4. Realist theories
- Created by: Amy Parkinson
- Created on: 15-04-15 12:06
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- Realist theories
- Right realism
- The causes of crime
- Crime is the product of; individual biological differences, inadequate socialisation and the underclass, and rational choice to offend rather than structural or economic factors
- Biological differences
- WILSON & HERSTEIN
- Crime is caused by a combination of biological and social factors
- Biological differences make some people innately more strongly predisposed to commit crime
- E.g. personality traits like aggressiveness and extroversion
- HERNSTEIN & MURRAY
- The main cause of crime is low intelligence, which they also see as biologically determined
- WILSON & HERSTEIN
- Socialisation and the underclass
- Effective socialisation decreases the chance of an individual committing crime
- The best agency of socialisation is the nuclear family
- MURRAY
- Crime rate is increasing because of a growing underclass
- The underclass is growing in both the UK and USA
- The underclass is a result of welfare dependency
- The welfare state's 'generous revolution' has led to an increase in lone-parent families and therefore unbalanced socialisation
- Absent fathers mean boys lack paternal discipline and appropriate role models
- The underclass' very existence threatens society's cohesion by undermining the values of hard work and personal responsibility
- BENNETT, DILULIO & WALTERS
- Crime is a result of growing up surrounded by deviant, delinquent and criminal adults in a practically perfect criminogenic environment
- Rational choice theory
- Individuals have free will and the power of reason
- CLARKE
- The decision to commit crime is a choice based on a rational calculation of the likely consequences
- People are more likely to commit crime if the perceived benefits outweigh the costs or is the rewards appear greater than that for non-criminal behaviour
- Currently the perceived costs of crime are low and so crime has increased
- FELSON
- Routine activity theory
- For a crime to occur, there must be a motivated offender, a suitable target and the absence of a 'capable guardian'
- Tackling crime
- It is not useful to try and deal with the causes of crime since they cannot easily be changed
- They try to find ways to make crime seem less attractive
- They focus on control, containment and punishment
- WILSON & KELLING'S article 'Broken Windows'
- Argues it is essential to maintain the orderly character of neighbourhoods to prevent crime taking hold
- They advocate a 'zero tolerance' policy towards undesirable behaviour like prostitution, begging and drunkeness
- Crime prevention policies should reduce the rewards and increase the costs of crime e.g by 'target hardening' and greater use of prison
- EVAL
- Ignores wider structural causes like poverty
- Overstates offenders' rationality and how far they make cost-benefit calculations
- Rational choice conflicts with biologically and socially determined crime
- Preoccupied with petty street crime and ignores corporate crime
- Zero tolerance policy gives police free rein to discriminate against ethnic minorities
- Over-emphasises control of disorder
- The causes of crime
- Left realism
- Left realists are reformist socialists and its key figure is former critical criminologist JOCK YOUNG
- Taking crime seriously
- Traditional Marxists have concentrated on crimes of the powerful. Left realists agree that this neglects w/c crime
- Neo-Marxists romantcise w/c criminals as Robin Hoods. Left realists point out that w/c criminals mostly victimise other w/c people
- Labelling theorists see w/c criminals as the victims of labels by social control agents. Left realists argue that this neglects the real victims- w/c people who suffer at the hands of criminals
- There has been a real increase in crime since the 50s, especially w/c crime
- YOUNG
- Increasing crime has led to an aetiological crisis- a crisis in explanation- for theories in crime
- The increase in crime is too great to be explained by labelling theories and such, which imply that it is a social construction. More people are reporting crime because more people are falling
- Taking crime seriously also involves recognising who is most affected by crime. Disadvantaged groups have a greater risk of becoming victims
- Disadvantaged groups therefore have a greater fear of crime and are more effected by it
- These groups are also less likely to report crimes because the police are often reluctant to deal with crimes like domestic violence, **** or racist attacks
- The causes of crime
- LEA & YOUNG: 3 related causes of crime
- Relative deprivation
- Deprivation itself is not directly responsible for crime
- Crime can occur in relation to how deprived someone feels in comparison to another
- Although poeple are better off, they are more aware of relative deprivation due to the media
- YOUNG
- 'The lethal combination is relative deprivation and individualism'. It causes crime by encouraging the pursuit of self-interest at the expense of others
- Increasing individualism is causing the disintegration of families and communities by undermining it's values of mutual support and selflessness
- This creates a spiral of anti-social behaviour, aggression and crime
- Subculture
- Very much based of MERTON and CLOWARD & OHLIN'S blocked opportunities and group subcultures
- A subculture for left realists is a group's collective decision to the problem of relative deprivation
- Different groups may produce different subculutures
- Criminal subcultures still subscribe to the values and goals of mainstream society. However, opportunities to achieve these goals legitimately are blocked do they resort to street violence
- Marginalisation
- Marginalised groups lack both clear goals and organistion to represent their interests
- Unemployed youths for example are marginalised unlike workers with a trade union
- These youths have no organisation to represent them and no clear goals just a sense of resentment and frustration
- Their helplessness leads them to commit crime as they cannot use political means to create change
- Relative deprivation
- LEA & YOUNG: 3 related causes of crime
- Late modernity, exclusion and crime
- YOUNG
- We are now living in the stage of late modern society
- Instability, insecurity and exclusion in this society make the problem of cime worse
- The 1950s and 60s represented a 'golden age' of modern capitalist society as there was a strong general consensus about right and wrong
- De-industrialisation and the loss of unskilled manual jobs have increased unemployment and poverty.
