explanations of deviance

Answer 20

1. Merton focuses on utilitarian crimes committed for material gain and doesn’t account for other crimes such as violence or vandalism.
2. Explains how deviance results from individuals adapting to the strain to anomie but ignores the role of group deviance such as delinquent subcultures.

Question 21

Cohen
Study focused upon working class boys

Answer 21

They faced anomie in middle class dominated school systems.
Young working class were frustrated as they lacked the opportunities to enable them to achieve societies goals - status frustration.
Status frustration led them to develop alternative set of values a ‘delinquent subculture.’

Question 22

Coward and Ohlin
Response to strain and status frustration

Answer 22

The key reason different subcultural responses occur is not only unequal access to legitimate opportunity but unequal access to illegitimate opportunity structures.
Different neighbourhoods provide different illegitimate opportunities to learn criminal skills and develop criminal careers.

Question 23

Cloward and Ohlin
Criminal subcultures

Answer 23

1. Conflict subcultures - occur in any areas with high population turnover preventing a stable criminal network.
2. Criminal subcultures - Provide youths with an apprenticeship for a career in utilitarian crime.
3. Retreating subcultures - young people spending time together but not interacting with other groups such as those sharing a particular interest in a type of music.

Question 24

Miller
Limitation of Cloward and Ohlin

Answer 24

Lower class has its own independent subculture with its own values. This subculture doesn’t value success so its members aren’t frustrated by failure.

Question 25

Matza Evaluation of Cloward and Ohlin

Answer 25

People belonging to subcultures use techniques of neutralisation justifying their behaviour by removing themselves from taking any violence because they were provoked or felt they had no choice.

Question 26

Lyng Edgework

Answer 26

Young people commit crimes in order to take risks and experience excitement.

Question 27

South Criticism of Cloward and Ohlin

Answer 27

Drug trade is a mix of disorganised crime and professional ‘mafia’ style subcultures.

Question 28

Messner and Rosenfeld Institutional anomie theories

Answer 28

Institutional anomie theory focuses on the American Dream. They argue that its obsession with money, success and winner takes all pressure towards crime by encouraging an anomic cultural environment where ‘anything goes.’

Question 29

Downey’s and Hansens Institutional anomie theories

Answer 29

Surgery of crime rates o 18 countries they found that in societies that spent more on welfare there were lower rates of imprisonment.

Question 30

Savelsberg Institutional anomie theories

Answer 30

Applies strain theory to postmodern communist countries on East Europe. Countries saw crime rise with the fall of communism. Savelsberg attributes this to the introduction of western capitalist goals of money success.

Question 31

Snider Criminogenic capitalism

Answer 31

Argues that these types of crimes actually cost society far more than the crimes carried out by the poor.

Question 32

Gordon Criminogenic capitalism

Answer 32

Crime is a rational response to the capitalist system and is therefore found in all classes even though official statistics make it appear largely a working class phenomenon

Question 33

Chanbliss Law reflects ruling class interests and ideology

Answer 33

Identified ‘non-decision making’ - conscious decisions avoid creating laws and regulations for the wealthy. Argued laws to protect private property are the cornerstone of capitalist society.

Question 34

Box Law reflects ruling class ideology and interests

Answer 34

What is defined as a serious crime is a social construct benefitting the wealthy

Question 35

Snider Selective law enforcement

Answer 35

Laws still dont curb the interest of big business. Big businesses are important and necessary within a capitalist society, they are given concessions which benefit them.

Question 36

Selective law enforcement example

Answer 36

Royal Bank of Scotland 62% owned by taxpayers disclosed the £305 million bonus pot alongside its annual results.

Question 37

Pearce Ideological functions of crime and law

Answer 37

Laws such as safety laws and workplace health often benefit the ruling class too

Question 38

Ideological functions of crime and law example

Answer 38

2007 law against corporate homicide - only 1 successful prosecution i the first 8 years despite large numbers of deaths at oak estimated to be caused by employers negligence.

Question 39

Taylor, Walton and Young Neo Marxist view on crime and deviance

Answer 39

Capitalist society is based on class conflict and exploitation. Agree that the state enforces the law in the interest of the capitalist state. Believe capitalism should be replaced with a classless society.

