Sociology Chapter 7
Deviance and Social Control
The Nature of Deviance
• The term deviance refers to behavior that departs from societal or
group norms
• criminal behavior, such as theft and murder, to antisocial behavior,
such as cheating and lying.
• Deviance is subjective, or a matter of social definition
• Negative deviance involves behavior that fails to meet accepted
norms
• People expressing negative deviance either reject the norms,
misinterpret the norms, or are unaware of the norms
• Positive deviance involves over-conformity to norms, which leads to
imbalance and extremes of perfectionism
• sociologists generally reserve the term deviance for violations of
significant social norms
Social Control
• Internal social control lies within the individual. It is developed during
the socialization process.
• you do something because you know it is the right thing to do or
when you don’t do something because you know it would be wrong
• External social control helps produce stability
• External social control is based on social sanctions—rewards or
punishments designed to encourage desired behavior
• Positive sanctions, such as awards, increases in allowances,
promotions, and smiles of approval, are used to encourage
conformity
• Negative sanctions, such as criticism, fines, and imprisonment, are
intended to stop socially unacceptable behavior
Costs and Benefits of Deviance
• Deviance has both positive and negative consequences.
• Negative Effects of Deviance, erodes trust, a society with widespread
distrust cannot function smoothly, deviant behavior is costly
• Beneficial Effects of Deviance, Émile Durkheim observed that
deviance clarifies norms by causing society to exercise social control
to defend its values
Functionalism and Deviance
• Deviance increases unity within a society or group
• When deviance occurs, it reminds people of something they value, it
strengthens their commitment to that value
Strain Theory
• E. Durkheim: anomie is a social condition in which norms are weak,
conflicting, or absent
• Without shared norms, individuals are uncertain about how they
should think and act, resulting in disorganized societies
• Robert Merton adapted Durkheim’s concept of anomie to deviant
behavior and called his hypothesis the strain theory
• Deviance, is most likely to occur when there is a gap between
culturally desirable goals, such as money and prestige, and a
legitimate way of obtaining them
Deviant Responses to Strain
• Innovation, the individual accepts the goal (in this case, success) but
uses illegal means to achieve it
• Innovation is the most widespread and obvious type of deviant
response to strain.
• ritualism, the individual rejects the goal (success) but continues to
use the legitimate means
• retreatism, both the legitimate means and the approved goals are
rejected
• rebellion, people also reject both the goal and the approved means
for achieving it, but they substitute a new set of goals and means
Control Theory
• According to control theory, conformity to social norms depends on
the presence of strong bonds between individuals and society
• If bonds are strong, people conform because they do not want to lose
face with others
• According to Hirschi, social bonds have four basic components:
• Attachment: The stronger your attachment to groups or individuals,
the more likely you are to conform
• Commitment: The greater your commitment to social goals, the more
likely you are to conform
• Involvement: Participation in approved social activities increases the
probability of conformity
• Belief: Belief in society’s norms and values promotes conformity
Symbolic Interactionism and Deviance
• deviance is transmitted through socialization in the same way that
conformity is learned
• Edwin Sutherland: Differential association theory emphasizes the role
of primary groups in transmitting deviance
• Three characteristics affect differential association:
• The ratio of deviant to non-deviant individuals. A person who knows
mostly deviants is more likely to learn deviant behavior
• The significance of the person acting deviant. A person is more likely
to copy deviant behavior from someone significant to him
• The age of exposure, Younger children learn deviant behavior more
quickly than older children
Labeling Theory
• Strain theory, control theory, and differential association theory help
us understand why deviance occurs
• Labeling theory explains why deviance is relative, not only to the
society or social group but also to the individual
• it explains why we might label, or identify, one person engaging in a
certain behavior as deviant, but not label another person engaging in
exactly the same behavior
• deviant behaviors are always a matter of social definition
• Edwin Lemert’s distinction between primary and secondary deviance
helps clarify the labeling process
• primary deviance: a person engages only in isolated acts of deviance,
deviance is not a part of their lifestyles or self-concepts
• one does not alter their self-concept to include this deviant identity
• Secondary deviance: means deviance as a lifestyle and as part of
one’s personal identity, Individuals identify themselves as deviants
and organize their behavior largely in terms of deviant roles
• When someone commits an offense of a more serious nature, then
one is likely to be labeled, internalize the label, and act out
accordingly in future criminal behavior
Conflict Theory and Deviance
• Proponents of the conflict perspective argue that minorities receive
unequal treatment in the American criminal justice system
• minorities generally do not have the economic resources to buy good
legal services
• Another source of difference is that crimes against whites tend to be
punished more severely than crimes against minorities
• Victim discounting reduces the seriousness of crimes directed at
members of lower social classes
• prosecutors are less likely to seek the death penalty when an African
American has been killed, and juries and judges are less likely to
impose the death penalty in cases involving African American victims.
