victim survey that asks over 40,000 households about their experience of crime.
helps to make up the ONS crime stats along with police records
2018 CSEW showed that nationally about 1 in 4 people experience a crime against themselves or home
those most at risk of violent crimes were young men aged 16-24, full time students and the unemployed
the risk of people aged 75 or over was 0.4%
4% of population make up 44% of all crime - experience repeat victimisation
Social construction of Victimisation
many crimes unreported and unrecorded
label of victim is a social construction - not always applied e.g state crimes
victimless crimes e.g green crime/corporate crime
people aren't always aware they are a victim
may reject label of victim e.g in case of sexual assault
Christie - media has an 'ideal victim' - weak,innocent and blameless individual
Positivist Victimology
Tierney: characteristics that contribute to own victimhood
victim precipitation - thing people do e.g women walking alone at night,valuables on display
victim proneness: characteristics -e.g live in inner city
Hentig: 13 characteristics of victim proneness e.g young,female,old
Wolfgang: studied 588 homicides in Philadelphia - 26% of them involved victim precipitation
Miers: Positivist victimology:
aims to identify factors that produce patterns in victimology
focus on interpersonal crimes of violence
aims to identify victims that contributed to own victimisation
Evaluation of positivist victimology
blames victim rather than offender - takes agency away from criminal e.g Amir - 1 in 5 rape cases were victim precipitated i.e 'asking for it
Brookman: shows offender-victim relationships can occur by chance (ignored offender is often someone you know)
too much focus on characteristics-ignores structural factors e.g poverty that can explain victimology
victimless crimes
Critical/Radical Victimology - based on conflict theories
based on structural factors like poverty and patriarchy
state has power to deny victims of labels of being identified as victims
'victim' is a social construct the same way criminal is
CJS decides who gets the label of victim e.g when a police officer does not prosecute a husband for domestic violence,they have denied her the status of 'victim'
Critical/Radical Victimology - Mawby and Walklate
victimisation is a form of structural powerlessness - 'victim is a social construct' - people in power e.g CJS decide if you are a victim e.g if police do not record reported crime e.g abuse - denial of victim status
A03 - Walklate: secondary victimisation in sexual crimes. women can suffer from this by CJS and by original crime
Critical/Radical Victimology - Tombs and Whyte
safety crimes e.g breach of health and safety regulation labelled as 'accident' or caused by accident-prone workers instead of company taking responsibility so deny victim status
performs and ideological function - failure to label a 'victim' - hides crimes of powerful(Pearce)
A02- Bhopal Disaster- blamed it on sabotage of equipment
Hierarchy of victimology
powerless are most likely to be a victim but least likely to be acknowledged by state
A02- Grenfell: found to be caused by faulty cladding - more powerless e.g W/C and EM groups lived in it. Many of the victims not rehoused years after and many other buildings have faulty cladding that needs to be replaced but is not being funded by government.
A02- fatalstabbings of 13-19 years olds are the highest more than a decade - 23 of 25 deaths in 2019 were stabbings
Evaluation of Critical/Radical Victimology
disregards role of victims bringing victimisation to themselves e.g not making homes more secure
valuable in understanding how powerful groups construct crimes and labels of victims.
Gender and victimisation
men more likely to be victims of violent street crime
around 70% of homicide victims are male
ONS - 2012-2013 - 1.2 million women suffered domestic violence
Coleman- 2 women killed each week by a current or former partner
Walklate- women make up 92% of all rape cases but 2 out of 3 do not report it though
Coronavirus
61 % increase in calls to domestic violence helpline in 2020
led to Domestic Abuse Act 2021
rape case trial in Ireland 2018
In the trial of a rape of a 17-year old, the female defence lawyer told the jury - you have to look at the way she was dressed. she was wearing a thong with a lace front.
27 year old man was found not guilty of rape shortly afterwards
Walklate - secondary victimisation- victim of crime and victim of CJS
Adler - single mothers less likely to believed in court by CJS
Why are men more likely to be victims of crime?
bedroom culture(McRobbie):
girls controlled in bedroom,boys less controlled-out in streets at night
subcultures-
Miller focal concerns of masculinity leads to violence.
Cohen: status frustration: W/C boys structurally lack status from family and education- crime to gain status
Feminisation of economy and crisis of masculinity -
Winlow: deindustrialisation = crisis of masculinity in bouncers - expressed masculinity through violence.
