Essay Feedback
Review of Theories
Functionalist
Subcultural
Marxism
Interactionism
Neo-Marxism
How serious are the following crimes?
Rate them 1 – 5
1. Borrowing stationery from work for use at home.
2. Exaggerating on your overtime sheet.
3. Fiddling your expenses account to get a free meal in a
restaurant.
4. Cutting corners on ‘red tape’ to save money and time.
5. Paying cash instead of through the books.
6. Browsing the internet, searching for holiday offers on
the company computer during office hours.
Marxist Overview.
• Crime is an ideological construct rather than
being a reflection of those behaviours that
cause us most harm.
• Ruling classes have power to define what is
crime.
White Collar Crime
Occupational
Crime
Corporate
Crime
What is the difference?
Why are they under-reported
Which one is most harmful?
State Crime
Why do RC get away with white collar crime?
Invisible
Victimless
Moral
ambiguity
Enforcement
Why are Marxists cynical about Health & Safety?
Selective Law Enforcement
•
•
•
•
•
•
Systematic bias in favour of RC.
Protects the system of K.
Individualises the crime problem.
Neutralises opponents.
Diverts attention from RC rime.
Diverts attention from own
exploitation.
• Criminals are a scapegoat for
alienated masses.
• Misrepresents crime problem and
hides the problems of capitalist
society.
The Goose and the Common
A man or woman who steals the goose from the
common, leaves the greater villan loose who steals the
common from the goose.
The law demands that we atone, When we take things we
do not own. But leaves the lords and ladies fine, who take
things that are yours and mine.
The poor and wretched don't escape, If they conspire the
law to break. This must be so but they endure, those who
conspire to make the law.
17th Century Protest Song.
“The heart of a capitalist economic system is the
protection of private property, which is, by
definition, the cornerstone upon which capitalist
economies function. It is not surprising then, the
find that criminal laws reflect this basic
concern.” William Chambliss (1976).
Property is theft
If I were asked to answer the following question: What is
slavery? and I should answer in one word, It is murder!, my
meaning would be understood at once. No extended
argument would be required to show that the power to
remove a man's mind, will, and personality, is the power of
life and death, and that it makes a man a slave. It is murder.
Why, then, to this other question: What is property? may I not
likewise answer, It is robbery!, without the certainty of being
misunderstood; the second proposition being no other than a
transformation of the first?
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon
Angela Davis, former leader of the Black
Panthers said;
“The real criminals in this
society are not all the people
who populate the prisons
across the sate, but those
people who have stolen the
wealth of the world from the
people.”
Marxism
•
•
•
•
What are the causes of crime?
How does the Law reflect ideology?
What is meant by selective enforcement?
What is white collar crime?
Ideological functions of crime
• Beginning - Ending
Evaluating Marxist theories
Deterministic
Reductionist
Crime as a
real problem
Crime under
communism
and capitalism
Gender &
Ethnicity
Neo Marxism
Criticisms about reductionism and
determinism have led Neo Marxists to
develop more complex approaches.
Rather than throwing the baby out
with the bath water they have adapted
traditional Marxist theory
Hall 1978:
‘Policing The Crisis’
Hall was strongly
influenced by Gramsci’s
concept of Hegemony in
a study of mugging in the
UK in the late 1970’s
Gramsci was an Italian Marxist who
argued that the MC ‘persuaded’ the
WC that the rules and regulations were
for everyone’s benefit.
This process is called ‘hegemony’
Hall 1978 – Policing The Crisis
There was a widespread fear of mugging – a moral panic
This was amplified via the media to be seen as a bigger
problem than it really was
Young black males were seen as major perpetrators
This all diverted attention away from serious economic
problems of the day
Criticisms of Hall and Policing The Crisis
Critics argue that the black crime wave was real
and not a myth as suggested by Hall.
However, Hall’s Policing the Crisis and the panic
surrounding black muggers seemed fit into a
framework that was developed by New
Criminologists – a branch of Marxist theory.
Jock Young (1942 – 2013)
• LSE PHd.
• Ethnography of drug
takers in Notting Hill.
• Professor of Sociology
at Middlesex – Head of
Centre for Criminology
–created first
postgraduate course.
Taylor, Walton and Young 1973 –
The New Criminology
The publication of ‘The New Criminology’ by
Taylor, Walton and Young 1973 marked a turning
point – they began to combine Marxist theory
with Interactionist approaches (particularly
Labelling Theory) to offer a more ‘holistic’
approach which recognised individual choices
and actions, societal responses and structural
constraints
They agree with Marx on the idea that to work out why people are
criminal,
• we have to understand how the economy of a society is organised.
• In the UK, we have a capitalist system where some people have a lot
of wealth and power and most have a lot less.
• Inequalities between rich and poor are at the root of crime.
• They argue that there has to be a radical transformation of society in
order to address crime....
....get rid of capitalism, basically.