Question 40

Young and Walton Neo Marxist views on crime and deviance

Answer 40

Believe their work layed some foundations for later radical approaches that seek to establish a more just society.

Question 41

Taylor et al Fully social theory of deviance

Answer 41

1. Wider origins of the deviant act. 2. Immediate origins of the deviant act. 3. The actual act. 4. The immediate origins of social reaction. 5. Wider origins of social reaction. 6. Effects of labelling on the deviants future actions.

Question 42

Hall Study of policing crisis in 1978

Answer 42

Focused on a moral panic surrounding mugging in Britain in the 1970s. Hall believed the idea of a black mugger was a scapegoat for other social problems.

Question 43

Smart Growth of feminist criminology

Answer 43

Women are seen as doubly deviant.

Question 44

Interactionists theories Explanations of crime

Answer 44

It is more important to explore how people come to be described as deviant and the impact this has on their future behaviour - labelling theory.

Question 45

Labelling theorists Explanations of crime

Answer 45

Crime is the product of interactions between suspects and the police.

Question 46

Becker Labelling theory

Answer 46

Suggests an act only becomes deviant when others perceive it as such and whether or not a deviant label is applied depends on societal reaction.

Question 47

Becker Effect of new laws

Answer 47

1. Creation of a new group of ‘outsiders’. 2. Creation or expansion of social control agencies - may campaign to change the law to increase their power

Question 48

Becker Pre-existing conceptions

Answer 48

Police operate with pre existing conceptions and stereotypical categories of what constitutes trouble, criminal types, criminal areas - these factors influence their response to behaviour they come across.

Question 49

Interactionists Official crime statistics

Answer 49

See official crime statistics as socially constructed - at each stage of the CJs agents of social control make decisions as to whether to proceed to the next stage and as a result statistics produced tell us the activities of police and prosecutors rather than the amount of crime.

Question 50

Lemert Effects of labelling

Answer 50

Distinguishes between primary and secondary deviance. 1. Primary deviance - deviance that hasn’t been public ally labelled as a crime. 2. Secondary deviance - when an offender is discovered and publicly exposed and the label ‘deviance’ is attached.

Question 51

Young The effects of labelling

Answer 51

Secondary deviance and deviant career - study of hippy marijuana use in Notting Hill London. Shows that it isn’t the act itself but the hostile reaction of society that creates serious deviance.

Question 52

Downes and Rock The effects of labelling

Answer 52

People are always free to choose not to deviate further

Question 53

Cohen Folk Devils an Moral Panics

Answer 53

A study of societal reactions to the ‘mods and rockers’ disturbances involving groups of youths at English seaside resorts.

Question 54

Lambert Deviance amplification spiral

Answer 54

Theories rest heavily on the idea that deviance leads to social control.

Question 55

Cicourel Police typifications

Answer 55

Found that police assumptions led them to concentrate upon certain ‘types of people’ - the working class which resulted in law enforcement having a class bias.

Question 56

Ciourcel Police typifications 2

Answer 56

Views justice as not fixed but negotiable.

Question 57

Ciourcel Police statistics

Answer 57

Statistics aren’t valid in providing patterns of crime and therefore cant be used as a resource instead they should be a ‘topic’ for sociologists to investigate.

Question 58

Ciourcel Research in focus

Answer 58

Studied more than four years of juvenile justice and argued that his first hand experience enabled him to uncover the often-unconscious assumptions of control agents in a way that methods such as interviewing wouldn’t have revealed.

Question 59

Braithwaite and Drahos Contemporary application

Answer 59

Labelling theory can be applied to the environment as well as people.

Question 60

Triplett 2000 in USA and De Haan 2000 in Holland Labelling and Criminal Justice Policy

Answer 60

Notes an increasing tendency to see young offenders as evil and to be less tolerant of minor deviance such as truancy.

