...Assess the View that Crime is Functional, Inevitable and Normal. (21 marks) Within the sociological perspectives of crime and deviance, there is one particular approach which argues that crime is functional, inevitable and normal. This sociological perspective, of Functionalism, consists of Durkheim’s work on crime and deviance. His main argument was that ‘crime is normal’ and that it is ‘an integral part of all healthy societies’. This perspective views crime and deviance as an inevitable feature of all societies which is universal. However, Durkheim did argue that too much crime can lead to the destabilisation of society. Durkheim identified three positive aspects of crime which make it a functional component of society. He did this through magnifying the positive impacts it can have on social cohesion which refers to the invisible bonds which bring people together within a society. There were three main positive aspects which he accentuated as they made crime and deviance functional. These were ‘reaffirming the boundaries’, ‘changing values’ and ‘social cohesion.’ The first, reaffirming the boundaries, refers to situations where crime has already occurred. When the criminal is taken to court, the public outcry which follows verifies the boundaries. This can be seen particularly in countries such as Saudi Arabia, where public hangings and executions take place. The second positive aspect of crime which makes it functional for society is changing values. Durkheim stated that...
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...modernization theory using all available materials on modernization and its critique, providing your own opinion on how modernization leads to development. The way people, societies, and countries develop and interact with each other have a strong influence on deviance. Although societies may differ in appearance and way of life, they all have crime, religion, family structure, politics, and economy. The vast differences in societies are constantly studied and theorized. Grand theories, for example, are meta-theories that examine an aspect of society on a global or national scale. One particular theory of interest is the modernization theory. The modernization theory suggests that the main causes of crime are the repercussions of the rapid development and modernization of nations (Howard 148). The theory of modernization is composed of three distinct Parts: (1) Identification of types of societies, and explanation of how those designated as modernized or relatively modernized differ from others; (2) specification of how societies become modernized, comparing factors that are more or less conducive to transformation; and (3) generalizations about how the parts of a modernized society fit together, involving comparisons of stages of modernization and types of modernized societies with clarity about prospects for further modernization. (Defining Modernization) Part one explains that there must be qualities that differentiate modernized and underdeveloped societies. This is essential...
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...Crime & Society - Durkheim's Theory of Crime CRIME AND SOCIETY How might Durkheim’s concept of anomie be used to explain the deviant behaviour that is becoming apparent in all strata of society? Emile Durkeim, describes how societies begin in simple forms of interaction and are held together by solidarity and likenesses. These homogenous societies he called “mechanical” with the growth of societies, together with technical and economic advances, make the inter-relationships more complicated and diverse. Members of society become more inter-dependent (“organic societies”), but viewed these changes as being natural and unavoidable, leading to greater happiness for individuals because they were released to enjoy goods produced by others and become a healthier society (a). Law plays an important role in both types of society law. In Durkheim’s view he felt crime was a normal occurrence and it was impossible to have a society totally devoid of crime, as all societies have rules and sanctions in case these are broken. Punishment deters crime but maintains social cohesion, setting boundaries and delivering order (“functionalism”). Healthy levels of crime are most likely in mechanical societies as they have a natural cohesion. An unhealthy level is more likely to arise in an organic society and is the result of the law being inadequate to regulate the interactions of the various parts of that society. The incomplete integrations gives rise to anomie, the result...
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... following it. Anomie is also a condition where individuals may lose sight of the goals of the society, or the means to achieve it. (ii) Identify and briefly describe two examples of studies that have used the concept of anomie to explain crime and deviance. In Durkheim's Study of Suicide, anomie refers to a situation in which cultural norms break down because of rapid change. For example, anomic suicide can occur during a major economic depression, when people are not able to achieve the goals that they have learned to pursue, and suddenly people do not know how to limit their goals and be satisfied with their achievements. An example of anomic suicide was provided in the 1929 Wall Street Crash when a number of stockbrokers allegedly threw themselves from high office windows. Another form of anomie occurs to ‘skidders’ – those who experienced downward social mobility. Hence, anomie may be a useful concept for Durkheim to explain much suicide in that period. In Robert Merton’s theoretical analysis of “Social Structure and Anomie” (1938; 1957), Merton based his theory on sociological assumptions about human nature and replaces Durkheim’s conception of greedy passions and appetites with the assumption that human needs and desires are primarily the product of a social process such as cultural socialization. For instance, people reared in a society where cultural values emphasize material goals, will learn to strive for economic success. For...
