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Flashcards by elliesteel2, updated more than 1 year ago
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Created by elliesteel2
over 9 years ago
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| Question | Answer |
| Crime and Deviance: Definitions and explanations// Crime | Any act which breaks the laws of society, such as murder or rape. Social control is enforced by agencies such as police and the courts. |
| Crime and Deviance: Definitions and explanations// Deviance | Behaviour which moves away from conventional norms and values such as burping and farting in public. |
| Crime and Deviance: Definitions and explanations// Deviant not criminal | Burping, not queuing |
| Crime and Deviance: Definitions and explanations// Criminal not deviant | Speeding, parking on yellow lines |
| Crime and Deviance: Definitions and explanations// Deviant and criminal | Rape, murder, paedophilia |
| Crime and Deviance: Definitions and explanations// Crime and deviance as relative | Crime and deviance is relative (changing) in relation to time, place and culture. What one society may see as a crime another may not, such as polygamy (many wives). Other examples are homosexuality and suicide. |
| Crime and Deviance: Definitions and explanations// Crime as socially constructed | If what is consider to be crime and deviance changes it can’t be inherently wrong but must be culturally specific. This means crime and deviance is socially constructed i.e. created and defined by the people of that society and not universal. |
| Crime and Deviance: Definitions and explanations// Biological explanations | Early criminologists like Cesare Lombroso sort to find physical criminal characteristics like long arms or sloping foreheads. Sociologists find such ‘born bad’ determinism dangerous and prefer to normalise crime by reminding us that we all commit crime and there are social factors which influence our behaviour. |
| Crime and Deviance: Functionalism on crime// Durkheim – Key ideas | 1. Crime is inevitable and necessary to society. 2. Crime has positive functions. 3. The perfect amount of crime will keep society healthy and avoid anomie (Normlessness) |
| Crime and Deviance: Functionalism on crime// Crime and society | Society is only healthy when social order is maintained through the police and courts. We need a small amount of crime to remind us of what we believe in. Only a small minority will be self-interested and commit crime. |
| Crime and Deviance: Functionalism on crime// Positive functions of crime | 1. Re-marking social boundaries – affirms social norms and values. 2. Media coverage – as a warning to others. 3. Social bonds – strengthened as we unite in disapproval. 4. Safety Value – a little bit of deviance reduces more serious problems – Prostitution – Kingley Davis. 5. Malfunctioning society – theft, drug use and truancy alert us to other social problems in society |
| Crime and Deviance: Functionalism on crime// Society of saints | Imagine there was no crime or deviance, even the most slight slip like coughing without putting your hand over your mouth would become a crime. |
| Crime and Deviance: Functionalism on crime// Criticisms | What is the perfect amount of crime? Explaining the functions of crime doesn’t explain what caused them in the first place. Murder maybe functional for society but what about the victim? |
| Crime and Deviance: Merton's strain theory// Key Idea | |
| Crime and Deviance: Types of behaviour | |
| Crime and Deviance: Subcultural strain theories// Subcultural group | A group with its own distinctive norms and values, sometimes although not always deviant. |
| Crime and Deviance: Subcultural strain theories// Albert Cohen – Status frustration | A Subcultural strain theory which argues lower class people are frustrated because they want to be successful but lack the qualifications and skills to do so. They solve this frustration by rejecting society and creating their own norms and values in a gang. Here they achieve status through non-utilitarian crimes like violence and graffiti. |
| Crime and Deviance: Subcultural strain theories// Cloward and Ohlin – Opportunity structures | A Subcultural strain theory like Cohen but more concerned about the different types of crimes groups commit. They conclude where you live dictates the type of criminal activity available to you. Criminal subcultures are available in areas of criminal hierarchy. Conflict subcultures arise due to low social cohesion and high population turnover. Retreatists subcultures are the result of being unsuccessful in society and the other two subcultures. |
| Crime and Deviance: Subcultural strain theories// Walter Miller – Lower class subcultures | Not a strain subculture, each social class doesn’t feel any strain but just has different focal concerns which lead to different criminal activity. The lower class experience a lack of excitement at work which leads to the desire to look for excitement in things like joy-riding. |
| Crime and Deviance: Subcultural strain theories// Contemporary examples | The Street gangs living in the Favelas of Rio and the gangs of South Africa show that often criminal groups are not rejecting societies norms and values but are in fact conforming to their own. |
| OVERVIEW | |
| Crime and Deviance: Interactionism – Labelling theory// Interactionism | Doesn’t focus on the structures of society but how people and society interact and how this affects criminal behaviour. |
| Crime and Deviance: Interactionism – Labelling theory// Howard Becker | Focuses on the process of a person and act getting labelled as deviant. He argues that no act is intrinsically deviant but relies on its context to determine its acceptability. Examples: nudity, injecting oneself even murder. |
| Crime and Deviance: Interactionism – Labelling theory// Labelling process | A label is attached by police and courts. Label becomes a master status –overrides other status as sibling, friend etc. The labelled person accepts the label – because how we see ourselves relies on how others see us. Self-fulfilling prophecy – whether the label was true or not we act in accordance with it. This confirms peoples beliefs about the label being true. |
| Crime and Deviance: Interactionism – Labelling theory// Stanley Cohen | Cohen studied how the media has often demonised youth culture. This happened to mods and Rockers in 1964 who were seen as modern day folk devils who threatened social order. His research found that actual acts of deviance were minimal |
