crime and deviancy

• • crime refers to illegal actions
  • deviency refers to behaviours outside of societys norms like eavsdropping
• becker

  • interactionalist perspective
  • act only becomes deviant when others define it as such
  • the agents of social control eg.police and court have the power to make the label stick
  • the label applied becomes a master status
  • individual will begin to see themselves associated with the label producing a self fulfilling prophecy
  • this then leads to a deviant career as they may then join a deviant subculture
• criticisms of becker:

  • doesnt explain why individual deviates in the first place
  • sees criminals as victims
  • overlooks influence of social structure
• merton

  • functionalist perspective
  • everyone shared the same goals of achieving the american dream

  -he identified 5 possible ways in achieving this:

  1. conformity - individuals who work towards success conventionally
  2. innovation - lower class individuals who are unable to achieve success conventionally so resort to crime
  3. ritualism - middle class who are deviant because they abandon conventional success goals . they have little opportunity to advance and stay in low satus respectable jobs
  4. rebellion - individuals that reject success goals with different ones . they wish to create a new society
• criticism of merton:

  • vandilism is not motivated by money
  • why some individuals faced with anomie break the rules and some conform
  • marxist say merton failed to explain power relations is society
• marxist

  • capitalism society is based on materialism , consumerism and competition
  • in an unequal society not everyone can afford it and try get material goods through crime
• marxist views on law enforcement:

  • agencies of social control (police) operate in the intrest of the bourgeosie
  • white-collar crime and corporate crime is not targeted
• criticisms of marxist:

  • not every law supports the intrest of the dominant class
  • functionalists believe society is based on consensus rather than conflict
  • femenist argue marxist ignore issues of patriarchal society
• femenists perspective:

  • double deviance thesis suggests the criminal justice system treats some women harshly as they have deviated from gender stereotypes
  • they broken the norms and the law
• heidenson

  • femenist theory
  • drew on secondary data
  • studies female conformity using social control
  • emphasises social bonds between people that prevents them from commiting crimes as an agency of social control
  • women are controlled at home at work and in public
• cohen

  • sub-cultural theory and delinquent subculture
  • studied working class boys in america
  • linked delinquency to schools
  • schools are built on middle class expectation and culture
  • working class boys expirience status fustration
• criticisms of cohen

  • shows middle class bias
  • femenists question how ar his explanation applies to girls
• carlen

  • femenist perspective
  • using unstructured interviews on 39 women
  • working class women are expected to make the class deal and gender deal
  • the class deal ofers them material rewards
  • the gender deal offers material and emotional rewards if they live with the male breadwinner
  • when the deals break down , crime becomes a possibility
  • there are 4 major factors that lead to theyre law breaking such as poverty , living in residential care , drug addiction and the search for excitement