Ethnicity and Crime

• In a nutshell


  Official statistics highlight that black people are more likely to be stopped, arrested and imprisoned. Some sociologists argue this is because they are more likely to offend, due to poor educational achievement, dysfunctional family structure and racist stereotypes portrayed in the media. However, some sociologists they merely appear more criminal due to discrimination in wider society.
• WHY BLACK PEOPLE APPEAR MORE CRIMINAL - LEA AND YOUNG


  Differences in statistics are the result of black people being discriminated in wider society. Utilitarian crime is a response to material deprivation and non-utilitarian crime is due to their frustration towards society. They believe police racism is not the main cause of this because 90% of crimes are reported by the public. 
• WHY BLACK PEOPLE APPEAR MORE CRIMINAL - GILROY


  BME do not commit more crime than others. It is the result of racist policing who act on stereotypes. Also, BME often come from former colonies where they resisted oppression. However, when they resisted racism in Britain it was criminalised.
• WHY BLACK PEOPLE APPEAR MORE CRIMINAL - HALL ET AL


  In the 1970s, there was a moral panic about black people and mugging. This is because capitalism was in crisis and they used this story to cover it up. Thus, black people were not more criminal but a mere victim of capitalism. However, this made black people more unlikely to get jobs and then turn to crime.
• WHY BLACK PEOPLE ARE MORE CRIMINAL - EDUCATION


  Black caribbean pupils statistically perform poorly in education, and therefore may find it hard to find a legitimate and sufficiently well-paid job. In turn, they may either turn to illegal means of employment (such as drug trade) or turn to crime due to relative deprivation.
• WHY BLACK PEOPLE ARE MORE CRIMINAL - FAMILY


  Functionalists - the growing rate of a lone-parent family structure with in the black community leads to inadequate socialisation, therefore children are not taught the correct norms and values of society - in this instance, they are not taught crime is immoral.
• WHY BLACK PEOPLE ARE MORE CRIMINAL - MEDIA


  Media representations reinforce the stereotype that black people are more criminal. This may lead to a self fulfilling prophecy and black people will in turn commit more crime.
• Lord MacPherson’s


  Lord MacPherson’s report into the Stephen Lawrence murder and police failings used the phrase ‘institutional racism’ when describing the actions of the police in that specific case.

  Macpherson accused the police of incompetency by not following up on important leads.
• HOLDAWAY - canteen culture

  Holdaway claimed that there was a ‘canteen culture’ that existed within the police force.

  He claimed that many officers held prejudicial thoughts about members of the African Caribbean community and therefore told negative stories and shared derogatory jokes at their expense.

  Holdaway argued that many new recruits felt under pressure to conform to this ‘canteen culture’.