| Crime and Deviance: Interactionism – Labelling theory// Deviancy amplification spiral | This idea says that sensationalist reporting by the newspapers distorts the act of crime or deviance and increases public awareness. Public pressure is put on the police and courts to act. This creates a moral panic where certain acts or groups are seen as a threat to social order. |
| Crime and Deviance: White collar crime// Blue collar crime | Crimes committed by manual factory workers (working class), these are street crimes like theft which are in public view. |
| Crime and Deviance: White collar crime// White collar crime | Crimes committed by office workers (middle/upper class) like fraud, these are often hidden from public view. |
| Crime and Deviance: White collar crime// White collar crime | Very difficult to prosecute due to problems of who is responsible and who is a victim. Much white collar crime is not dealt with criminally but administratively by external agencies like the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) and the Trading Standards Agency. Only serious cases go to court. |
| Crime and Deviance: White collar crime// Case study – Guinness affair | False claims of success led to high share prices and company directors making millions. Gerald Ronson received a one - year sentence in Ford (open prison) and was released on parole after serving about 6 months. He is still a successful businessman and one of Britain's 100 richest people |
| Crime and Deviance: White collar crime// Case study – Enron | False accounting and reports of high profit allowed president Kenneth Lay to borrow $74 million from a company before it was made bankrupt. 20,000 creditors were owed an estimated $67 billion, most received less than 20 cents for every dollar they were owed. 19,000 people lost their jobs and savings. |
| Crime and Deviance: Marxism on crime// Key idea | The Law and the criminal justice system is another tool used by the ruling class to serve their interests and maintain a position of power. |
| Crime and Deviance: Marxism on crime// Criminolgenic Capitalism | Crime is inevitable in Capitalism. The working class commit utilitarian and non-utilitarian crimes because of poverty, constant advertising, alienation and a lack of control. Even the ruling class feel the pressure to commit crime and get ahead. |
| Crime and Deviance: Marxism on crime// The state and law making | All laws serve the ruling class. Most law is based on protecting private property. The working class and ethnic minorities are punished harshly while the crimes of the powerful go unnoticed. |
| Crime and Deviance: Marxism on crime// Ideological functions of law | Laws don’t just punish but perform functions to keep capitalism stable. Health and safety laws keep the working class able to work. Seeing crime as a working class problem diverts it away from capitalism. Seeing criminals as disturbed also disguises the true nature of crime. |
| Crime and Deviance: Marxism on crime// Strengths | 1. Shows a link between law and the interests of the ruling class. 2. Highlights selective enforcement. |
| Crime and Deviance: Marxism on crime// Weaknesses | 1. Very deterministic, not all working class commit crime. 2. Switzerland and Japan are capitalist but have low crime rates. 3. Prosecutions against companies and the ruling class do happen. 4. Left Realists say most working class crime is committed against working class people not the state. |
| Crime and Deviance: Neo-Marxism on crime | |
| Crime and Deviance: Right Realism// Key ideas | The root cause of crime is biology and poor socialisation as people make a rational choice to commit crime. The solution is more formal social control such as harsher prison sentences, zero tolerance policies and more CCTV. |
| Crime and Deviance: Right Realism// Biology | Wilson and Hernstein suggest some people are innately more strongly predisposed to commit crime than others. Especially those who have personality traits like aggression, risk taking and low impulse control. |
| Crime and Deviance: Right Realism// Charles Murray (1990) | Argues most crime is committed by the underclass (unemployed). A recent upsurge in lone-parent families has led to poor socialisation and encouraged these people to be welfare dependant. |
| Crime and Deviance: Right Realism// Rational Choice theory | Ron Clarke (1980) suggests that people rationalise their choice to commit crime by weighing up the cost vs benefits. If the benefits (money) outweigh the costs (prison) then they will commit crime. |
| Crime and Deviance: Right Realism// Tackling crime | Make crime less attractive to criminals by (formal control):- Zero tolerance – harsh sentences ‘broken window’. Target hardening – make it difficult to access private and public buildings. More surveillance – CCTV. |
| Crime and Deviance: Right Realism// Criticisms | Doesn’t explain white collar crime or domestic violence. Ignores issues like poverty. Scapegoats the underclass. Overstates the role of rationality. Crime displaced to other areas. |
| Crime and Deviance: Left Realism// Key ideas | The root cause of crime is Relative deprivation, marginalisation and exclusion in modern society. The solution is more informal social control such as better housing, more job opportunities and more democratic policing. |
| Crime and Deviance: Left Realism// The offenders | Young and Lea argue that most crime is committed by W/C against the W/C. This is due to discontent caused by relative deprivation (judging your status by that of others) and individualism (being self-interested). |
| Crime and Deviance: Left Realism// Marginalisation | Marginalised groups are those who lack clear goals or representation. Young W/C are powerless and unrepresented which leads to violence and rioting. |
| Crime and Deviance: Left Realism// Modern society and exclusion | A lack of jobs for the W/C and being out priced of the property market has left many socially excluded. Jock young says we live in a ‘bulimic society’ where we are exposed to a large variety of consumer products which the W/C cannot purchase. |
| Crime and Deviance: Left Realism// Tackling crime | Make things better for people by (informal social control): Giving them housing conditions to be proud of. Better job opportunities. A better relationship between police and public, being more democratic will help the flow of information. |
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