Evaluation

• Strength - Explanatory power

  Able to account for crime within all sectors of a society

  Whilst Sutherland recognised that some types of crime, such as burglary, may be clustered within inner-city, working class communities, it is also the case that some crimes are more prevalent amongst more affluent groups In society

  Sutherland was particularly interest in so-called 'white collar' or corporate crime and how this may be a feature of middle-class social groups who share deviant norms and values
• Strength - Shift of focus

  Sutherland was successful in moving the emphasis away from early biological accounts of crime, eg Atavistic forms, as well as away from those that explained offending as being the product of individual weakness or immorality

  Differential association theory draws attention to the fact that dysfunctional social circumstances and environments may be more to blame for criminality than dysfunctional people

  This approach is more desirable because it offers a more realistic solution to the problem of crime instead of eugenics or punishment
• Weakness - Difficulty testing

  Despite Sutherlands promise to provide a scientific, mathematical framework where future offending behaviour could be predicted, differential association proves difficult to test

  Its hard to measure what pro-criminal attitudes a person has or has been exposed to

  Similarly, its based on the assumption that offending behaviour will occur when pro criminal ones outweigh anti criminal ones

  However, without being able to measure these it is difficult to know at what point the urge to offend is realised and the criminal career is triggered