Question 61

Braithwaite Reintegrative shaming

Answer 61

Identifies a positive role and two types of shaming: 1. Disintegrative shaming - where criminal and the crime are labelled bad and the offender is excluded from society. 2. Reintegrative shaming - labels the act rather than the offender which avoids stigmatisation and encourages forgiveness. Argues crime rates are lower in societies where Reintegrative rather than disintegrative shaming is the dominant way of dealing with offenders.

Question 62

Plummer Evaluation of labelling theory

Answer 62

Although most sociologists no longer see themselves as labelling theorists, the theory has been very influential in embedding a range of theories such as moral panics and crime and the media.

Question 63

Young Aetiological crisis

Answer 63

Argues this led to an aetiological crisis - a crisis explanation for theories of crime.

Question 64

Lee and Young The causes of crime

Answer 64

Three causes of crime: 1. Relative deprivation - how people regard their position in relation to others that causes crime. 2. Subcultures - various types form among the working class who may begin to see offending behaviours as normal. 3. Marginalisation - the process through which some people find themselves on the edges of society unable to access rights and services available.

Question 65

Young Late modernity exclusion and crime

Answer 65

Since the 1970s insecurity and exclusion have increased with deindustrialisation and increased unemployment.

Question 66

Young Bulimic society

Answer 66

1. People gorge on media images of expensive consumer lifestyles. 2. Economic circumstances to vomit out raised expectations. 3. Leads to resentment and feelings of relative deprivation.

Question 67

Lea and Young Tackling crime

Answer 67

Police clear up rates are too low to act as a deterrent to crime and therefore there needs to be an increased trust between the public and police.

Question 68

Henry and Milovanovic Evaluation of Left Realists

Answer 68

They accept the authority’s definition of crime as being street crime committed by the poor instead of defining it as a being how powerful groups do to harm the poor.

Question 69

Cornish and Clarke Rational choice

Answer 69

People commit crime based on a rational choice - if they feel the chances of being caught are low they will commit a crime.

Question 70

Wilson and Hernstein Biological differences

Answer 70

Bio social theory of criminal behaviour - crime caused by a combo of social and biological factors.

Question 71

Wilson and Hernstein Biological differences

Answer 71

Bio social theory of criminal behaviour - crime caused by a combo of social and biological factors.

Question 72

Hernstein and Murray Biological differences

Answer 72

The main cause of crime is low intelligence which they see as biologically determined.

Question 73

Murray Socialisation and the underclass

Answer 73

Crime rates have increased due to a growing underclass who defined by their deviant behaviour fail to socialise their children.

Question 74

Murray Socialisation and the underclass 2

Answer 74

Sees the welfare state as generous provision since the 1960s as allowing a growing number of people to become dependent on state benefits.

Question 75

Bennet Socialisation and the underclass

Answer 75

Lone mothers are ineffective socialisation agents especially for boys lacking male role models. Crime is the result of growing up surrounded by deviant, delinquent and criminal adults in a practically perfect Criminogenic environment that seems almost consciously designed to produce viscous, predatory unrepentant street criminals.

Question 76

Clarke Rational choice theory

Answer 76

The decision to commit crime is a choice based on rational calculations of the likely consequences.

Question 77

Tackling crime Wilson and Kellings

Answer 77

Broken windows argues it’s essential to maintain the orderly character of neighbourhoods to prevent crime taking hold.

Question 78

Young Zero tolerance policing

Answer 78

Success of zero tolerance policing was a myth peddled by police and politicians. New York's crime rate was already reducing since 1985, 9 years before zero tolerance. The police needed arrests to justify their existence and so arrested people for minor deviant crimes.

Question 79

Murray The New right

Answer 79

Argues the underclass is responsible for a large proportion of crime. An overly generous state has led to people becoming reliant on welfare benefits.

Question 80

Henry and Milovanovic Forms of harm

Answer 80

1. Harm of reduction - someone uses power in a way that results in immediate loss of possession to cause some form of harm to the person. 2. Harms of repression - Where peoples future growth and development are threatened.

Question 81

Bauman and Lyon Liquid surveillance

Answer 81

There are many forms of surveillance including mobile phones, passports etc which people willingly buy and use which suggests our lives are becoming increasingly transparent to the point surveillance is invisible to us.