crime

• Outline 2 reasons why crime is inevitable in all societies?

  • Boundary maintenance - functionalists like Durkheim argue crime is inevitable and necessary to reinforce social cohesion
  • Adaption - crime is fluid, historically, and things that used to be criminal (homosexuality) are decriminalised. Crime is inevitable to allow society to progress
• Outline 2 criticisms of the functionalist explanation of crime?

  • Crime is not 'functional' for the victims of crime
  • Feminists criticise Davis' safety valve theory, it only serves men and is exploitative of women
• Outline 3 functions that crime may provide in society?

  • Boundary maintenance - reaction to crime reinforces social norms and values
  • Safety valve - small crimes release frustration that would otherwise lead to bigger crimes, eg Davis and prostitution
  • Warning device - increasing crime rate is indicative of a failing social institution
• Outline 3 ways people may respond to structural strain according to merton?

  • Retreatism - rejection of both goals and means eg drug users
  • Rebellion - rejection of both goals and means but establish their own eg political activists
  • Conformists - acceptance of both goals and means regardless of their lack of success
• Outline 2 criticisms of strain theory?

  • Only explains utilitarian crime for monetary gain, but not state crime like genocide or violent crime like rape
  • Assumes there is a value consensus - that everyone strives for 'money success' - and ignores the possibility that many may not share this goal
• Outline 2 reasons for crime according to subcultural theory?

  • Cohen - status frustration, lack of success in lower classes leads them to turn to crime for status
  • Cloward and Ohlin - unequal opportunity for legitimate and illegitimate structures forms 3 subcultures, one of which criminal
• Outline 3 criticisms of subcultural theory?

  • Over predicts working class crime - ignore the wider power structure and who enforces and creates the law
  • Boundaries between Cloward and Ohlin's subcultures are drawn too sharply
  • Miller: suggests lower class has an independent culture with seperate goals, so status frustration doesn't exist
• Outline 3 interactionist explanations for crime?

  • Labelling theory - can create a master status, creating a self fulfilling prophecy
  • Deviance amplification spiral - attempts to prevent crime end up causing it, exemplified in moral panics
  • Disintegrative shaming - isolating someone from society and labelling them 'bad' increases risk of readmitting
• Outline 2 Marxist explanations for crime and deviance?

  • Capitalism is criminogenic, it relies on exploitation of the working class and creates poverty that leads people to crime
  • Ideological law making - the law is written by the bourgeoisie and protects their interests
• Outline 2 strengths of Marxist theory?

  • Offers an explanation for non-utilitarian crime
  • Explains the relationship between crime and capitalism, putting into context a wider insight of labelling theory and law enforcement
• Outline 3 criticisms of Marxist theory?

  • Ignores the relationship between crime and non-class inequality like race and gender
  • Too deterministic and over-predicts working class crime, not all in poverty commit crime
  • Ignores intra-class crime such as burglary and mugging which harm victims greatly
• Outline 2 areas of agreement between neo-marxists and marxists on crime?

  • Capitalism is characterised by extreme inequalities of wealth and power which must be understood to understand crime
  • Capitalism should be replaced by a classless society
• Outline 3 elements of Taylor, Walton and Young's fully social theory of deviance?

  • wider origins of the deviant act in the unequal distribution of wealth and power under capitalism
  • immediate origins of the deviant act - the particular context in which the individual decided to commit the act
  • the act itself and the meaning for the actor