Right Realism

?

Rational Choice Theory: Clarke and Coleman (1980)

  • Crimiminals will engage in a crime if the besefits outweigh the costs.
  • Increase the cost of crime. Increase the liklihood of being caught and tougher punishments.
1 of 9

Anti-Sociological Criminology

  • Right Realists point out that with increased affluence, crime rates have soared 
  • Extending the Welfare State, lack of discipline in education and a decine in the traditional family are seen as key factors behind crime increase 
2 of 9

Selfish Human Nature

  • Rising crime levels reflect ineffective and inadequete social control
  • Permissive attitudes allow self-indulgent and anti-social behaviour 
  • Feckless parenting, absent fathers, lack of discipline in schools, liberal policies of the state all served to ferment crime 
  • The resut has been spiralling volumes of incivilities: Muggings, graffiti, vandalim, car break-ins and theft 
3 of 9

Solutions to Crime

  • Reduce opportunities of offending 
  • Increase the costs to exceed the benefits 
  • Crime control should also fall upon members in the community 
  • Responsible parenting and 'active citizens' who challege anti-social behaviour 
  • Tough punishment: heavy fines, sentences and advocation of corporal and capital punishment 
4 of 9

James Q. Wilson: Broken Window Thesis

  • Unless incivilities are kept minimal, then wider anti-social behaviour and mre serious crimes will follow 
  • Advocated the police adopt the 'zero tolerence' policy for even minor crimes 
  • Reflects Durkheim's idea that local informal controls are crutial for law and order
  • 3 key factors affecting long term crime: 
  • Number of young males (Typical deviants)
  • Costs/benefits of crime (Rational Choice Theory)
  • Inadequete socialisation into norms and values
  • To deal with these he suggests target hardening of deviant groups and areas through pro-active policing
5 of 9

Inadequate and Inappropriate Socialisation

  • Blame crime on inadequate or inappropriate socialisation by key socialisation agencies in society 
  • The non-traditional famiy, especially single mothers, is viewed as a major factor
  • Lack of discipline in schools, a mass media that glamourises deviance and crime and the decline in the influence of religious values are other important factors 
6 of 9

Charles Murray (1990)

  • New Right theorist
  • Underclass are insufficiently integrated into society's norms and values 
  • Calls the deviant subcultural values of the underclass 'paternalism'
  • Views the underclass as prone to: criminal tendenices, violoence, illigitimacy and promiscuity educational failure and welfare dependencey
7 of 9

Ernst van den Haag (1975)

  • Adopts a poor view of humanity as willing to cheat to 'get on' and therefore some groups need to be controlled for thier own good and that of society 
  • It is reasonable for las and order agencies to target the poor 
  • He advocates a tough penal system of punishment both Corporal and Capital
  • Agrees with Durkheim and sees punishment as functional, acting as a deterrent 
8 of 9

Critique

  • It is influencial on Government policy in both the USA and UK
  • It is a lack of investment in deprived areas rather than incivilities that cause crime to rise 
  • It is easy to pick up on scapegoats like single parent families 
  • Marxists argue that concetration on mior offences means that more serious crimes get ignored by the authorities 
  • The 'Zero Tolerance' policy simply shifts crime to other areas
9 of 9

Comments

No comments have yet been made

Similar Sociology resources:

See all Sociology resources »See all Crime and deviance resources »