Notes

Explanations of crime

Marxism

Chambliss - crime and deviance are products of the capitalist system itself - Greed created by capitalism and bourgeoise motivates crime in order to reach wealth and get consumer goods

Ohlin Illegitimate opportunity structure - turn to the alternate means and the crime structure in order to get rich and successful. criminal subcultures, conflict subcultures and retreatist subcultures.

Cohen status frustration - feel frustrated about lack of status, often working class who are disadvantaged in m.c based society (eg. education system hidden curriculum), thus gain status by criminal success rather than academic success.

Snider Capitalistic state is often reluctant to pass laws, which regulate big business concerns, which might threaten profitability. [eg. laws against pollution and workers health] = Get away with crime, they are true criminals

Gordon - Turning to crime is rational, capitalism gives everyone a reason to to turn to crime [wealth]

Gordon Law enforcement supports capitalism by imprisoning those against capitalism eg. Black Panthers and focusing on working class crime rather than bourgeoise crime.

Scraton The police can be seen as an occupying force, imposed upon working class communities.

Reiner Police discretion - cultural, canteen, individual

Pearce argues that the creation and enforcement of corporate law is governed by the ruling class, who will have friends who put pressure on the government to protect them from serious allegations.

Croall argues that those who own the means of production have a greater opportunity to make large sums of money from crime.

Tax evasion Starbucks, for example, had sales of £400m in the UK last year, but paid no corporation tax. It transferred some money to a Dutch sister company

Box When people are released from capitalist control, people are more likely to commit crime because they see the unfairness of the system. eg. Free from work, see unjust greed

People commit crime because..
Secrecy - Not being caught, likely to do again
Supply – The equipment to commit crime
Symbolic support – justification for crime eg. poor
(Social support – connections to groups

Criticisms
Too deterministic
Ignores the individual, too macro
Ignores the complexity of law - not just ruling class

Globalisation and Crime

Taylor argues that globalisation has brought about further crime and deviance:
The ability to move money around the world leads to financial crime –eg. tax evasion

The increased profits from moving production to countries with no employment laws or worker standards. No production =the resulting rise in unemployment in Western countries can lead to crime.

Kramer 3rd world countries do not have pollution controls or safety legislation.

Neo marxism

Hall - Crime is a result of other socialisation factors such as the media and family, not just capitalism

Cohen - Moral panic - creates negative police discretion [Reiner] and negative labelling which can lead to self fulfilling prophecy for W.C who will commit crime as it is expected of them.

Taylor and Young - Relative Deprivation, Marginalisation and Subcultures can lead to crime

Paul Gilroy - crime is a result of ethnic minorities rebelling and resisting racism in a historically racist state

Criticisms:
Romanticises w.c and ignores the crimes committed by the W.C

Functionalism

Criminal Justice System (CJS) as crucial in looking after the interests of society as a whole. Without it, society would collapse.

Durkheim - crime acts as a reminder for the norms and values within society, preventing anomie. Family important in socialising these norms and values to create collective conscience = No family = crime
-People become united against an immoral crime eg. Murder = community cohesion
-Crime brings social change - eg. new laws can result from crimes Megans Law - Sex offender registry

Eisenstadt - crime acts as a tension outlet

Davis Argued that crime and deviance can act as a ‘safety valve’. Deviance can act as a tension outlet and releases pressure preventing worse things from happening and protecting your role in society. eg. Prostitution is functional because it provides sexual satisfaction without threatening the family role [not having an affair, just doing it for sex]

Clinard- Crime acts as a warning function - If we can see that there is a lot of crime and deviance, argues Clinard, we know that there is some underlying social problem and can therefore do something about it. eg Riots, protests

Hirschi crime occurs when attachment to society is weakened - Attachment, Commitment, Involvement, Belief

Criticisms:
says how crime has a function but doesn’t fully explain why people commit crime
Explains why w.c is committed but not white collar crime
Views law as representing everyone
Generalises individuals

Subcultural theory

Merton strain theory
individual suffering from anomie [lack of role in society ] would strive to attain the common goals of a specific society yet would not be able to reach these goals legitimately because of the structural limitations in society. As a result the individual would exhibit deviant behaviour.
People unable to achieve goals with accepted means turn to alternate means or reject goals all together.
Conformist + +
Innovation - +
Ritualism + -
Rebellion - - +
Retreatism - -+ +
Valier (2001) criticises Merton on account of his argument that society consists of common goals, there are a variety of goals.
Why do some people but not others turn to deviance4

Ohlin Illegitimate opportunity structure - turn to the alternate means and the crime structure in order to get rich and successful. criminal subcultures, conflict subcultures and retreatist subcultures.