- These changes have destabilised the family and community and increased marginalisation and exclusion of those at the bottom
- Greater inequality between the poor and rich and the spread of the free market have encouraged individualism further and increased relative depprivation
- JOCK also argues that there is a growing contrast between cultural inclusion and economic exclusion as a source of relative deprivation:
- Media-saturated late modernity promotes cultural inclusion
- There is a greater emphasis on leisure, which stresses personal consumption and immediate gratification and leads to higher expectations for the'good life'
- Desipte the ideology of meritocracy, the poor are systematically excluded from opportunities to gain the 'glittering prizes of a wealthy society'
- The result of the trend towards exclusion is that the amount and types of crime are changing in late modern society
- Crime is more widespread and is found increasingly throughout the social structure, not just at the bottom
- The result of the trend towards exclusion is that the amount and types of crime are changing in late modern society
- Crime is also nastier with an increas in hate crimes
- Reactions to crime by the public are also changing
- The public have become more intolerant and leads to demands for harsher formal controls by the state and increased criminalisation of unacceptable behaviour
- Reactions to crime by the public are also changing
- Late modern society is thus a high-crime society which a low tolerance for crime
- YOUNG
- Tackling crime
- Policing and control
- KINSEY, LEA & YOUNG
- Police clear-up rates are too low to act as a deterrent to crime
- The public must become more involved in determining the police's priorities and style of policing
- The police are losing public support
- As a result the flow of information dries up and the police come to rely on military policing and using random stop and search tactics
- This alienates communities who see the police as victimising local youth, and result in a vicious circle
- Policing must therefore made more accountable to local communities and must deal with local concerns
- Crime control cannot be left to the police along- a multi-agency approach is required
- The police need to improve their relationship with the community by spending more time investigating crime, changing their priorities and involving the public in making policing policy
- KINSEY, LEA & YOUNG
- Tackling the structural causes
- Left realists do not see improved policing as the main solution
- The causes of crime lie in the unequal structure of society
- Major structural changes are needed if we want to reduce levels of offending
- We must also become more tolerant of diversity and cease stereotyping whole groups of people as criminal
- Left realism and government policy
- Left realists' views have strong similarities with the New Labour government's stance of being 'tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime'
- However, YOUNG regards many of the policies from the New Labour gov. as nostalgic and doomed attempts to recreate the conditions of the 'golden age'
- Policing and control
- They see society as an unequal capitalist one and believe in gradual social change rather than a violent overthrow of capitalism like for Marxists
- We must take action to reduce crime now rather than waiting for a revolution and a classless socialist utopia to abolish crime
- EVAL
- HENRY & MLOVANOVIC
- It accepts the authorities definition of crime as being street crime committed by the poor, instead of defining it as being a problem of how powerful groups harm the poor
- INTERACTIONISTS: we need qualitative date to understanding the meanings behind criminal acts
- Relative deprivation cannot fully explain crime as not all those who experience it commit crime
- HENRY & MLOVANOVIC
- Realists see crime as a real problem to b tackled and not juts a social construction created by social agencies
- Comparing left and right realism
- Both see crimeas a real problem
- Right realists are neo-conservative whereas left realists are reformist socialisats
- Right realists blame individual lack of self-control, while left realists blame structural inequalities and relative deprivation
- Right realists prioritise social order, achieved through a tough stance against offenders whereas left realists prioritise justice achived through democratic policing and reform to create equality
- Right realism
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