2.6 Marxist and critical criminological theories content

• What do Marxist theories of crime cover?

  Law-breaking, law-making and law enforcement
• What do Marxists see capitalism as?

  Criminogenic - generating crime
• Who are crimes carried out by but what does the criminal justice system focus on?

  Crimes are carried out by people in every social class, but the criminal justice system focuses its efforts on working-class crime and treats white-collar criminals more leniently.
• What does the occasional prosecution of wealthy people help to maintain?

  The fiction that the law treats everyone the same
• What do laws in capitalist societies reflect?

  The interests of the capitalist class
• What have conventional marxists theories of crime been criticised for?

  Ignoring patriarchy, oversimplifying the nature and role of the state in modern capitalist societies and ignoring crime under socialist societies.
• Who published The New Criminology?

  Taylor, Walton and Younng
• What did The New Criminology seek to offer?

  A 'fully social' theory of deviance by drawing on Marxism and labelling theory and argued that some criminals could be seen as proto-revolutionaries.
• What were the seven aspects of crime the authors of The New Criminology believed adequate theory needed to cover.

  1. The wider origins of the deviant act
  2. The immediate origins of the deviant act
  3. The actual act
  4. The immediate origins of the social reaction
  5. The wider origins of the social reaction
  6. The impact of social reaction on the deviant's subsequent actions
  7. The nature of the deviant process as a whole
• How does Burke criticise The New Criminology?

  Says it is too general to be of much use in explaining crime and too idealistic to be useful in tackling crime.
• How has The New Criminology been criticised in terms of social class?

  Criticised for romanticising working-class criminals as modern day Robin Hoods

  Neglects the impact of working-class crime on its victims
• What 4 areas did focus on on the impact of crime?

  1. Marketisation and opportunities for criminality
  2. Changes in employment and unemployment
  3. Materialism and inequality
  4. Drugs and globalisation
• What does Crime in Context by Taylor seek to explain?

  The impact of the changes that have taken place in global capitalism since the 70s on crime.
• What does Crime in Context provide?

  A wide-ranging overview of how a globalised capitalism underpined by a neoliberal ideology has impacted on crime.
• What is a criticism of Taylor's crime in context?

  Generalised arguments which lack a detailed examination of criminal motivation. Therefore difficult to evaluate how directly any increase in criminality can be linked to changes he discusses.