TOPIC 2: Strain and subcultural theories

Robert Merton (1938):

• Crime and deviance = evidence of poor fit/strain between goals
• Resulting strain = led to deviance
• Not everyone shared same goals - stratified society: goals linked to person's position in social structure

1) Conformity = continue to adhere to goals/means
2) Innovation = accepts goals of society, uses different ways to achieve goals
3) Ritualism = sight of actual goal lost
4) Retreatism = rejects goals/means, e.g. dependent upon drugs/alcohol
5) Rebellion = socially sanctioned goals/means rejected, different ones substituted

Criticisms of Merton:

• Criticised for assuming there is value consensus in society
• Too deterministic = fails to explain why people who experience effects of anomie do not become criminals/deviants

Cloward and Ohlin:

• Merton failed to consider illegitimate opportunity structure
• E.g. thriving adult criminal subculture in one area but may not exist in another area
• Greater pressure on members of working class to deviate --> less opportunity to succeed by legitimate means

1) Criminal subculture = thriving local criminal subculture, 'work way up ladder' in criminal hierarchy
2) Conflict = no local criminal subculture, people likely to turn to violence --> e.g. violent gang 'warfare'
3) Retreatist = no opportunity/ability to engage in other subculture --> resulting in retreat into alcohol/drugs

Evaluation of Cloward and Ohlin:

• Ignore female deviancy
• Assume everyone is committed to goal of achieving wealth = much greater variety of goals, some social groups have made conscious choice to reject goal of financial success

Cohen:

• All boys regardless of social class desired to achieve success in life
• Working class boys 'lack the means'
• Status frustration = sense of personal failure/inadequacy
• Working class reject middle class values --> e.g. behaving badly, anti-social behaviour

Miller (1962) - focal concerns:

• Smartness = should look good, be witty with 'sharp repartee'
• Trouble = 'I can't go looking for trouble, but...'
• Excitement = important to search out thrills
• Toughness = good to be physically stronger than others --> important to demonstrate this
• Autonomy = important not to be pushed around by others
• Fate = little chance to overcome wider fate

• Downes = young working class males detached from mainstream values, more concerned with 'having fun' than getting jobs

Subterranean values:

• Matza = no distinctive subcultural values
• All groups in society used shared set of subterranean values
• People control deviant desires --> rarely emerge
• Difference between persistent offender and law-abiding citizen = how often/what circumstances subterranean values emerge, justified by techniques of neutralisation

Techniques of neutralisation:

• Denial of responsibility
• Denial of victim
• Denial of injury
• Condemnation of condemners
• Appeal to higher loyalties

Carl Nightingale (1993):

• Subculture emerges from desire to be part of mainstream US society that has rejected/marginalised them
• Black children consume US culture by watching TV with emphasis on consumerism - still excluded economically/racially/politically from participating in culture
• Response = overcompensate, acquiring articles with high-status trade names/logos
• High-status goods possessed = often obtained through violence in USA, expressed in violent gangs/high crime rates

Philip Bourgois (2002):

• El Barrio study - looked at lives of drug dealers/criminals in New York
• Believe in 'American Dream' of financial success
• Values of subculture little different from mainstream values --> difference: deal drugs in order to get money to pursue all-American lifestyle

Maffesoli (1996):

• Better to think of subcultures in terms of 'fluidity, occasional gatherings and dispersal'
• Neo-tribes = states of mind and lifestyles, very flexible/open/changing
• Deviant values less important than stress on consumption/suitably fashionable behaviour/individual identity, can change rapidly

Connell (1995):

• Hegemonic masculinity = males conspire with/aspire to
• Similar to Miller

Winlow (2004):

• Values best seen within context of changing economic social structure
• Traditional/working-class male values fitted physical work undertaken by men in industrial settings
• Values inappropriate for contemporary employment

Marshall et al (2005):

• 3 types of gangs:

1) Peer groups/'crews' = unorganised, hang around together, offending behaviour is incidental, does not reflect any great enstrangement from society

2) Gangs = focus on offending/violence

3) Organised criminal groups = most serious, heavily involved in serious crime, clear hierachy, illegal activities comprise occupation

• Being able to make brutal/sub-racist remarks about working-class = one acceptable form of discrimination left
• Gap between rich/poor increased = growth in negative stereotyping of working-class
• E.g. feckless, stupid, having too many children, not wanting to work
• Social mobility has declined = far smaller proportion of parliament/media come from working-class backgrounds
• Much less understanding of those permanently in low-paid work/less education
• Working-class = object of fear and ridicule