Theories of Crime and Deviance

Functionalist strain and subculture theories:

Nature of society: because of role allocation, crime will always occur because meritocracy creates differences and inequalities.

Durkheim view on crime

• Durkheim argues that in traditional pre-industrial societies, there was no class divide, but a strong collective conscience and social cohesion.
• Traditional societies were held together by strong religion-based collective conscience. -However industrialisation led to urbanisation which meant less control. Which led to anomie where social norms become unclear.
• In complex modern societies, there is a diversity of lifestyles and values, and different subcultures with distinct norms and values.
• Durkheim however suggests that crime can be functional and that it only becomes dysfunctional (harmful to society) when its rates are unusually high or low - there needs to be a balance between social solidarity and freedom. Durkheim's positive functions of crime:

1. Boundary maintenance: crime produces a reaction from society - it unifies its members in condemning the wrongdoer and reinforcing the shared norms and values. The function of punishment that results from crime isn't to punish the wrongdoer necessarily - instead, the purpose is to reaffirm society's shared rules and reinforce social solidarity. A02: Old Bailey allows cameras inside for the first time during the killer's (Ben Oliver) sentencing.

A03: Interactionalists argue that boundary maintenance isn't true and wouldn't work and that functionalists assume we have shared values and norms to begin with.

2. Adaptation change: Durkheim argues that without crime and deviance, we would be stuck with no change, no new ideas, values or way of thinking. Deviance also facilitates social change. If people never deviated from a society's norms and values then society would never change and would stagnate. An organic process of social change is started by society responding positively to deviant behaviour. A02: Martin Luther King stepped up in 1964 facilitating the start of the civil rights movement.

A03: too deterministic. Durkheim doesn't specify how much crime is functional for society, and is beneficial to whom?

Evaluation:

For Durkheim, society requires a certain amount of deviance to function successfully but he offers no knowledge of how much is the right amount of crime.

• Functionalists assume we have the same shared norms and values to begin with. But Postmodernists would argue that that's not always the case.
• Functional for whom? What about the victims and their families?
• Interactionists would argue that Durkheim's theory is too deterministic as it underplays people's agency - their ability to choose and behave in certain ways.

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Other two positive functions of crime:

3. Warning device: Crime sends a message that social order is breaking down which often prompts governments and councils. A02: Knife crime campaigns. Women voting -> suffragettes.

A03: Assumes governments and councils are always active.

4. Safety valve: deviance can act as a safety valve releasing stresses and frustration in society. A02: Mass violence protest demonstrations might be seen as an outlet for expressions of discontent avoiding wider and more serious challenges to social order.

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Merton's strain theory

• Merton is a functionalist but criticises their ideas as for him society is structurally unequal and dysfunctional.

• Merton drew upon Durkheim's concept of anomie. Anomie occurred because people could not achieve their goals (The American Dream)

• Society (within its value consensus) puts pressure on people to achieve - society presents us with cultural goals.

• Society also presents us with institutionalised means (socially approved ways of achieving these goals).

• If we are unable to use institutionalised means and thus achieve all of our desired cultural goals, we can conform to our society's value consensus. However, when people cannot access the institutionalised means and cultural goals of their society they experience anomie which in turn leads to strain.

• Merton argues there are 5 responses to this strain:

  1. Conformists: (has the means and goals) people from all social classes, they conform to society's success goals and the normal means of achieving them.
  2. Innovators: (haven't got the means but have got the goals) typically of lower social classes. They often turn to organised crime with low educational qualifications they turn to a life of crime, pickpocketing, robbing etc.
  3. Ritualists: (have got the means but haven't got the goals) and it is those of lower middle class and middle-class backgrounds who largely abandon society's success goals but are too strongly socialised to turn to crime.
  4. Retreatists: (don't have the means or the goals) Merton doesn't relate to any social class position and is the least common response. They don't internalise means and goals.
  5. Rebels: (have and don't have means have and don't have goals) typically members of the rising class. They reject both success goals and institutionalised means of achieving them, they wish to create a new society replacing goals with different ones. Evidence to support Merton (A02)****:

• Hannon and Defronzo's study of 406 countries in the USA: found that those with higher levels of welfare support had lower levels of crime. This is because those who needed the most support felt less strain when helped by the government = this reduced anomie.

• Savelsberg argued that Merton's strain theory can explain the rapid rise in the crime rate in post-communist countries: The crime rate rose by no less than 69% after communism fell. Communism emphasised collective responsibility rather than individual financial success. When communism was replaced with free market capitalism, competition, dog-eat-dog world, crime went up. A03: Evaluation

Comment (strength) Merton recognises that the American dream is a central feature of American culture and that class structure militates against equal opportunity to be financially successful.

Evaluation (weakness) working class people experience most strain yet they don't deviate at all.

• Marxists argue that it ignores the power of the ruling class to make and enforce rules/laws that criminalise the poor but not the rich.
• It assumes there is a value consensus that everyone strives for money success, but this isn't always the case.
• Doesn't consider crime amongst successful people who 'do not feel strain' (white collar crime?)
• Ignores non-utilitarian crime e.g. violence and vandalism.

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Subcultural strain theories:

• They see deviance as the product of a delinquent subculture with different values from those of mainstream society, as they see an alternative opportunity structure for those denied the chance to achieve by legitimate means. Subcultural theories criticise Merton's theory but also build upon it.

