Causation midterm

• Sociological theories


  Suggest that crime is shaped by factors external to the individual: their experiences within the neighborhood, the peer group, and the family
• Social Disorganization Theory


  • Created by Chicago-based sociologist Clifford R. Shaw (1895-1957) and Henry D. Mckay (1899-1980)
  • Applies the principles and methods of sociology to understand the prevalence of high crime rates especially among juveniles of working class committees
  • Used spatial mapping to examine the residential locations of juveniles referred to court
  • Found that patterns of delinquency were higher in areas characterized by poor housing, poor health, socio economic disadvantage and transient populations
  • Suggests that crime was a function neighborhood dynamics and not due to individual actors and their actions
  • Explained these patterns by reference to the problems that accompanied immigration to Chicago at this time
• Strain Theory


  • Sociology and criminology theory developed in 1938 by Robert K. Merton
  • Argues that crime occurs when there aren't enough legitimate opportunities for people to achieve the normal success goals of a society
  • When there is a 'strain' between the goals and the means to achieve those goals, some people turn to crime in order to achieve success
• Ways people adapt when faced with strain

  • Conformity: pursuing cultural goals through socially approved means
  • Innovation: using socially unapproved or unconventional means to obtain culturally approved goals
  • Ritualism: using the same socially approved means to achieve less elusive goals (more modest and humble)
  • Retreatism: to reject both the cultural goals and the means to obtain it, then find a way to escape it
  • Rebellion: to reject the cultural goals and means, then work to replace them
• Social Learning Theory


  • Suggests that social behavior is learned by observing and imitating the behavior of others
  • People engage in crime because they learn to involve in crime through their friends, and others
  • Explains human behavior in terms of continuous reciprocal interaction between cognitive, behavioral and environmental influences
  • People learn from one another via observation, imitation and modeling
• Mechanisms by which individuals learn to involve in crime

  • Differential reinforcement: People may guide others to get involved in crime through the support and punishments they provide for behaviour
  • Modeling: Behavior or manner is not a part of reinforcements and punishments, and beliefs, and individuals receive, but also of the behaviour of those who are around them
  • Beliefs favorable to crime: Other people not only reinforce our crime, in fact, they also teach us beliefs favorable to crime
• Control Theory


  • Also called "Social Control Theory"
  • Refers to the idea that people are less likely to engage in deviant activity due to their bonds within society
  • Maintains that all people have the potential to violate the law and that modern society presents many opportunities for illegal activity
  • Provides an explanation for how behavior conforms to that which is generally expected in society
  • Postulates a shared value or belief in social norms, even those who break laws or violate social norms are likely to share the general belief that those rules should be followed
• Aspects of affiliation addressed by social control theory

  • Attachment: affection ties with persons such as parents, teachers, and peers
  • Commitment: cost factors involved in criminal activity
  • Involvement: time spent on the job, that is, participation in activities related to future goals and objectives
  • Belief: conviction about the legitimacy of conventional values, such as the law in general and criminal justice prescriptions in particular
• Economic Theories of Crime


  • Consider criminal activity as a decision made by rational individuals, based on the perceived costs and benefits of the criminal act
  • Describe the worldly trend in crime rates in most industrialized economies as the most difficult task
  • Argue that crime is closely connected with work, education, and poverty and that wages, youth unemployment, and crime are the side-effects or even count of social exclusion
  • Analyze how individual attitudes toward risk affect the extent of illegal behavior
  • Suppose that individuals are rational decision-makers who are connected in either legal or illegal activities as per the awaited utility from each activity
• Anomie Theory


  • Defined by Emile Durkheim as the breakdown of social order as result of the loss of standards of values
  • When a simple society develops into a modern, urbanized one, the intimacy needed to sustain a common set of norms declines
  • Crime is normal according to this theory
  • Anomie arises from a mismatch between personal or group standards and wider social standards, or from the lack of a social ethic, which produces moral deregulation and an absence of legitimate aspirations
• Differential Association Theory


  • Developed by Edwin H. Sutherland in 1939
  • Looks at the acts of the criminal as learned behaviors
  • Explains how criminal behavior is learned through interaction with other persons in a process of communication
• Anomie


  A mismatch between individual circumstances and larger social mores, not simply the absence of norms
• Causes of anomie


  • Disrespect to elderly and parents
  • No values nurtured
  • "come what may" idea
  • Abuse of freedom
• Differential Association theory


  A criminology theory that looks at the acts of the criminal as learned behaviors
• Differential Association theory


  • Criminal behavior is learned in interaction with others in a process of communication
  • Differential associations vary in frequency, duration, priority, and intensity
  • Learning criminal behavior occurs within primary groups (family, friends, peers, their most intimate, personal companions)
  • Learning criminal behavior involves learning the techniques, motives, drives, rationalizations, and attitudes
  • The specific direction of motives and attitudes is learned from definitions of the legal codes as favorable or unfavorable
  • A person becomes a criminal when there is an excess of definitions favorable to violation of law over definitions unfavorable to violation of law
• Differential Identification theory


  A person pursues criminal behavior to the extent that he identifies himself with real or imaginary persons from whose perspective his criminal behavior seems acceptable
• Causes of Differential Identification


  • Law Enforcers with firearms- expected to kill
  • Public Officials- anytime can do corruption
  • Teachers- can always bully and shout to his/ her students
  • Manager- can belittle subordinates
• Labeling theory


  A theory of how the self-identity and behavior of individuals may be determined or influenced by the terms used to describe or classify them
• Distinctions in labeling


  • Hard labeling - mental illness does not exist, it is merely deviance from societal norms
  • Soft labeling - mental illness does exist, it is not socially constructed but are objective problems
• People in power decide what acts are crimes, and the fact of labeling someone a criminal is what makes him a criminal. Once a person labeled a criminal, society takes away his opportunities, which may ultimately lead to more criminal behavior.
• Conflict theory


  A theory propounded by Karl Marx that claims society is in the state of perpetual conflict due to competitions for limited sources, and that social order is maintained by domination and power, rather than consensus and conformity
• Assumptions in modern conflict theory

  • Competition over scarce resources is at the heart of all social relationships
  • Inequalities in power and reward are built into all social structures
  • Change occurs as a result of conflict between social classes competing interests rather than through adaptation
  • War may set an end to whole societies
• Causes of conflict


  • Nationality
  • Religion
  • Position
  • Accomplishment
  • Power
  • Injustices
  • Inequality
• Containment theory


  The deviant behavior is defined in the context of relationship between personal and social control, and that for every individual there exists a containing structure and a protective internal organization both of which provide defense and security against delinquency and behavior
• Causes of breakdown in containment


  • Presence of out of school youth (OSY)
  • No Recreational facilities for the young OSY
  • Presence and tolerance of vices
  • Slum areas
• Broken Windows theory


  A criminological theory that visible signs of crime, anti-social behavior, and civil disorder create an urban environment that encourages further crime and disorder, including serious crimes
• The broken windows theory is not theoretically sound according to some criminologists, as it closely relates correlation with causality, a reasoning prone to fallacy
• Marxist criminology


  A school of criminology that parallels the work the structural functionalism school but adopts the predefined political philosophy of Marxism
• Causes of crime from Marxist perspective

  • Unemployment
  • Capitalism
  • High Class ruling over the low class