Crime And Deviance : Marxist, Neo-Marxist And Critical Criminology Flashcards
Marxist criminology
The structure of society (the state, the law and the CJS) functions to serve the interests of the RC and maintain capitalist economy
- Law breaking - the WC SEEM to break the law more
- Selective law enforcement - the law is enforced unfairly against the WC and in favour of maintaining capitalism
- Law-making - the RC are also the ones who create the laws
Chambliss
Capitalism is criminogenic - it generates crime
The nature of capitalism means that crime is inevitable:
W/C = Poverty could mean that the only way to survive is crime, consumerism leads to utilitarian crime, people feel alienated and commit violent acts/vandalism
M/C + R/C = ‘dog eat dog’ environment – need to win at all cost leads to things like tax evasion, flouting health and safety rules
Law breaking
Gordon - crime is rational:
Dog eat dog society = competition is inevitable
Mankoff
Lower crime rate in Western Europe compared to USA was a result of the effects of criminogenic capitalism
= in w.Europe, they have comprehensive state welfare systems with strong trade union movements and socialist parties = neither of which existed in the USA
Snider:
- Capitalism encourages corporate crimes through competition – firms will break the law to post higher profits
- Street crimes cost less than corporate crimes, yet don’t get prosecuted as much!
- In her research, street crime cost $4 billion, compared to $325 billion bailout of banks
Evaluation for criminogenic capitalism
Strengths:
• Structural inequality caused by the system, has been cited by many as a reason for crime – Merton’s strain theory!
• Links can be made to Hannon and Defronzo + Savelsberg’s studies
Weakness:
• Doesn’t explain why WC criminals do not target higher classes for criminal activity
• Doesn’t explain why some WC people do not turn to crime despite financial situations
Selective law enforcement AO2
Social Exclusion Unit Report:
Over a 1/4 of prison inmates in England and wales had been in care
2/3 had been unemployed before imprisonment
1/3 had been homeless
Rishi sunak leaving out fraud when quoting statistics decreased
HSBC
Ideological functions of selective law enforcement
Gordon
The occasional prosecution of R/C crime perpetuates the fiction that:
1. The law operates for the benefit of society as a whole
2. The state represents public interest
3. The extent of R/C crime is small
WC are put under a FCC
Frequent prosecution of members of the subject class supports the capitalist system in 3 ways:
- By selecting members of the subject class and punishing them, it protects the system (capitalism) that is actually to blame for their deviance
- The imprisonment of selected members of the subject class neutralizes opposition to the system
- Defining criminals as ‘animals and misfits, as enemies of the state’ provides a justification for incarcerating them in prisons
Different perspectives of law making
For functionalists:
Law reflects the collective conscience of a society and holds all to account equally
For labelling theorists:
Law is a product of the actions of moral entrepreneurs
For Marxists:
The law is an expression of R/C interests made possible through their control of the apparatus of the state
Law making - development
In feudal society
Land was an unmovable property
Such laws were unnecessary and everyone knew their place and who was in power
In capitalist society
We have trade and commerce (moveable property)
Strict laws are now needed to protect the interests of the emerging capitalist class
AO2 for how the law reflects the interests of the ruling class
Vagrancy Laws 1349
Massive shortage of workers following the Black Death
The law made it illegal to give money to any person who was unemployed
This forced people to work for landowners in order to survive
Poll Tax in East African Colonies
Tax introduced on every household by the British colonisers in their East African colonies
The only way that migrant workers could pay for this tax was by working on the tea and coffee plantations
Wages were kept low so they had to stay and work for the landowners
Law making - the law is a creation to protect the rich
Snider = capitalist state is often reluctant to pass laws which regulate large capitalist concerns and may threaten their profitability
Althusser - law is part of the ISA. Most laws protect private properties
Capitalist states often have the same interests as major corporations = unwilling to risk alienating large corporations
They won’t in turn pass or enforce stringent laws against pollution
Pearce (1976) argued that even laws that appeared to help workers indirectly benefit the bourgeoisie. His focus was on health and safety laws which provided the R/C with a healthy workforce
Evaluation of Marxist theories
Strengths:
Shows how the law can reflect sectional interests rather than the public interests.
Also focuses on corporate crimes which the labelling theory does not
Weaknesses:
For criminogenic capitalism: deterministic! Suggests all W/C people desire goods and want a higher status. ignores those in the lower classes that do not deviate
For law enforcement: Marxists seem to suggest that the high rate of crime among the working class people is solely the outcome of biased policing, when in reality, they commit the most crime (Realist view)
For law making: many laws in capitalist societies clearly are in the general interest – laws relating to robbery, burglary, assault, rape etc show this (functionalist view)
Left Realists tend to see Marxist theories as putting undue emphasis on corporate crime at the expense of other types of crime
Why do neo Marxists criticise Marxists and labelling theorists
They criticise the labelling theory because they thought that crime needed to be located within a structural framework
They criticise traditional Marxism because they saw it as economically deterministic = it places too much emphasis on the economy shaping people’s behaviour
They suggest NO ONE is forced to commit crime – they see it as a voluntary act
Therefore, they combine both Marxism and the labelling theory together in order to understand crime and deviance
Neo-Marxism : new criminology
Taylor et al argue that Marxism is economically deterministic:
❑ Workers ARE NOT driven to commit crime for economic advantage
❑ Criminals ARE NOT passive puppets whose behaviour is shaped by the nature of capitalism.
❑ They do not commit crime due to anomie/strain
• They argue that crime is voluntaristic
• Crime is a conscious choice by the actor. It is often has a political motive, e.g. to redistribute wealth / fight back against the system
• Criminals are deliberately striving to change capitalism.
Neo-Marxism - a fully social theory of deviance
They identified 7 aspects of crime and deviance that they believed an adequate theory needed to cover.
- The wider origins of the deviant act
Locate the deviant act within the wider social system – i.e. capitalism and all the inequalities that go with it.
(Marxism) - The immediate origins of the deviant act (Labelling)
The social context in which an individual chooses to commit an act of deviance. E.g. police racism or unemployment - The actual act.
Attention need to be given to the individual concerned. Is it a political act? Is it to support a drug habit? - The immediate origin of social reaction (Labelling)
E.g. the immediate response of other people, such as family members and the police, to the discovery of deviance. - The wider origins of social reaction (Marxism)
The immediate reaction needs to be located in the wider social system, with particular attention paid to who has the power to define an act as deviant. - The impact of societal reaction on the deviant’s subsequent actions (Labelling)
They then turn to labelling theory. Labelling effects the deviant’s future actions – e.g. why does labelling lead to deviance amplification in some cases but not in others?
AO2 for a fully social theory of deviance
Hall et al - policing the crisis
The black muggers