Cohen status frustration - feel frustrated about lack of status, often working class who are disadvantaged in m.c based society (eg. education system hidden curriculum), thus gain status by criminal success rather than academic success.

Matza attacks subcultural theory.
He claims that all groups in society have a shared set of subterranean values.
However,most people control these deviant desires most of the time.
People use techniques of neutralisation to justify deviance and crime.

Left explanations of crime

Lee and Young - Crime occurs due to relative deprivation, marginalisation, subculture
Relative deprivation - poverty causes crime - awareness of inequality
Marginalisation - Not in the government and isolated
Subcultures - emerge amongst segregated people - have criminal norms and values

Young - relative deprivation =people feel a sense of economic insecurity.
turn to crime for wealth in order to protect family

The state affects crime amounts - police discretion

Becker - Labelling theory

Lee and Young - Labelling of police....Lack of trust between police...take military approach...lack of trust...etc.

Minority ethnicities are labelled and targeted

Criticisms:
Only looks at w.c
Doesn’t explain why all people turn to crime


Right explanations of crime


Murray: Decline in nuclear family and fatherless figure - boys grow up without role models - turn to crime

Wilson - poverty and crime do not link, poverty does not cause crime, otherwise elderly would be committing crime

The public are more concerned with street crime.
Therefore this destroys communities far more than white collar crime

Wilson claimed that crime flourished in situations where there is little social control. Parallel of broken windows - once one crime is committed, if there is no control, all people will commit crime.

Clarke - benefits of crime outweigh the risks

Hernstein - People more likely to commit crime if not socialised properly

Critcisms:
Platt - Only look at w.c crime and ignores justice
Matthew - Found little evidence that little social control leads to more crime in areas


Post Modernism
Katz - crime is thrilling
Foucalt -CCTV
[?? ]


Feminism


Feminism - Why women are victims


British Crime Survey focused on achieving quantitative data.

Feminist surveys aim to achieve empathetic understanding (verstehen) – qualitative data.

Critical of structured interview - Hilary Graham (1983)
Structured interviews give a distorted and invalid picture of women’s experience, don’t give true experience because forcing them to answer specific questions.

Dobash and Dobash - unstructured interviews with women victims of domestic violence
23% of the sample had experienced violence before their marriage but hoped it would cease.
77% had not experienced violence and saw aggression as showing seriousness about relationship

Violence is normalised and the female was accused of being a bad mother/wife - self blamed themselves

Walklate - Many female victims are unable to leave their violent partners due to the dominance and power of the man in the relationship - breadwinner - rely and depend on

Domestic Abuse..can’t leave because..
-Blackmail
-Family
-Love and belief
-Isolation

Radical: Women are likely always the victims, need to see crime through female perception not malestream

Liberal - Women ignored in research, understanding this will bring greater understanding, more research needs to be done in womens role in crime [victim or criminal]

Social - Brings in the social context and capitalism patriarchy to understand gender inequality and how it links to crime

Smart and Cain women should be looking at how harm comes to women.


Socialisation into gender roles:

Oakley - Manipulation, canalisation, verbal appellation, domestic activities
Statham Neuron path ways still developing - learn the most as child socialised

Smart - More social control on females, males are encouraged to go outside, rape is normalised in society via the patriarchy - men are encouraged to seek sex, women are encouraged to give in

Mcrobbie and Garber - Bedroom culture - private sphere - females kept inside away from crime - females are less likely to be victims of crime
Lincoln developed from this, now technology is bedroom culture

Connell hegemonic masculinity and femininity

Parsons expressive and instrumental roles

34% of women receive a jail sentence for their first offence, compared to 10%

Heidensohn – females are more likely to conform because patriarchal society imposes greater control over their behaviour, they are entrapped in family role as wives and looking after children, no opportunity to be involved in illegal activity. Public role - fear of labelling

Sue Lees – girls are more likely to fear having a bad reputation and having negative labels placed on them.