Messerschmidt: EM males have less chance of employment-turn to gang membership for masculine status
Ethnicity and Crime
CSEW and Home Office statistics show EM more likely to be victims of most crimes than white people
all minority ethnic groups are likely to be victims of burglary and vehicle theft than white people
Black and Indian more likely to be robbed
BCS estimates that both Black and Asian were up to 14x more likely to be victim of racially motivated incident than white people
Clancy et al
range of structural factors contribute to high EM victimisation e.g high levels of unemployment, younger demographic of EM groups
Pakistani and Bangladeshi and Black unemployment rate is at 8%(2024)
Ethnicity and Victimisation - environmental theory
Shaw and McKay -
zones of transition - migrants move into least desirable but cheap areas.
as they get wealthier, they move out
new migrants move in which causes social disorganisation - no cohesion and no informal social controls - less policing,less environmental crime prevention
crime was more common in these areas
Messerschmidt
Black lower working-class youths - may have fewer expectation of a reasonable job and may use gang membership and violence to express their masculinity or turn to serious property crime to achieve material success
EM lower in hierarchy of victimisation
those who are powerless are more likely to be denied status of being a victim
e.g hate crimes
A02 - Stephen Lawrence - murdered by racial motivation - police thought immediately it was a gang crime so denied status of victim
Sampson and Phillips: hate crimes form of racial victimisation
over 150,000 hate crimes recorded in 2022 , 70% racially motivated
Sutherland - Differential association
people in urban areas commit crimes due to 'differential association'. if someone interacts with other lawbreakers, they are likely to follow suit
EM more likely to be differentially associated with other criminals
frequency - how often you are with criminal
duration- how long
priority- how important they are to you
intensity - stage of life individual is in e.g unemployment
Age and Victimisation
problem with CSEW is it only looks at people aged 16 or over but most at risk of murder is those under 1 year
Wilson found that young people are the group most likely to be victims of crime
2003 - separate crime and justice survey was conducted with 10-15 year olds - 35% had been victims of at least 1 personal crime e.g assault,robbery or theft
Young children and criminality
Palmer - toxic childhood - growing up in world of social media means young people more likely to be victim of crime - children are exposed to violence and adult content via media which harms development
Bandura - bobo doll experiment - observe violence,more likely to imitate it
average age to view pornography for first time is 11 years
Jamie Bulger Case
Katz and Lyng - edgework
around half of sexual abuse started before secondary school age(2019)
most sexual assault victims begins at very young age but stops at 16 when now included in victim surveys.
Social Class and Victimisation
areas with high levels of deprivation - CSEW found the 20% of poorest areas face twice the risk of being a victim of burglary and nearly double risk of vehicle-related theft
unemployed,long term sick and those living in rented accommodation - New Right and underclass
Areas with high levels of deprivation - lack of ECP/SCP - no deterrence
areas of high physical disorder - Skogan, Broken Window Theory
Inverse victimisation law - poor steal from poor - w/c on w/c crime
1 in 4 households will become victims of white collar crime at some point.
Social class - Newburn and Rock
A survey found that out of 300 homeless people, they were 12 times more likely to have experienced violence than the general population
one in 10 had been urinated on when sleeping - inverse victimisation law
denied status of victim as cannot report it - so lowest on hierarchy of victimisation
Sociological explanation - W/C victims of white collar/corporate crime
Pearce - 'crimes of powerful'
Snider - rich largely shaped law so do not close down loopholes which could prevent victims of crime e.g tax havens
Sir Phillip Green - BHS pension scandal
BHS had created a private pension fund for workers - some paid into it for 30 years but were told it was all lost when BHS went into administration
victims eventually repaid - made it victimless
Post Office Scandal
Horizon software problems
accused post office workers of fraud - eventually exonerated
had to pay compensation to victims
A02 - Tombs and Whyte - health and safety regulation - workers denied status of victim - accident prone worker / accident
Box- ideology that corporate crimes are less widespread or harmful than working clasa crime is capitalism's control of the state - 'mystification
A02 - Awaab Ishak died from extensive mould despite parents reporting it 3 years prior - could have been prevented.
Hoyle - effects of victimisation
lots of effects besides physical harm and material loss