Crime and devience Flashcards
(33 cards)
Functionalism Ideals
Crime is inevitable
Crime is positive as it allows for boundary maintenance along with adaption and change
Durkhiem
Bounty maintenance - When a person is punished for an action it teaches the rest of society not to do the same
Adaption and change - For society’s norms and values to change a criminal act must take place to break them
Merton (American dream)
Conformism - accepting the goals and legitimate means to achieve them
Innovation - aspire to achieve the goal of the American dream but do it through illegal ways
Ritualism - reject the goals but conform to the means
Retreatism - Reject the goal of the American dream and perform in illegal means
Rebellion - replace the goals and means with their own
Cohen status frustration
working class boys who fail within education that upholds middle class values are likely to form a deviant subculture and reject the schools ideals
interactionalist
Interactionists believe that an act only becomes deviant when it is labelled as such by society. They also argue that labelling theory is selectively applied to certain groups, which can lead to the creation of a master status
Cicourel - interactionalist
Police stereotypes of a criminal leads them to over patrol in working class areas
Lemert - interactionalist
Primary deviance: Deviant acts that are not yet labelled
Secondary deviance occurs when both the deviant act and the individual are labelled by society. This label can lead to the creation of a master status, where the individual is primarily seen in terms of their deviant behavior for example, being seen only as a “criminal” rather than as a whole person.
Marxism beliefs
Capitalism is criminogenic, People must commit crime due to the competitive nature of society and the fear of poverty. All classes commit crime however working class are seen as more criminal due to white collar crime going under the radar
Selective enforcement - Marxist
All classes commit crime however powerful classes are ignored and the criminal justice system only targets powerless groups like the working class 2
CRIMINOGENIC CAPITALISM - Marxist
In capitalist society, working-class individuals may feel pressure to commit crime because of poverty and constant exposure to advertising that promotes expensive consumer goods. When they can’t afford these items, they may turn to theft or other crimes to obtain them.
Left/Right Realist Ideals
Right realists believe crime to be half biological and half societal, Due to these causes not bean easy to change they attempt to deter people from crime. Left realists believe crime is caused by deprivation, subcultures and marginalisation to counter this they aim to reduce social inequality
explanations for crime - Realist
Right -
Rational choice theory
Poor socialisation
Biological traits - low iQ, high aggression
Left -
Relative dep (Lea and Young)
subcultures - turn to crime in order to close the ‘deprivation gap’.
Marginalisation - lack clear goals and organisations to represent them, they express this frustration through criminal acts such as violence and rioting.
Tackling crime - Realists
Right realism -
Zero tolerance - Search everyone that’s suspicious and charge sentences high
The broken window theory - remove any signs of crime asap
Target Harding - make it harder to commit crime by locking doors ect
Left realism -
Policing and control - Left Realists argue that police should work closely with communities, carry out thorough investigations, and involve locals in policing decisions to build trust and improve crime control.
Tackle structual causes of crime -
Reduce inequality of opportunity, discrimination and provide jobs for everyone.
Gender overview
Offical statistics show that men commit more criems than woman. Some sociologists argue this to be false and claim that alot of female crimes either go unreported or unnoticed. other sociologists believe that the way women are socialised creates less opportunity’s for crimes e.g a mother
WHY WOMEN COMMIT LESS CRIME THAN MEN
PATRIARCHAL CONTROL THEORY - Heidensohn argues that all women have at least one male figure in their life that does not want them to commit crime
FUNCTIONALIST SEX ROLE THEORY - Parsons argues that women are nurtering by nature and are to busy being carers/mothers to want to commit crime
Why women commit crime
CHIVALRY THESIS - Pollak, Men are typically judges in courts and have a bais towards women
LIBERATION THESIS - due to women becoming more equal in society they are committing more crime
Ethnicity overview
Official statistics suggest that black people are more likely to be stop and searched then other races, Some sociologists say this is because they typically have a poor education and are more likely to commit crime others say it is due to institutional racism via the police
WHY BLACK PEOPLE APPEAR MORE CRIMINAL
Hall, mugging - 1970s capitalism was fallin apart with the fear of a revolution from the working class to fix this the government used the media t o create a moral panic around black people being muggers.
Gilroy - higher ethnic crime rates is due to police racism
WHY BLACK PEOPLE ARE MORE CRIMINAL
Education - Black Caribbean pupils may find middle class education difficult and there for turn to crime to survive in capitalism. also relative dep
Family - Functionalism believe the growing rate of lone parent black family’s leads to inadequate socialisation
Media - reinforces the stereotype that black people are more criminal. This may lead to a self fulfilling prophecy and black people will in turn commit more crime.
Media overview
the media give a distorted image of crime as to invoke emotions for profit or to push a personal agenda, some sociologists see media as a cause of crime due to intimidation
Fictional representation of crime
The fictional vision of crime is always the opposite to official statistics,
villain is a middle class white man
Sex crimes done by maniacs when its usually victims acquaintances
Property crime is never seen always a focus on drugs and violence
MORAL PANICS
COHEN - THE MODS AND ROCKERS
the media exaggerated a relatively minor incident creating a deviancy amplification spiral that later lead to more fallout. They did this by saying more people where involved then there was and exaggerating the damage caused they also assumed what could happen later on.
NEWS VALUES
COHEN AND YOUNG:
News companys decide weather to take on a news story through attributes like
Immediacy - ‘breaking news’
Dramatisation - action and excitement
Personalisation - human interest stories about individuals
Higher status - celebrities
Simplification - eliminating shades of grey
Risk - victim-centred stories about vulnerability and fear
Violence
GLOBALISATION, GREEN CRIME & STATE CRIME OVERVIEW
Globalisation has allowed for international crime to thieve with things like the trafficking of drugs arms and people, We are now in a global risk society due to man made ecological issues, Green criminology try’s to combat this but prioritising eco based harm over law
