RADICAL PERSPECTIVES ON CRIME AND SOCIETY

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• RADICAL PERSPECTIVES ON CRIME AND SOCIETY

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Comparisons Consensus v Conflict Approaches

• Consensus
• Nature of crime unproblematic
• Definition unproblematic
• Seeks causal explanation-scientific method
• Social democratic-solutions within system
• CJS works for society within rule of law
• Progress through causal understanding the
  better society

• Conflict
• Recognises partial nature of crime crimes of
  the powerful
• Definition in the interests of the powerful
• Crime reflects wider/deeper social inequalities
• The system is part of the problem
• Agencies of social control work in the interests
  of the powerful
• Social constructionist or reactionist
• Utopian-major social changes

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Radical Approaches

• Many traditions, in the readings Chambliss,
  Classical Marxist
• Non Marxist conflict approaches e.g. Dahrendorf
• In term two feminist perspectives
• In relation to responses to crime restorative
  justice including peacemaking stances
• Todays example is The New Criminology
• Ensure you read a general chapter on radical
  approaches as part of this weeks work

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• The New Criminology by Taylor, Walton and
• Young 1973
• Inequality lies at the root of crime
• This derives from the material basis of
  society
• Rejects much criminology as correctionalism and
  part of ruling class ideology
• Individuals turn to crime as meaningful response
  to inequality
• Utopian vision of a tolerant, socialist society

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In developing a fully social theory of deviance a
clearer understanding of crime from a critical
perspective emerges

• A. The Act
• 1. The Wider Origins of the Deviant Act
• 2. The Immediate Origins of the Deviant Act
• 3. The Actual Act
• B. The Reaction
• 4. The Immediate Origins of the Social Reaction
• 5. The Wider Origins of the Deviant Reaction
• 6. The Outcome of the Social Reaction to a
  Deviant's Further Action

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A. The Criminal Act

• 1. trace the "wider origins" of deviance to
  structural relationships and inequalities in the
  basic political and economic organisation of
  capitalist society.
• 2 understand the way in which different types of
  crime are related to an individual's social
  circumstances, motivations, and choices
• 3 what a particular criminal act means to the
  people involved. Why they chose to follow this
  path.

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B. The Reaction

• 4. understand the meanings given to the act by
  those directly and indirectly involved in its
  production. Why some acts result in a formal
  criminal response. Eg. police, local community
  etc
• 5. understand why crimes are treated
  differentially, who decides this and how this is
  affected by
• a. the individual's structural location in
  society whether they are rich / poor, powerful /
  powerless, their social class, gender and the
  like.
• b. the individual's personal attributes. E.g.
  manner, dress, language

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• 6 understanding of the process whereby the
  deviant comes to see the deviation as the
  "solution" to a particular "problem- accepting
  or rejecting the label
• the relationship between the act and the reaction
  studied fully gives a far more complete theory
  than anything before in Criminology.
• Read about the study Policing the Crisis Hall et
  al, 1979 and consider the usefulness of the
  analysis.

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CRITIQUE

• Thorough and rigorous analysis
• Provides framework for empirical work
• Challenges much previous work
• Builds on insights of labelling theory and
  neo-Marxist approaches
• BUT
• Romanticises criminals fighting against the
  system
• Ignores women and victims
• Ignores some crimes eg in the domestic/private
  arena
• However, re-inforces the fact that crime is a
  relative and socially constructed concept