Victimisation

Question 1

What is the definition of a victim, according to the UN?

Answer 1

A victim is someone who has suffered harm (including mental, physical or emotional suffering, economic loss and impairment of their basic rights) through acts or omissions that violate the laws of the state.

Question 2

What are the three key features of positivist victimology, according to Miers?

Answer 2

1. it aims to identify the factors that produce patterns in victimisation - especially those that make some people more likely to be victims
2. it focuses on interpersonal crimes of violence
3. It aims to identify victims that have contributed to their own victimisation

Question 3

Wolfgang looked at 588 murders in Philadelphia, what did they find?

Answer 3

26% of the murders included ‘victim precipitation’

Question 4

What are the two elements that critical victimology focus on?

Answer 4

1. structural factors

2. The states power to apply or deny the label of a victim

Question 5

Who showed that ‘safety crimes’ in the workplace that lead to the death of a worker may be explained away as ‘accident prone’ workers and argued that this failure to label conceals the crimes of the powerful?

Answer 5

Tombs and Whyte (2007)

Question 6

What is secondary victimisation?

Answer 6

victims may suffer at the hands of the criminal justice system