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...functionalist approaches in explaining crime. (21 Marks) Crime is the act which breaks the criminal laws of society. The functionalists approach to crime and deviance gives us some insight into how society copes with deviant behaviour. However it has limitations for example it only looks at the functions of deviance and not the causes. Durkheim says that to allow social solidarity to occur in society there are two key mechanisms which are socialisation and social control. He states that crime and deviance is inevitable and that it is needed in society as it preforms two positive functions; boundary maintenance and adaption. In Durkheim’s view, the purpose of punishment is to reaffirm society’s shared rules. As it states in Item A the publicity given to crime highlights the boundaries of acceptable behaviour and this reinforces social solidarity through for example court rooms which dramatizes the wrong doing and stigmatises the offender and therefore discourages others from breaking society’s rules. For individuals that want adaption, there must be some scope for them to challenge and change the existing norms and values which is deviance. However, in time there values may give way to a new culture and morality. For example gay marriage would be seen as deviant but in current times it has become less deviant in countries such as the United Kingdom because it has become more popular over the last decade. If those new ideas are supressed, society will stagnate and unable to make the...
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...Deviance and Social Control Unit M4: Functionalism Introduction In these Teachers’ Notes we’re going to review a number of theories of crime and deviance from a Structural Functionalist perspective. In case this sociological perspective is not clear to you, the first part of these Notes is given over to a brief overview of this perspective. If you are familiar with this perspective, then this overview will serve as revision material... The second part of these Notes will provide an overview of some of the basic themes and theories put forward by writers working within this general perspective to explain crime. Functionalism: An Overview The Functionalist perspective is a form of Structuralist sociology and, as such, we can initially characterise it as a form of macro sociological theorising. In this respect, the main theoretical question addressed by sociologists working within the Functionalist perspective is that of: * How do social systems ("societies") hold together? In their attempts to provide an answer to this question, Functionalists have initially concentrated upon two ideas that are closely related to the above: 1. How is order maintained in any society? 2. What are the main sources of stability in any society? As you might imagine - given that the theoretical emphasis seems to be placed on rather grand questions about the nature of social systems - Functionalist sociologists...
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...functionalist view that a small amount of crime is useful to society There is a long running argument between sociologists about the existence of crime and deviance and whether or not it can benefit societies in some ways. Many of them in the functionalist point of view argue that it can however, there are many, for example Marxists and feminists, which would argue that it doesn’t benefit anyone. Durkheim, the ‘founding father’ of functionalism believed that a small amount of crime in a society is necessary toward creating a perfect society, due to the three functions or outcomes that crime induces upon its occurrence: boundary maintenance, adaptation and change and social solidarity. Boundary maintenance is the effect that crime has upon the conformers within the society in which they see or hear about a crime and then know where the boundaries of their actions lie, due to the reaction of the authorities from the crime carried out and from the severity of the punishment given to the law-breaker, acting almost as a deterrent of crime toward the wider society. Adaptation and change is an outcome of a crime and is what can be done to prevent that crime from happening, as it perhaps show that parts of the society and community are flawed and need to be adjusted so that everybody can live better lives and not think they need to break the law to get the things they want or deviate from the consensus values to get what they want either. A large scale crime, for example the 7/7 bombings...