White-Collar Crime
• any crime committed by respectable and high-status people in the
course of their occupations
• Officially, the term is used for economic crimes such as price fixing,
insider trading, fraud, embezzlement, manufacture of hazardous
products, and tax evasion
• $10 billion a year to check fraud / Securities and commodities fraud
$40 billion / health care fraud $100 billion
• probation is granted to 40 percent of antitrust law violators, 61
percent of fraud defendants, and 70 percent of embezzlers
• If white-collar criminals are imprisoned, they receive shorter average
sentences than other criminals
Punishment for Victimless Crime
• Crimes that are illegal but do not infringe upon the rights of or
victimize other people
• taking illegal drugs and gambling are considered victimless crimes
Crime and Punishment
• more than 4,000 acts are classified as federal crimes and many more
acts violate state and local statutes
• approximately 18.7 million Americans aged 12 or over experienced
one or more crimes in 2010
• The majority of crimes included in the 2010 survey were property
crimes
• more than 3 million people reported being the victims of violent
crime
• American crime statistics are gathered by the Federal Bureau of
Investigation, and reported in the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR)
• nine types of crimes (called crime index offenses): murder, forcible
rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny-theft, motor
vehicle theft, arson, and hate crimes
• It is estimated that about two-thirds of U.S. crimes are not reported
at all
Juvenile Crime
• legal violations among those under 18 years of age
• Juvenile delinquent behavior includes deviance that only the young
can commit : failing to attend school, fighting in school, and
underage drinking and smoking
Approaches to Crime Control
• The criminal justice system is made up of the institutions and
processes responsible for enforcing criminal statutes
• police, courts, and correctional system
• system may draw on four approaches to control and punish
lawbreakers—deterrence, retribution, incarceration, and
rehabilitation
• Deterrence approach uses the threat of punishment to discourage
criminal action
• Capital punishment : Around 6,000 people have been executed in the
United States since 1930
• of those executed from 1976, the vast majority were male, 77% were
white, followed by 15% African American, and 7% Latino
• revenge and a desire for retribution, appear to contribute more to
support for capital punishment than do its deterrent effects
• a higher proportion of the American public supports the death
penalty for murder (61%) than opposes it (35%)
• Cesare Beccaria : “On Crimes and Punishments” (opposed the death
penalty)
• Punishments should serve only as deterents
• Retribution is a type of punishment intended to make criminals pay
compensation for their acts
• Comes from the ideas of Hammurabi’s code : 282 laws
• 14. If any one steal the minor son of another, he shall be put to death.
• 21. If any one break a hole into a house (break in to steal), he shall be
put to death before that hole and be buried.
• 153. If the wife of one man on account of another man has their
mates (her husband and the other man's wife) murdered, both of
them shall be impaled
• 195. If a son strike his father, his hands shall be hewn off.
• 196. If a man put out the eye of another man, his eye shall be put
out. [ An eye for an eye ]
• 218. If a physician make a large incision with the operating knife, and
kill him, or open a tumor with the operating knife, and cut out the
eye, his hands shall be cut off.
• incarceration—keeping criminals in prisons—is that criminals who are
not on the street cannot commit crimes
• Rehabilitation is an approach to crime control that attempts to resocialize criminals
• Most prisons have programs aimed at giving prisoners both social and
work skills
• Recidivism: more than half of those released from penal institutions
are sent back to prison in three to five years
• Cesare Lombroso: “The Criminal Man”, Criminality is inherited and
could be identified by physical traits