Is the formation of gangs linked to the strains set out by Cohen, Cloward and Ohlin? Might other explanations explain this phenomenon better? Discuss

Theorists have been and for a long time interested in trying to explain why people commit crimes and violence and whether people have the choice and choose to commit crime (Classical theory) or it is in their genes (positivists theory). In 1897 Durkheim in concentrated his efforts to understand society and was investigating social facts. In his book Suicide (1897) Durkheim explained the anomie concept where he outlined the causes of suicide and described a condition or malaise in individuals, characterized by an absence or diminution of standards or values and an associated feeling of alienation and purposelessness. According to Thompson 1984, Durkheim felt that his empirical study of suicide had discovered the structural forces that caused anomie and egoism, and these forces were natural results of the decline of mechanical solidarity and the slow rise of organic solidarity due to the division of labour and industrialism. Also of importance was Durkheim's discovery that these forces affected all social classes.
A major figure in the development of Criminal theories is Robert K. Merton. He introduced his social theory of deviance first in 1938 and extended and revised it in 1957. Merton argued that individuals in different social class positions in the social structure do not possess the same opportunity of realizing the shared values of success, and this situation generates deviance in terms of an individual’s adaptation to the goal of success. He went on to identify social class as casual factor in the generation of deviance (Newburn, 2007). Merton believed that conformity leads to crime and deviance. This is the opposite of Durkheim’s conception of Anomie where he suggests that crime and deviance is a result