Crime is a rational choice:
Pat Carlen – working-class females may commit crime because they lack the four controls that prevent people from committing crime (Attachment, Commitment, Involvement, Belief). In poverty, so may turn to crime as benefits outweigh disadvantages = Rational

Feminisation of poverty women more likely to be in poverty - jobs discriminate Sandra Wilklate – shoplifting and prostitution are typically motivated by economic necessity.

Liberation theory Freda Adler – society has become less patriarchal, so female crime rates will rise. Freedom from patriarchy will give females greater opportunity and confidence to commit crime. -Ladette culture


Post Modern: Hazel Croall – teenage girls are typically motivated to commit crime by three inter-related factors

A drug habit (which often leads to prostitution and shoplifting)

The excitement that accompanies the act of committing a crime.

The conspicuous consumption

Messerschmidt argued boys are socialised into a hegemonic masculine value system.
Males may turn to crime in order to strengthen their masculinity in a de-industrialisation [Wilson] world
Working-class youth’s experience with education is typically one of under-achievement.

Winlow and Hall - night time violence - subculture

Anti-social subcultures are constructed around the achievement of hegemonic masculine values to compensate for negative experiences in the school.

Lyng [post mod] Edgework. - It is located on the edge between the thrill of getting away with it and the potential danger and uncertainty of being caught and punished. escapism for men who have financial insecurity.

Gilmore - protector, provider, impregnator, - Wouldn’t commit crime to women - protect

Mac an Ghail - crisis in masculinity

Canaan - men see importance of men being fighting, drinking, and sexual conquests.

Faludi - Unilad website - strengthens masculine lad culture - hypermasculinity

Katz - young males commit crime for the thrill

Stanko - domestic violence is committed eve ry 6 seconds in Britain.

Smart - Rape is normalised

45-70% of cases, the father inflicts violence on the children as well as the mother (BMA Report,
Seventy-three per cent of domestic violence incidents were against women

female homicide - 46% were killed by current or former partners

Pollack - Judicial Leniency, Masked Female offender, Chivalary thesis

Becker - Labelling theory, master status, self fulfilling prophecy

Heidensohn - Women’s crime is ignored - commit less serious crime, malestream sociology - focuses on crime committed by males, ignoring females

Criticisms:
Too deterministic, over exaggerates gender role in crime
Ignore men who are victims of female crime
Heidensohn over generalises experiences of women

Right realism supports functionalism because it says the police do a good job

Law favours women over men

Women are victims of crime because:
-Socialisation
-Strengthens masculinity
-Unlikely to report crime and see it as a crime, also kept in private sphere
-Can’t go agains patriarchy - must accept..Heidersohn - treated more severely


Usefulness of crime statistics


Official Crime statistics are socially constructed via..
>The Police:
Reiner - Police discretion - stereotypes, racism - canteen culture

Interpretivists argue that the OCS tell us more about nature of policing than crime and criminality s

Circourel - Two cities - same socio-economic background - different crime statistics and rates - Due to the police approach -One had tolerance, one was intolerant. Crime statistics depend on the police approach rather than actual crime rates.

Hall - Policing the crisis. Moral panic of mugging meant police target African-caribbean to act as a scape goat for issues in capitalism - Statistics reflect this.

40% of crime goes unreported - The Dark figure of crime

90% of time it is the victim who reports the crime

Cicourel - Study of police officers - operate on stereotypes and labels]Becker - Labelling theory

Simon & Ben - stats released in 2010 show police stop and search African-Caribbean six times more often than Asian - stereotypes - racial attitude

Bowling - Some officers in London stop black young males in cars - believe they are driving a car above their means - stolen or drug dealers

Young - Military style policing in ethnic minority dominated areas - see ethnic minorities more in crime stats as no tolerance

Macpherson - Institutional racism - outdated policies in the system and those who control it are from older generations and have a racist mindset

Pollak - Judicial Leniency

49% if female offenders receive caution
30% of males receive caution

Masculine police culture - fewer than 20% of officers are women

Policing not in a standardized way - Circourel

Hood: Judges - stereotype - even when black youths were up for same offense as white offenders, 17% more likely to get prison sentence

Counter:

-Paul Gilroy - Crime committed rebelling to a historically racist state - reflected in figures
Hall - moral panics have to be built up on something..
-Overexaggeration - Not all police officers are racist
Heidersohn - women likely to be penalised more if they go against the values [