Topic 2: Interactionism and labelling theory Flashcards
How is crime considered a social construction by labelling theorists?
Argue that no act is inherently criminal or deviant in itself, Instead it only comes to be so when others label it as such.
What does Becker (1963) say a deviant is?
Someone who the label has been successfully applied, and deviant behaviour is simply behaviour that people label.
Explain Becker’s ‘Moral Entrepeneur’ theory.
-Moral entrepeneurs are people who lead a moral campaign that change the law
What are the two effects that moral entrepeneurship has?
-The creation of a new group of outsiders- outlaws or deviants who break the rule
-The creation or expansion of a social control agency (such as police etc) to enforce the rule and impose labels on offenders
What example does Platt (1969) give towards moral entrepeneurship?
-Idea of juvenile delinquency created as a result of a campaign by victorian moral entrepeneurs.
-This created a new category of offender ‘juveniles’
According to Becker, how can social control agencies also campaign for change?
To help increase their own power.
Give an example of social control agencies campaigning for change.
US Federal Bureau of Narcotics successfully campaigned for passing of Marijuana Tax Act in 1937 to outlaw weed use. Becker argues it was to extend the Bureau’s sphere of influence.
What factors effect whether a person is arrested, charged and convicted?
-Their interactions with agencies of social control
-Appearance, background and personal biography
-Situation and circumstances of the offences.
What does Piliavin and Briar (1964) say about police decisions to arrest youth?
Based on physical cues, from which they made judgements,
Also influenced by the suspects gender, class, ethnicity, time and place.
What theorist talks about officer’s typifications?
Cicourel.
Explain what officer’s typifications are.
Stereotypes of what a typical delinquent is like. This can result in law enforcement showing a class bias.
Give an example of how social control within criminal justice system reinforces this bias?
Probation officers holding idea that juvenile delinquency was caused by broken homes, poverty and lax parenting.
What does Cicourel say about justice?
Justice is not fixed but negotiable.
What is Cicourel’s view on official crime statistics?
Statistics do not give us a valid picture of the patterns of crime and cannot be used as a resource ,
We should instead use them as a topic to investigate to shed light on labelling.
What do interactionists say about crime statistics?
-Socially constructed,
Social control agents decide at each step to proceed to next stage and continue the process of labelling.
What is the dark figure of crime?
The difference between the official statistics and the ‘real’ rate of crime.
How does Lemert (1951) distinguish between primary and secondary deviance?
Primary deviance: Deviant acts that have not been publicly labelled
Secondary deviance: The result of societal reaction, being labelled and repeating the act.
What is the master status?
Once an individual is labelled, others may come to see them only in terms of the label.
How can the master status effect the individual?
Provoke a sense of individual’s self-concept or sense of identity, this may lead the individual to accept the deviant label and the self full-filling prophecy.
What is a deviant career?
When the labelled deviant acts out more deviant acts, leading to a deviant career.
What example does Young (1971) give of secondary. deviance and a deviant career?
-Marijuana users in Notting Hill,
persecution and labelling lead to a deviant subculture,
-Drug use became a central activity, leading to a self full-filling prophecy
What is a criticism of primary and secondary deviance?
Downes and rock (2003) cannot predict if someone labelled will follow down deviant career, always free to choose not to deviate further.
What is the deviance amplification spiral?
A term used to describe a process in which the attempts to control deviance leads to an increase in the rate of deviance.
-Leads to more attempts to control and higher rates of deviance.
What example does Stanley Cohen use to explain the deviance amplification spiral?
-Mods and Rockers
-Press exaggeration caused a crack down, mods and rockers labelled ‘folk devils’
-Caused further marginalisation and deviant acts
Whats the difference between folk devils and the dark figure of crime?
-Folk devils are over-labelled and over-exposed to public view
-Compared to dark figure that are unlabelled and under-recorded, ignored by public and police.
What policy implications does labelling theory have?
-Logically , to reduce deviance we should make and enforce fewer rules to break
-Avoid publicly ‘naming and shaming’ offender, likely to create a negative perception of them and send them down a deviant career.
What two types of shaming does Braithwaite (1989) distinguish between?
Disintegrative shaming and reintegrative shaming.
What is disintegrative shaming?
Where not only crime but criminal is labelled as bad and offender excluded from society.
What is reintegrative shaming?
Where the act is labelled, not the actor.
What does Braithwaite argue about shaming?
Crime rates tend to be lower in societies where reintegrative shaming is more dominant than disintegrative.
How and why did Durkheim (1897) study suicide?
-Using official statistics, claimed to have discovered causes of suicide in poorly socially integrated individuals
-Wanted to prove sociology as a science
Why do interactionists reject Durkheim’s approach?
argue that to understand suicide, we must study it’s meanings for those who choose to kill themselves.
Explain Douglas’ approach to suicide, statistics and meaning.
Official statistics are socially constructed and tell us more of the activities of the people who construct them, such as coroners.
Give examples as to how official statistics are untrue in representing rates of suicide?
-Relatives may feel guilty about failing to prevent a death, and may press for other cause of death
-A coroner may have strong religious view, that believes suicide is a sin, so may not record it.
What does Douglas say we must do in order to find the true meanings of suicide?
-Use qualitative methods,
-analyse suicide notes,
-unstructured interviews with friends and families,
-interview those who survive suicide attempts.
What is Atkinson’s main focus on the topic of suicide?
-The assumptions that coroners make, that may lead to untrue statistics
-Ideas about typical suicides, modes of death, location, circumstance and history, can lead to different interpretations of death.
What is a criticism of Atkinson’s view of suicide?
If he is correct about having interpretations rather than facts, then his account is an interpretation with no reason to be accepted.
What are interactionists interested in when it comes to mental illness?
-How does someone become labelled as mentally ill, and what are its effects?
Explain Lemert’s (1962) theory into Paranoia.
-Some individuals don’t fit into groups (Primary deviance)
-As a result they are excluded
-Their response to exclusion begins secondary deviance
-People around them talk about how best to deal with them
-The person becomes suspicious of conspiracy, and confirms fears for their mental health, may lead to hospitalisation
-‘Mental patient’ then becomes their master status.
Whats an example of Lemert’s theory into paranoia?
Rosenhan’s (1973) ‘psuedo-patient’ experiment
-False admissions into hospital under schizophrenia
-Even acting normally, their actions considered insane.
