Sociology

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  • Crime and Deviance
    • Official Statistics
      • Self - report studies
        • Criminals can anonymously report what crimes they've commited
        • Not valid: People may lie about crimes committed
        • Can uncover 'The Dark Figure of Crime'
      • Police Recorded Crime (PRC)
        • All crime reported and recorded by the Police
        • Reliable: Can compare patterns and trends over time
        • Lacks Validity: Doesn't account for the 'Dark figure of Crime'
      • Victim surveys (CSEW)
        • People can relay what crimes they have been a victim to in the last 12 months
        • Not valid: People may forget crimes
        • Can uncover the dark figure of crime
      • 'The Dark Figure of Crime' is all crime not witnessed, reported and recorded
    • Gender and Crime
      • 94% of prison populations are male
      • Pollack
        • 'Chivalry Thesis'
          • Men in the CJS tend to be lenient towards women
            • Men are taught young to 'protect' women
            • seen as 'sad not bad'
          • This may be why there are low rate of female offending in statistics
          • Criticisms: Unlikely that officers left women off significant crime.
            • Female offending is rising
      • Carlen
        • unstructured interviews with 39 women to find why some women offend
        • She concludes that women made a class and gender deal that generally keeps them under control
          • Class Deal: Women who work will have material rewards
            • LImitations:  unemployed women, (lack of £££)
            • This givies them a good standard of living
          • Gender deal: Women do domestic work and give love to their partners
            • In exchange they receive love and financial support from their husband
            • LImitations: (no family) divorced, raised in care
          • Statistically, women do utilitarian (money) crime
        • Criticisms: The sample is too small to be generalisbale
        • When these deals break down they turn to crime as a rational choice
      • working class women have less to lose
    • Ethnicity and Crime
      • Institutional racism - racial discrimination in institutions that  is considered normal
        • E.g there may be bias' against black people ingrained in the polices of a school
      • William McPherson's
        • 'The Macpherson Report' into the police investigation of Stephen Lawrence's murder.
        • The report shows the police often label people of minority ethnic backround
          • Police and courts more likely to target BAME individuals
        • Anti- racism training + increased recruitment of BAME officers suggested  the problems
          • Made recommendations related to police reform
        • Famously described the police as 'institutionally racsist'
      • Racial stereotypes in the police force and promoted by the media
        • May create bias' against people of specific ethnic backgrounds.
          • This will obviously deteriorate relations between the police and the group
        • The police may label black and Asian people as criminals more
          • This is evident by the disappropriate amount of  stop and searches against black people
            • Black people are 9x more likely to be stopped and searched
      • The media can focus on specific ethnic groups and  make them look like a threat to society
    • Age and Crime
      • 17 is the optimum age for crime
        • Easily motivated by material factors. E.g Money
        • Easily pressured by peers
        • 15 - 24 more likely to appear in statistics
      • After 25 people start to settle down with jobs and families.
        • Reason for steep decline in crime?
      • Police targets youth - crime easier to detect
        • Stereotyped by CJS and the  media
        • Youth heavily featured in data - always targeted and checked
      • Lyng
        • 'Edgework' theory
          • Argues that young people are looking for excitement
          • Engage in deviant acts as it provides a thrill
            • The 'buzz' is from an increase in adrenaline
      • Lack of p+s socialisation - impacts behaviour
        • Wrong role models
        • Socialised wrong - males told aggression is an important part of being a man
        • Fighting and arguing seen as normal
      • Fatalism
        • Nothing can be changed
    • Social construction of Crime
      • Cross-cultural deviance
        • Deviance varies on expectations of different cultures
        • E.g Drinking is forbidden in Muslim countries
          • However it's legal in the Uk
      • Historical deviance
        • Deviance varies based on time in history
        • E.g Homophobia used to be illegal but now it's not
      • Situational deviance
        • Deviance depending on the situation
        • E.g Nakedness in public is illegal,in the bath it socially acceptable
      • A deviant is someone whose behavior falls far outside of society's norms
        • Deviant behaviour in some circumstances is not a crime
          • E.g Facial tattoos and piercings
      • A crime is a criminal act punishable by the law
        • E.g Murder or Theft
    • Social class and Crime
      • Merton
        • Anomie/Strain Theory
        • This occurs when people have goals they cannot achieve due to lack of means
          • This results in them trying to find other ways to do so which may be classed as criminal
        • People act criminally due to lack of alternatives
          • This leads them to commit monetary crimes like theft instead of crimes like murder
        • Anomie is when societal norms break down
      • Interactionist - labelling
        • w/c are labelled as deviant, are stereotyped
        • usually ppl from the lower end of the strata commit traceable crimes
          • m/c crime is harder to detect so w/c are targeted
            • E.g Tax evasion
          • E.g Theft
      • Cohen
        • 'Status Frustration'
        • Cant achieve society's shared goals
          • Leading to them joining subcultures with deviant goals
          • Joining a subculture gives them a chance to gain status
      • In education w/c typically perform worse than their m/c counterparts
        • social class can affect a families income - w/c may suffer from material deprivation
      • w/c are more likely to be convicted offenders
        • Reasons: inadequate socialisation, material deprivation, Class Divide

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