Cohen - Status frustration:

• Cohen agrees with Merton that deviance is a largely lower-class phenomenon. Stating that it results in the inability to achieve cultural goals. However, he criticises Merton's explanation of deviance on 2 grounds:

5. Merton sees deviance as an individual response
6. Focuses on utilitarian crime

• Cohen argues that young working-class males form delinquent subcultures as a result of experiencing status frustration. They look to obtain status by forming subcultural groups with similar peers and construct an alternate status hierarchy subverting norms and values of society to give status to criminal and deviant activities. A02 (synoptic link) Paul Willis learning to labour (1977): Willis studied Lads from a school in Birmingham he spent a total of 18 months observing them in school and a further 6 months in the workplace. He concluded that the boys adopted an anti-school subculture, subverting the norms and values of the school.

A03 Evaluation:

Comment (strength) his theory makes sense of acts that would otherwise appear senseless e.g. vandalism - explains how they emerge out of a process that leads to the inversion of mainstream values.

Evaluation (weaknesses) Postmodernists argue: do the boys really think about their decisions? Lyng and Katz argue that it is more likely the individual is influenced by boredom or that they are seeking a "buzz".

• Miller = delinquency is not a product of status frustration but instead an attachment to 6 focal concerns they've been socialised into trouble, toughness, smartness, excitement, fate and autonomy. They never held mainstream values in the first place.
• Matza -> drift in and out of delinquency.

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Cloward and Ohlin - 3 subcultures:

• They attempt to explain why different subculture responses occur. The key reason is not only unequal structure (which M and C focus on) but unequal access to illegitimate opportunity structure. For example, not everyone who fails by legitimate means such as schooling has an unequal chance to become a thief. They still need the opportunity to have access to these illegitimate means. 3 subcultures:

7. Criminal subcultures: emerge in areas where there's an established pattern of organised crime. A learning environment is provided for the young where they are exposed to criminal skills and deviant values presented with criminal role models and the opportunity to rise through the criminal hierarchy.
8. Conflict subcultures: emerge in areas where young people have little opportunity and access to illegitimate opportunity structures. There is little organised crime. The response to this is often gang violence/welfare.
9. Retreatist subculture: product of a double failure, w/c boys fail to succeed legitimately and illegitimately. Couldn't access either of the above subcultures and often turn to illegal drug use.

A02 (synoptic links/application):

Winlow: explains the existence of working-class subcultures that value hardness amongst young men. Arguing that in the modern industrial era there were few opportunities to make a living out of crime. There was little in the way of organised crime, no illegitimate opportunities in these circumstances and conflict subcultures developed characterised by petty crime.

South: writing about the supply of illegal drugs in towns and cities in the UK argued that the drug trade is largely based on disorganised crime although some of the trade is based around professional criminal organisations.

Venkatesh: research in the housing projects of Chicago found evidence of a hierarchical and quite organised criminal subculture similar to that described by Cloward and Ohlin, concluding that different levels of management backed up by large numbers of street dealers with gangs heavily involved in the running of projects.

Evaluation:

Comment (strength): their application to strain theory offers a way of understanding how strain can lead to a variety of delinquent responses. Their concept of illegitimate opportunity structure broadens our understanding of the pathways to crime and delinquency.

Evaluation (weakness): they alongside Merton and Cohen ignore the wider power structures including who makes and enforces the law. They draw the boundaries too sharply between the subcultures. In their theory, you can't be a member of more than one.

Malta -> claims that most delinquents are not strongly committed to their subculture but drift in and out of delinquency.

The Marxist theory of crime:

Marxists take a conflict view of crime, arguing that its main purpose is to control the proletariat and protect the interests of the bourgeoisie. The ruling class ideologically control the working class and creates false class consciousness among them as they consider the bourgeoisies' rule as normal and unavoidable unaware, that they are being exploited

Although all classes commit crimes, Marxists argue that there is selective enforcement. As the ruling class controls the state, they make and enforce laws in their own interests.

As a result, the criminal justice system benefits the powerful, making working-class groups more likely to be punished for crimes, and white-collar crimes to often be ignored.

Evaluation:

However, a reason for this selective enforcement could be the severity of the crime.

For example, some would argue that crimes committed by the proletariat are treated more seriously, due to them having a greater risk to public safety, e.g. assault. Whereas white-collar crimes such as fraud are less violent. Thus, resulting in white-collar and corporate crimes being under-policed.

Tombs – Argues that corporate crimes have enormous physical costs such as death. Thus, contradicting the view that they have less of a risk to public safety.

Therefore, perhaps this is due to corporate crime being relatively invisible due to having less media coverage and going underreported. Perhaps, due to the middle class negotiating non-criminal labels for their deviance.

Criminogenic capitalism:

Marxists believe that capitalism causes crime, thus it is criminogenic. This is because capitalism causes poverty by exploiting the working class. Therefore, crime may be the only way they can survive.

Evaluation:

However, this ignores why the ruling class still commit crimes, despite having access to so many resources and also ignores the relationship between crime and non-class inequalities such as gender and ethnicity.

📝For example, Marxists are unable to explain why black people make up 13% of the prison population, despite only making up 3% of the UK population.

Functionalist - Merton – Argues that black pupils perform less well in school, resulting in them being unable to achieve social mobility and 'The American dream' legitimately. So, they turn to crime as an alternative way to obtain wealth.

However, this ignores the possibility of ethnic minority crime statistics being higher due to racism and discrimination by police officers.

Interactionists argue that crime statistics only tell us about the activities of police officers and courts, rather than details about criminal activity

Thus, there are important non-class inequalities that Marxists ignore.