3A - Law and Society Flashcards
What is society?
A group of people with common territory, interaction and culture. Law is an important aspect of social structure.
People of the same society share aspects of their culture, such as language or beliefs.
What does culture refer to?
The language, values, beliefs, behaviour and material objects that constitutes a person’s way of life.
Pluralism
A form of society in which the members of minority groups maintain their independent cultural traditions.
What is a pluralist?
A person who believes that the existence of different types of people, beliefs and opinions within a society is a good thing. This requires tolerance from everyone concerned.
Is the UK a pluralist society?
Yes - the influence of the British Empire and Commonwealth enabled immigration from many parts of the world. Successive governments have either encouraged or discouraged immigration from different countries/groups.
This helped to establish a pluralist society in the UK. Members of a particular culture, religion or immigrant society tend to congregate together for comfort and to preserve the cultural identity of their society.
Multiculturalism in the UK
The UK contains people from different societies who blend together into a single population. This is referred to as multiculturalism, as even if a group has been in the UK for many generations, it can still retain some of its original heritage.
The term “multiculturalism” recognises that those who are originally from other societies don’t have to lose their individual culture or beliefs by becoming part of the new society.
In a pluralistic society, no-one group is officially considered more influential than another. However, powerful informal mechanisms, such as prejudice and discrimination, working to keep many groups out of the political process or out of certain areas, or to prevent free expression of their values and beliefs.
What are the four primary roles of law in society?
1) To protect people from harm – the criminal law system prohibits harm by other people or by dangerous things such as unsafe machinery or pollution.
2) To ensure a common good – by providing facilities for all such as education and health care.
3) To settle arguments and disputes regarding finite resources – this is the idea of a civil justice system.
4) To persuade people to do the right thing – by giving nudges through law such as encouraging giving to charity through gift aid.
How does the law strike a balance between competing interests with society?
There is a two-way movement between law and society:
- The law can shape social norms and behaviour
- Society can shape the law through protests, strikes and civil disobedience.
Informal social control
It occurs through the family, a peer group, a local community or societal group.
Formal social control
It occurs through specific social agencies which have the role of maintaining order in society:
- The criminal justice system – including the police, the judiciary, the probation and prison services.
- Law makers – Parliament, local authorities and the judiciary.
- The civil justice system – settles disputes between individuals.
Theories of dealing with consensus and conflict
1) The consensus theory
2) The conflict theory
3) The labelling theory
Legal Realism
The view that we should understand the law as it is practised in the courts, law offices and police stations, rather than as set out in statutes or books.
Legal realists are interested in the law rather than society. They don’t give any importance to laws enacted by Parliament as they only regard judge-made law as genuine law.
Left realism
Left realists believe the main causes of crime are inequality, marginalisation, relative deprivation and subcultures.
They believe that the main victims are the working class and that community-oriented programmes for controlling and reducing crime should be implemented, rather than focusing on white-collar crime.
Left realism – controlling crime
Providing employment, paying living wages and affordable housing will all help to reduce deprivation and the need to commit crime.
Having a more accountable and democratic criminal justice system will reduce the marginalisation of groups.
Crime control should be shared responsibility between several agencies, not just the police and law enforcement. Schools and social services should also be involved.
People will have more money to contribute to their local economy, which will help to create more jobs and allow a community to thrive.
Right realism
Right realists believe that individuals make a rational choice to commit crime, and emphasises tough control measures to reduce crime. E.g. Zero tolerance policing and more severe punishments.
It asks how governments can reduce crime in the short term (here and now).
It takers a victim-centred approach to crime, putting victims at the forefront. It considers that the individual is responsible for the crime.
