Marxist view

• key idea of marxist

  Capitalism is criminogenic: it is the root cause of crime. All classes commit crime but selective law enforcement means crime appears to be only a working- class problem
• Strengths of marxists

  • shows how poverty and inequality can cause working-class crime and how capitalism promotes greed and encourages upper-class crime
  • shows how both law-making and law enforcement are biased against the working class and in favour of the powerful.
• Limitations of marxists

  • focuses on class and largely ignores the relationship between crime and other inequalities, such as gender and ethnicity
  • over-predicts the amount of working-class crime
  • not all capitalist societies have high crime rates e.g. Japan’s homicide rate is only 1/5 of the USA’s