Topic 2 - Interactionism And Labelling Theory

Question 1

What are labelling theorists interested in when looking at crime ?

Answer 1

Labelling theorists are interested in how and why certain acts come to be defined or labelled as criminal in the first place.
They argue that no act is inherently criminal or deviant in itself but comes to be so when others label it as such
It’s not the nature of the act that makes it deviant but the nature of society’s reaction to the act

Question 2

What does Becker (labelling theorists) believe a deviant is ?

Answer 2

Becker believes a deviant is simply someone to whom a label has been successfully applied , and deviant behaviour is simply behaviour that people so label

Question 3

What are moral entrepreneurs ?

Answer 3

Moral entrepreneurs are people who lead a moral crusade to change the law

Question 4

What are the 2 effects that Becker argue a new law created by moral entrepreneurs has ?

Answer 4

-the creation of a new group of outsiders -deviants who break the new rule
-the creation or expansion of social control agencies ( police , courts) to enforce the rule and impose labels on offenders

Question 5

How does Platt argue that the Idea of juvenile delinquency was originally created and what did it mean for juveniles ?

Answer 5

-Platt argues that the idea of juvenile delinquency was originally created as a result of a campaign by upper class Victorian moral entrepreneurs aimed at protecting young people at risk
-This established juveniles as a separate category of offenders with their own courts and it enabled the state to extend its power beyond criminal offences involving the young into status offences (where their behaviour is only an offence because of their age) such as truancy and sexual promiscuity

Question 6

What are the 3 factors which contribute to if a person gets arrested , charged and convicted ?

Answer 6

-their interaction with agencies of social control
-their appearance , background and personal biography
-the situation and circumstances of the offence

Question 7

What did Piliavin and Briar found police decisions to arrest youths were based on ?

Answer 7

Piliavin and Briar found that police decisions to arrest a youth were mainly based on physical cues such as manner and dress , from which they made judgements about the youths character
Officers decisions were also influenced by the suspects gender, class , ethnicity , time and place
For example , those stopped late at night in high crime areas ran a greater risk of arrest.

Question 8

What did Cicourel find officers are influenced by when looking at what a typical delinquent is and how did this influence officers ?

Answer 8

Cicourel found that officers used typifications - their common sense theories or stereotypes of what the typical delinquent is like which led them to concentrate on certain types
This resulted in law enforcement showing a class bias , in that working class areas and people fitted the police typifications most closely so officers patrol working class areas more intensely resulting in more arrests and confirming their stereotypes

Question 9

What did Cicourel find out about how probation officers typifications led them to treat juvenile delinquency ?

Answer 9

Cicourel found probation officers held the common sense theory that juvenile delinquency was caused by broken homes , poverty and lacked parenting . They tended to see youths from such backgrounds as likely to offend in the future so were less likely to support non custodial sentences for them.

Question 10

How does Cicourel believe justice is not fixed but negotiable and why was this ?

Answer 10

In Cicourels view justice is not fixed but negotiable , for example , when a middle class youth is arrested they are less likely to get charged . This was partly because the background did not fit the police’s typical delinquent and partly because their parents were more likely to be able to negotiate successfully.
As a result they would be counselled , warned and released rather than prosecuted

Question 11

What does Cicourel believe about official crime statistics recorded by the police ?

Answer 11

Cicourel argues that official crime statistics do not give us a valid picture of the patterns of crime so cannot be used as a resource (facts about crime )

Question 12

What does Cicourel believe about how we should treat official crime statistics recorded by the police ?

Answer 12

Cicourel believes we should treat official crime statistics as a topic for sociologists to investigate . This will shed light on the activities of the Control agencies and how they process and label certain types of people as criminals.

Question 13

What do interactionists believe official crime statistics are and why are they like this ?

Answer 13

Interactionists see the official crime statistics as socially constructed .
At each stage of the criminal justice system , agents of social control such as police officers make decisions about whether to proceed or not . The outcome depends on the label attached to the offender , this label is likely to be affected by typifications or stereotypes they hold about the offender
As a result the statistics produced by the police only tell us about the activities of the police rather than about the amount of crime out there in society or who commits it

Question 14

What is meant by the dark figure of crime ?

Answer 14

The dark figure of crime - the difference between the official crime statistics and the real Rate of crime because we don’t know for certain how much crime goes undetected , unreported and unrecorded.

Question 15

What are 2 alternative statistics which can be used to investigate crime ?

Answer 15

-victim surveys - where people are asked what crimes they have been victims of
-self report studies - where people are asked what crimes they have committed
These help us to gain a more accurate view of the amount of crime.

Question 16

What are limitations of alternative statistics such as self report and victim surveys when investigating crime ?

Answer 16

-people may forget , conceal , exaggerate when asked if they have committed a crime or been a victim of one
-surveys usually only include a selection of generally less serious offences

Question 17

What are the 2 types of deviance that Lemert refers to and what are these ?