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...Assess functionalist theories of crime and deviance. Functionalism is a social structural and social control theory. It believes that it is society that causes the individual to commit crime. Social control theory looks at why people do not commit crime as it says that people are controlled by the primary and secondary agents of social control, such as the family or religion, and so should not commit crime. Functionalism is also a Right Wing theory, which believes that agents of social control like the police are fair and just; law reflects the collective conscience; people are biologically selfish and official statistics are valid. Functionalists included in this essay are Durkheim and Merton with evaluation from functionalist subcultural theorists, Cloward and Ohlin, and Marxism. Durkheim said that crime is inevitable: this is because people are not equally committed to the law due to individual differences and each society has its own definitions of what is deviant and so even a ‘society of saints’ will have deviance. He also said that crime is functional for society when there is the ‘right’ amount. The collective conscience needs to be at a moderate energy so that there is not too much or too little crime. When there is the right amount, society can progress as the criminal may be ‘the origin of the genius’ as they challenge societies current values. Durkheim also made the concept of anomie. At times of rapid change, society can enter a state of normlessness, as there are...
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...Assess functionalist theories of crime and deviance. Functionalism is a social structural and social control theory. It believes that it is society that causes the individual to commit crime. Social control theory looks at why people do not commit crime as it says that people are controlled by the primary and secondary agents of social control, such as the family or religion, and so should not commit crime. Functionalism is also a Right Wing theory, which believes that agents of social control like the police are fair and just; law reflects the collective conscience; people are biologically selfish and official statistics are valid. Functionalists included in this essay are Durkheim and Merton with evaluation from functionalist subcultural theorists, Cloward and Ohlin, and Marxism. Durkheim said that crime is inevitable: this is because people are not equally committed to the law due to individual differences and each society has its own definitions of what is deviant and so even a ‘society of saints’ will have deviance. He also said that crime is functional for society when there is the ‘right’ amount. The collective conscience needs to be at a moderate energy so that there is not too much or too little crime. When there is the right amount, society can progress as the criminal may be ‘the origin of the genius’ as they challenge societies current values. Durkheim also made the concept of anomie. At times of rapid change, society can enter a state of normlessness, as there...
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...and asses the functionalist explanations of crime and deviance. Functionalist ignore deviance; they look at society as a whole and ignore individualism. Functionalism is a structuralist approach (also known as a consensus theory) they believe that individuals are shaped by society and social facts. A limitation of functionalist is that they ignore certain groups within society, such as women and people with disabilities. They also ignore factors such as ‘race’ and social class. They believe that society will maintain stability if the institutions still exists and the factors that may cause conflict – are ignored. I will assessing the functionalist contribution to explanations of crime, to how useful it is and if those explanations have been applied within modern day society. Also how useful the explanations are at reducing crime. Deviance is a normative approach, it is associated with behaviour that differs from the set norms and values set out by society. Deviance is linked to informal social control through sanctions (not by laws or government policy). In a Post Modern society – this definition of deviance would be problematic because it refers to societal norms (which would have disappeared; due to individualism making it hard to follow set norms and values). Deviance could collapse in a post-modern society. Durkheim (1895) is a positivist who proposed the concept of anomie; as an explanation as to why certain people commit crime. He believes that if individuals feel a sense...
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...Crime, a Normal Element in the Society Sociologists like Emile Durkheim are more concerned with the study of deviance. Emile Durkheim’s ideas, concepts, and issues are traced, which provides explanations to why he says crime should be considered as a normal element in the society. Functionalism is one of the sociological theories that focus on issues of crime. A functionalist analyzes deviance from a societal point of view rather than the psychological nature of a person or the existing biological explanations. According to Durkheim, crime should be considered as a regular element in the society. He conquered to the consensus and social order of the society about criminal issues (Hawdon, Ryan & Agnich, 2010). His belief was that crime is not an evitable but a typical aspect of social life in different types of societies. He views it as an integral part that ensures the well-being of society. He argues that not all members of a community are equal (Durkheim, 2013). Each is influenced differently according to different circumstances he or she faces. This leads to unequal reluctance in law breaking. Durkheim is a positivist functionalist and clearly points out the reasons for why he says crime should be considered as a regular element in the society. He argues that crime should be regarded as functional and something necessary for a society but not something pathological (Hawdon, Ryan & Agnich, 2010). He says that crime is present in almost every society since each community...