The New Criminology
Antideterministic
Voluntaristic
Free will
Crime is a conscious, rational choice often with a
political motive – a rebellion against capitalism.
Taylor, Walton and Young 1973
Key Issues Of Crime
1. Inequalities in wealth and power (unfair society)
2. What lead to the decision to commit the crime?
(circumstances etc)
3. What the deviant act means to the person carrying out the act
4. How others in society see the ‘act’ and their response
5. Who makes the laws – and in whose interests?
6. The effects of labelling
7. The relationship between all these different aspects should be
holistically studied.
3 of the above are typically Marxist views, whilst 3 are
typically Interactionist...which are which?
•
Points 1,2 and 5 reflect the strong Marxist influence in
the work (structural-large scale)
•
Points 3,4 and 6 reflect the fusion with Interactionist
approaches (social action – smaller scale)
Consequently the freedom to choose whether to commit
a crime or not has been addressed.
However, New Criminology has been criticised for still
ignoring gender.
Taylor, Walton and Young aim to provide a ‘fully social
theory of deviance’ – to explain every aspect of deviance
from the activity of the state to crime on the streets.
i. The criminologist first needs to understand the way in which
wealth and power are distributed in society.
I live in the UK, it’s capitalist. I’m part of
the underclass and can’t hope for anything
better.
ii. He or she must consider the particular circumstances
surrounding the decision of an individual to commit an act of
deviance.
I’ve got no money, no prospects and no
status. So I use a gun to get all three.
iii. It is necessary to consider the deviant act itself, in order to
discover its meaning for the person concerned.
I’m waving this gun in your face to
intimidate you into giving me your money.
iv. The criminologist should consider in what ways, and for
what reasons, other members of society react to the
deviance.
Guns have robbed our
families of our sons and
robbed our community of
trust and safety.
v. The reaction then needs to be explained in terms of the
social structure. This means that the researcher should
attempt to discover who has the power in society to make the
rules, and to explain why some deviant acts are treated much
more severely than others.
Armed police
and farmers are
allowed guns
but no one else
is.
vi. It is necessary to study the effects of deviant labels.
People expect me to have
guns in every orifice, so I
get picked up a lot by the
police and searched.
vii. The relationship between these different aspects of
deviance should be studied, so that they fuse together into a
complete theory.
Apply the seven stages in Taylor,
Walton and Young’s Fully Social
Theory of Deviance to the
following case studies:
Knife & gun crime
MPs expenses.
Baby P.
Paedophilia.
Safety Deposit Robbery.
Shoplifting.
Rape & Sexual Assault
Terrorist offences.
1.
2.
3.
4.
Find out about the case you’ve been given – in detail.
Apply the seven stages to your case study.
Give a brief presentation on this to us all.
Fill in your part of the wall display grid.
6. Policing the Crisis, Hall et al argued that
* the state manufactures a crime problem;
* justifies strengthening its control over the population;
* certain groups such as young black men, in particular are
heavily criminalized so they can be heavily controlled.
Evaluation of Critical Criminology
Gender Blind
Robin Hood
Mentality
Laid foundations
for Left Realism
Ignores real
problem
More tolerance in
criminology not
just subcultures.
7. Radical criminology has been criticised for:
• seeing the actions of the state and the agents of social
control as solely serving the interests of the capitalist class.
What about examining how the law
works to protect the vulnerable?
• downplaying the significance of crime and largely ignoring
the victims of crime.
Bollocks to the Robin Hood and “woe is me”
routine – I’m the victim here and my life is
ruined.
Crime and deviance are spread fairly evenly throughout the
class structure: it is just that lower class offenders tend to be
caught and processed as criminals more than middle class
workers are.
White collar crime (committed by middle class workers)
merges into corporate crime.
Occupational crime is that committed by white-collar workers
for personal gain, corporate crime is illegal activity
commissioned by individuals for corporate gain.
White collar crime causes large financial losses to
organisations, but it is relatively under-investigated by the
social control agencies.
Much corporate crime is extremely harmful to individuals and
communities, and is committed because of pressure on
executives to cut costs and therefore corners, in order to
maximise profits.
The boundary between organised crime and respectable large
corporations is becoming increasingly blurred.
Corporate crime is increasingly taking on a global dimension
as organisations gain the ability to move large amounts of
money, staff and expertise swiftly around the world.
Governments also commit crimes, and increasingly so, and
yet human rights legislation has gained legitimacy in many
countries.
This contradiction is a feature
globalisation.
of
Plenary: Key concepts...
Capitalism
Criminogenic
Ruling class
Subject class
Superstructure
Agencies of social control
Ideological state apparatus
Ruling class ideology
False class consciousness
Non-decision making
Corporate crime
White collar crime
Selective law enforcement
Socialism
Fully social theory of deviance
Labelling
The New Criminology
Marxist Assessment Question
• Assess different Marxist views of the
relationship between crime and social class.
(21 marks) June 12.