Answer 17

-Primary deviance - refers to deviant acts that have not been publicly labelled therefore individuals do not generally see themselves as deviants
-Secondary deviance - is the result of societal reaction / labelling

Question 18

What is meant by master status and what leads individuals to experience a master status ?

Answer 18

Master label occurs once an individual is labelled and may come to only see themselves in terms of that label. This becomes their master status which controls their identity , overriding all others . In their eyes he is no longer a colleague , father nor neighbour but now a thief , junkie or paedophile (an outsider )

Question 19

What is a deviant career and how does it link to secondary deviance ?

Answer 19

Secondary deviance is likely to provoke further hostile reactions from society and reinforce the deviants outsiders status . Which leads to more deviance and therefore a deviant career .

Question 20

An example of a deviant career applied to an ex convict ?

Answer 20

For example , the ex convict finds it hard to go straight because no one will employ him , so he seeks out other outsiders for support. This may involve Joining a deviant subculture that offers deviant career opportunities and role models and rewards deviant behaviour which will confirm his deviant identity

Question 21

What is Youngs study which uses the concepts of secondary deviance and deviant career ?

Answer 21

Young uses the concepts of secondary deviance and deviant career in his study of marijuana users . Initially , drugs were peripheral to the hippies lifestyle - an example of primary deviance . However persecution and labelling by the police led the hippie to increasingly see themselves as outsiders , they retreated into closed groups where they began to develop a deviant subculture where drug use was a central activity , attracting further attention from the police and therefore creating a self fulfilling prophecy.

Question 22

What do Downes and Rock say about how a deviant career is not always inevitable ?

Answer 22

Downes and Rock note that we cannot predict whether someone who has been labelled will always follow a deviant career because they are always free to chose not to deviate further

Question 23

What is the deviance amplification Spiral according to Cohen ?

Answer 23

Deviance amplification spiral is a term labelling theorists use to describe a process in which the attempt to control deviance leads to an increase in the level of deviance. This leads to a greater control to control the deviance which produces higher levels of deviance and so on

Question 24

What is an example of the deviance amplification spiral at work according to Cohen ?

Answer 24

An example is mods and rockers
Press exaggeration and distorted reporting of the events began a moral panic with moral entrepreneurs calling for a crackdown . The police responded by arresting more youths while the courts imposed harsher penalties. This seemed to confirm the truth of the original media reaction and provoked more public concern , in an upward spiral of deviance amplification

The demonising of the mods and rockers as folk devils caused their further marginalisation as outsiders resulting in more deviant behaviour on their part

Question 25

How is the idea of cohens deviance amplification spiral and Lemerts idea of secondary deviance similar ?

Answer 25

In both cases , the societal reaction to an initial deviant act leads not to successful control of the deviance but to further deviance which then leads to greater societal reaction and so on

Question 26

How are folk devils and the dark figure of crime opposites ?

Answer 26

-dark figure is about unlabelled and unrecorded crime that is ignored by the police and society
-folk devils and their actions are over labelled and over exposed to the public view and the attentions of thee authorities

Question 27

How do the labelling Theory argue we should reduce deviance and an example of what this does ?

Answer 27

We should make and enforce fewer rules for people to break
For example , by decriminalising soft drugs , we might reduce the number of people with criminal convictions and hence the risk of secondary deviance

Question 28

What are the 2 types of labelling identified by Braithwaite ?

Answer 28

-Disintegrative shaming - Where not only the crime , but also the criminal are labelled and excluded from society
-reintegrative shaming - labels the act but not the actor as if to say he has done a bad thing but not he is a bad person

Question 29

What is disintegrative shaming ?

Answer 29

Disintegrative shaming - where both the crime and the criminal are labelled , so the offender is excluded from society

Question 30

What is reintegrative shaming ?

Answer 30

Reintegrative shaming - labels the act rather than the actors as to say he has done a bad thing not he is a bad person

Question 31

What does Braithwaite argue is positive about reintegrative shaming ?

Answer 31

Reintegrative shaming avoids stigmatising the offender as evil while at the same time making them aware of the negative impact of their actions upon others . This makes it easier for the offender and the community to separate the offender from the offence and re admit the wrongdoer back into mainstream society , while avoiding pushing the offender towards secondary deviance

Question 32

What does Brathwaite argue about crime rates where reintegrative shaming are the dominant way of dealing with offenders rather than disintegrative shaming ?

Answer 32

Braithwaite argues that crime rates tend to be lower in societies where reintegrative shaming rather than disintegrative shaming is the dominant way of dealing with offenders.

Question 33

Evaluation of the labelling theory - Criticisms ?

Answer 33

-it tends to be deterministic , implying that once someone is labelled a deviant career is inevitable
-its emphasis on the negative effects of labelling gives the offender a victim status . Realist sociologists argue this ignores the real victims of crime
-tends to focus on less serious crimes such as drug taking
-it assumes that offenders are passive victims of labelling ,it ignores the fact that individuals may chose deviance
-fails to explain why people commit primary deviance in the firsts place , before labelling has taken place
-implies that without labelling deviance wouldn’t exist