The problem for any society is that these boundaries are unclear and change over time. While a certain, limited amount of crime may perform positive functions for society, according to Durkheim, too much crime has negative consequences. His most well known concept was that of 'anomie', which has been widely used in sociology. According to Durkheim, society is based on people sharing common values which form the basis for actions. However, in periods of social change, people may be freed from the social control by collective conscience and start to look after their own self need rather than following social values.
Along with a brief description of the criminological theories, an attempt to show how they differ from one another and discussion of one strength and one weakness unique to each theory will be made. Finally, I will provide my opinion as to which of the two philosophies (classical or positivist) explains criminal behavior in a much more complete manner and why. The first of the criminological theories is called Social Control Theory. What makes a person not a criminal? This is the main question asked in control theories.
Also, it is important in this process to prove a person guilty by legally-found facts and evidence. However the crime control model does not protect a suspected offender’s rights as much. The crime control model is based more on helping the victim, even if defendant’s rights are compromised. This model attempts to repress crime and give expansive power to police. It looks to find guilt rather than prove innocence.
Assess Functionalist Approaches to the Study of Crime and Deviance Functionalists such as Emile Durkheim, Robert Merton and Albert Cohen all attempt to explain the nature and extent of crime in today’s society. In essence, Functionalists argue that society is based on value consensus and social solidarity which is sustained via socialisation and social control mechanisms within society. Emile Durkheim states that whilst crime is obviously a social negative with the ultimate power to destabilise society, he stands by the claim that crime is inevitable, universal, and integral to a healthy society and even having positive benefits. He claims that crime occurs in society due to two fundamental reasons; firstly, not everyone is effectively socialised to the same norms and values which leads to people being prone to deviation and secondly, due to the diverse lifestyle and subcultures in contemporary society, subcultures act out different norms and values and what members of that subculture regard as normal, mainstream culture may deem it as deviancy. The Functionalist approach to the study of crime states that crime has two positive functions for society.
Nathan Malbrue Charles Hauber Victimology CJUS280-1403A-01 7/18/2014 PH 2 DB Measuring Crime Victimization This paper will cover sources of reporting crime/arrest data and which I feel is best. Which method I think is accurate, significant challenges and overcoming them. The most important form of crime reporting data is from witnesses and victims. The most accurate data can be from a witness because they have nothing to gain from telling lies. The victim may lie in order to try and gain sympathy or favor.
We can conclude that biological approach has a big role to cause criminal behaviour. Therefore this is a strength of biological approach because we can easily compare the result. On the other hand, one of the main disadvantages of the biological approach is that it ignores other approaches to crime. If we look at one view to criminal
Key Concepts and Implications of Neurocriminology The concepts Dr. Raine discussed in this presentation were very thought provoking and dealt with a concept that I have long been interested in. Many of us search for an answer regarding “where does evil come from?” When a violent crime occurs that has an effect on society we often hear phrases such as, “You know there had to be something wrong with him. No person in their right mind could have done something like that.” In our search for answers, it is very typical to assume there is a defect of the mind. When Dr. Raine discussed what I felt was a key concept, if not the central theme of his presentation, “Violent offenders may know right from wrong cognitively, but may not have the feeling of right and wrong” (Raine, 2010) I think he hit on an idea that we can all buy into. At least in part, many can agree with the lack of a conscious or soul.
Whereas, Marxists believe that capitalism creates potential criminals. Functionalists believe that all crimes are functional and has both positive and negative effects to society. Durkheim, French sociologist, hold beliefs that “too much crime or deviance constitutes to a threat, too little is unhealthy”. The three main positives are that it reaffirms boundaries by the public degradation ceremonies such as criminal trails to remind everyone of social norms and to reinforce society’s toleration to deviance. Another positive is that crimes change values, when someone is prosecuted it results in public outcry which triggers sympathy, this changes values in society.
A good term for this is called “Social Desirability Bias” which means that you reply in a manner that is socially acceptable and desirable. The main purpose of this study is to allow the participants to describe the crimes in their own words instead of implying from observing participants. Honesty in these self-report studies help many different groups to better understand crime and criminal behavior. They use these reports to gather information to put them into statistics. The reports that are used are collected from the NIBRS (National Incident-Based Reporting System) and NCVS (National Crime Victimization Survey) and published by FBI in their yearly UCR ( Uniform Crime Report.)
Abstract This paper will explore and discuss the difference in opinion regarding crime and who should be held accountable for criminal activity. The views of social responsibility and social problems will be examined, along with the perspectives that each holds to justify their belief. Theories such as Determinate Sentencing that holds the value of social responsibility in response to crime, and also the Constructionist theory that places that blame on society as to why a person commits a crime. In the end I believe that Social/Individual responsibility is the most appropriate way to approach crime. Perspectives of Social Problems and Social Responsibility Within criminology there has been multiple theories suggested to explain the numerous motives behind why crime exists in our world.