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...The essay focuses on the social construction of crime, and the possible reasons for these social constructions. In the first section, the essay explains what crime is, and the constructionist perspective theory. In the Second section my essay focuses on the crime as socially constructed and why it is socially constructed. In the third section essay explains, three levels of explanation in the study of deviant and criminal behaviour. In the final section, it focuses on the historical theoretical periods, which plays an important role in revitalising past discoveries. Crime is a term that refers to many types of misconduct that is forbidden by law. There are a number of different reasons as to why crime can be viewed as a social construction. There cannot be 'social problems' that are not the product of social construction - naming, labelling, defining and mapping them into place - through which we can 'make sense' of them' (Clarke, 2001). In this essay I will explain what is social construction, also what crime is, and why we think, that crime is socially constructed. Furthermore, I will explain how media construct crime and the stigma of black crime. In the last paragraph I will explore the importance of Marxist and Durkheim's theories on the emergence of crime....
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...streets of London and broke into shops and set fire to pubs. There are many theories as to why people commit crimes. Are these crimes due to inherited predispositions? Are they a response to the strain of disjunction between goals and the means of achieving? Is this because they were written off as delinquents at school? Are these crimes a result of being labelled a murderer or a hooligan? Is the inequality in the capitalist world responsible for these people’s actions? This essay will look at biological, physiological and sociological perspectives to consider why people commit crimes. Deviance can be defined as behaviour that differs from the normal and is subjected to public disapproval. What is labelled as deviant is relative and will clearly differ between cultures. Similarly what is seen as deviant behaviour changes over time, it was once deviant to bear a child out of wed lock but over time it is now considered to be the norm. Lastly deviance is subjective depending on location for example it would be considered to be deviant to chant, shout and walk around topless at your local supermarket but this is considered the norm at a football match (Harlambous and Holborn, 2004). Crime can be defined as breaking the laws of the land. Crime is distinct from deviance, although crimes tend to be deviant behaviour, not all crime is deviant. For example, many people ignore 30mph hour laws and this is a crime however it is not considered deviant (Taylor et al). There...
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...Chapter Seven: Deviance Deviance is recognized as the violation of cultural norms. Norms help guide us thought life activity. Crime is an act of violation of society formally enacted criminal law. Criminal deviance is divided into a wide range of offenses, from minor traffic violation to sexual assault to murder. In general that we would normally view nonconformity as breaking the rules, or regulation, like driving while under the influence of alcohol, stealing which is viewed as someone is negative or an bad person. On the other side we view someone that is good as a nerd that doesn’t do anything but think about computer software and programs, and someone that does a lot of volunteer work. Deviance doesn’t have to involve our actions or even choose. Some deviances action can be detached on how we all think about others and if we don’t like a certain people because of the person’s disability race, and other difference. This means that racial hate groups are performing a deviance act against other unlike racial groups. Social control is subjected to everyone in a society. Social control is an attempt to control people’s thoughts and behavior to standards of the society. Unfortunately social control has been able to control all of those murders and other people that constantly break the rules and regulation. In cases of serious deviance, however may bring action by the criminal justice system, which is a formal response by police, courts, and prison official to alleged...
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...(21marks) Functionalism is based on the idea of each members of society sharing a common culture and one value consensus, which provides solidarity and binds individuals together by directing them what to strive for and how to conduct themselves. In order for solidarity to be achieved, society must have two main mechanisms; socialisation which instils the shared into its members and social control mechanisms which include positive sanctions for conformity and negative sanctions for deviance. Functionalists view crime and deviance as a positive feature of society which is inevitable and universal. They argue that every known society has some form of crime and deviance, a crime free society would be a contradiction according to Durkheim ‘crime is normal… an integral part of all healthy societies’. Functionalists maintain that there are two main reasons why crime is found in all societies. Firstly not everyone is equally effectively socialised into the shared norms and values thus some individuals are prone to deviate. In addition to this, in complex modern societies there is a diversity of lifestyle because different groups develop their own cultural norms and values what each subculture see as normal, mainstream culture may see as deviant. For example; in parts of Africa polygamy is allowed where as in mainstream western culture it is illegal. Durkheim’s develops this further and maintains that in modern societies there is a tendency towards anomie this is due to the rules governing...
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