Functionalist, Strain & Subcultural Theories

Functionalist, Strain and Subcultural Theories from the Crime & Deviance topic of AQA A level Sociology

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Durkheim's functionalist theory

The inevitability of crime

Functionalists argue that to achieve social solidarity society has two key mechanisms; Socialisation and Social Control. While they see too much crime as destabilising society, they also see crime as inevitable and universalas every known society has some level of crime. This is because not everyone is equally effectively socialised into the shared norms so some will deviate and different groups develop their own lifestyles so what members of the subculture regard as normal, mainstream culture may see as deviant

In Durkheim's view, modern societies tend towards anomie - the rules governing behaviour become weaker and less clear cut because modern societies have a complex division of labour which weakens the shared culture and results in higher levels of deviance

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Durkheim's functionalist theory

The positive functions of crime

1. Boundary maintenance

Crime produces a reaction from society uniting its members in condemnation of the wrongdoer and reinforcing shared norms and values. This explains the function of punishment, not to make the wrongdoer suffer but to simply reaffirm society's shared rules and reinforce social solidarity. This could be done through the courtroom which dramatrises wrongdoing discouraging others from rule breaking with Cohen saying that the media has an important role in doing this through the creation of moral panics

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Durkheim's functionalist theory

2. Adaptation and change

All change starts with an act of deviance. Individuals with new ideas must have scope to challenge existing norms and in the first instance this may appear as deviant. An example is Galileo who was attacked for suggesting the earth revolved around the sun but this now is seen as a fact and has given rise to a new scientific culture. If those with new ideas are suppressed society won't be able to make adaptive changes. Too much crime threatens society but too little means society is controlling its members too much

Other functions of crime

Davis argues that prostitution acts as a safety valve for the release of men's sexual frustrations without damaging the nuclear family, Cohen says deviance is a warning that an institution is not working properly and festivals license misbehaviour that would otherwise be punished giving young people a way of coping with the transition from childhood to adulthood

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Durkheim's functionalist theory

Criticisms

  • Durkheim doesn't state how much deviance is needed for society to function successfully
  • It ignores how crime might affect individuals and groups as they only focus on the functions for society as a whole
  • Crime doesn't always promote solidarity, it can actually make people feel more isolated such as forcing women to stay indoors for fear of attack
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Merton's strain theory

Strain theories argue that people engage in deviance when they are unable to achieve socially approved goals by legitimate means. For Merton, deviance is the result of a strain between the goals that a culture encourages individuals to achieve and what the structure of society allows them to achieve legitimately

The American Dream

Americans are expected to pursue the money success goal by legitimate means such as educational success and hard work with the ideology being that society is a meritocratic one where there are opportunities for all. However, the reality is very different as poverty and discrimination may block opportunities for ethnic minorities and the lower classes. This strain between the cultural goal and the lack of opportunities produces frustration meaning people turn to crime to achieve these goals

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Merton's strain theory

Deviant adaptations to strain

Merton argues that an individual's position in the social structure affects the way they adapt or respond to the strain to anomie:

Conformity - individuals accept the culturally approved goals and strive to achieve them legitimately, the response of most Americans

Innovation - individuals accept the goal of money success but use theft or fraud to achieve it, the response of the lower end of the class structure

Ritualism - individuals give up on trying to achieve the goals but follow the rules for their own sake, the response of most workers in dead end routine jobs

Retreatism - individuals reject both the goals and means so becone dropouts, the response of outcasts and drug addicts etc

Rebellion - individuals replace the goals and means with new revolutionary change

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Merton's strain theory

Criticisms

  • He takes official statistics at face value which over represent working class crime
  • It is too deterministic as the working class experience the most strain yet not all of them deviate
  • Marxists argue that it ignores the power of the capitalists to enforce laws which criminalise the poor but not the rich
  • It assumes there is a value consensus but not everyone shares the same goals
  • It ignores why people commit non-utilitarian crime such as violence and vandalism
  • It ignores the role of group subcultures and deviance such as delinquents
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Subcultural strain theories

Subcultural theories see deviance as the product of a delinquent subculture with different values from the rest of society so they provide opportunity for those who are denied it by legitimate means.

Cohen: status frustration

He agrees with Merton that deviance is largely a working class phenomenon. He criticises him on two grounds; he ignores the fact that much deviance is committed by groups and he ignores crimes such as assault which have no economic motive

Cohen argues that working class boys face anomie in the middle class dominated school and their inability to succeed keaves them at the bottom of the status hierarchy. The boys suffer from status frustration so they resolve this by rejecting mainstream values and turning to boys in the same situation forming a delinquent subculture

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Subcultural strain theories

The subculture's values are the opposite of mainstream society so the subculture's function offers the boys an alternative status hierarchy in which they can achieve and win status from their peers through deviance. This explains non-utilitarian crime but it also ignores the possibility that these boys didn't share the middle class success goals in the first place so never saw themselves as failures

Cloward & Ohlin: three subcultures

Not everyone who is denied legitimate opportunties to succeed adapts to it by turning to innovation but different subcultures respond in different ways because there is also unequal access to illegitimate opportunity structures. They argue that different neighbourhoods provide different illegitimate opportunities for young people to learn criminal skills so there are three types of deviant subcultures that can result:

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Subcultural strain theories

Criminal subcultures - provide youths for a career in utilitarian crime, they arise in neighboirhoods with a longstanding and stable criminal culture which allows the young to associate with adult criminals who can give them opportunities for employment on the criminal career ladder

Conflict subcultures - arise in areas of high population turnover, there's high levels of social disorganisation preventing a stable criminal network from developing. The only illegitimate opportunities available are those in loosely organised gangs 

Retreatist subcultures - in any neighbourhood, not everyone who wants to be a professional criminal actually succeeds. These double failures can turn to a retreatist subculture based on illegal drug use

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Subcultural strain theories

Criticisms of Cloward & Ohlin

  • You could belong to more than one subculture; South found that the drug trade is a mixture of both disorganised crime and professional mafia style crime
  • They assume that everyone starts off sharing the same mainstream goal but the lower class could have its own independent subculture where they don't value success in the first place
  • Matza argues that most delinquents drift in and out of delinquency and are not strongly committed to their subculture

Recent strain theories

Savelsberg applies strain theory to post communist societies in Eastern Europe which saw a rapid rise in crime after the fall of communism in 1989. He attributes this rise to communism's collective values being replaced with new western capitalist goals of money success

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