PUNISHMENT Although punishment has been a crucial feature of every developed legal system, widespread disagreement exists over the moral principles that can justify its imposition. One fundamental question is why (and whether) the social institution of punishment is warranted. A second question concerns the necessary conditions for criminal liability and punishment in particular cases. A third relates to the form and severity of punishment that is appropriate for particular offenses and offenders. Debates about punishment are important in their own right, but they also raise more general problems about the proper standards for evaluating social practices.
There are many theories relating to deviance and crime with each theory illustrating a different aspect of the procedure by which people break rules and are classed as deviants or criminals. (New texts pg 138) which highlights the problems in defining crime or deviance. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN CRIME AND DEVIANCE Many believe crime and deviance has developed on separate tracks over the years as criminologist serve only for legality, crime and crime-related phenomena. The study of deviance however serves for a wider range of behaviours that are not necessarily illegal for example suicide, alcoholism, homosexuality, mentally disordered behaviours. (Bader et al) The main difference between crime and deviance is deviant behaviour is when a social norm has been broken whereas a crime is where a formal and social norm is broken.
The division between and crime control and welfare is blurred!!!! Ah no shit? :) → Garland argues on two areas 1.punitive segregation; means increase in control and the utilisations of what he calls `expressive punishment (punitive) 2.preventative partnership; characterised by a withdrawal of the centralised control of criminal justice in favour of working to control crime through communities partnership and a new emphasise on crime prevention (softer set of innovation) Policies are; child protection, risk assessment, antisocial behaviour, restorative justice However sometimes the extent of punitiveness may be overestimated in particular policy field, and other times when they aim preventative strategies they unwittingly lead
It is defined as: “A structural perspective which argues that although crime and deviance are problematic, they must also be understood as ‘social facts’ and analysed in terms of the possible manifest and latent functions that they perform in enabling the smooth running of the social system as a whole” (McLaughin, 2013, p. 190) This theory focused on the social structures within society at the macro level. Functionalism suggests that not only is crime a part of society, but crime
As OCS is social construct, different actors involved in constructing the figures to distort the reality of crime. Although OCS is not reliable, we can still learn something from it. In the following, we will discuss the reliability of OCS and explain what problems are involved during the procedure of OCS and discover the merits of OCS. Definition of social construct Social construct refers to “persons and groups interacting together in a social system form, over time, concepts or mental representations of each other's actions, and that these concepts eventually become habituated into reciprocal roles played by the actors in relation to each other” (Berger, P. L. and Luckmann, T. 1966). Since OCS relies largely on criminal law while criminal law is socially constructed by social norms from different actors, OCS is regarded as social construct.
The most methodologically sophisticated individual-level studies offer evidence supporting the link between race and police brutality suggested by both perspectives (Smith, 1986; Worden, 1996). It remains unclear whether inclusion of community accountability variables in the statistical models would attenuate that relationship. Even so, individual-level research on community accountability variables provides little evidence supporting the assumptions of the proposed policies. Beyond indicating a link between race and police brutality, research with individual-level data cannot test the predictions of the threat hypothesis, which requires aggregate-level
As a conclusion this essay will take into consideration whether the perspectives outlined are external or internal in their description of reasons for crime and deviance and try and determine the relevance of the arguments. Deviance according to Jary and Jary in the Dictionary of Sociology (2000) is any social behaviour that departs from that regarded as normal or socially acceptable in a society or social context. Deviance will include criminal behaviour; but it's scope is far wider than just criminal behaviour. Deviant behaviour is not necessary criminal - according to the legal code of a given society, culture or country. Crime is defined as an infraction of criminal law.
Community Policing Assignment “Community policing can mean different things to different people. Throughout the world, there is a range of different models and structures in existence. Essentially however, Community Policing is best defined not in terms of a single structure but as a philosophy. “ (Connolly J ( 2004 )p.13 ) When exploring Community Policing it is a very good starting point to explore the concept as a philosophy rather than a single aspect of any one role of An Garda Siochana. There is a substantial difference between what the police are “a body of people patrolling public places in blue uniforms, with a broad mandate of crime control, order maintenance and some negotiable social service functions” (Reiner, 1985).
Howell, J. and Pearce, M. (2002) ‘Genealogies of the Conceptual Encounter’, Civil Society and Development: A Critical Exploration (Lynne Reinner Publishers:London) (2) pp. 13-38 Summary: The historical context of civil society and its multiple understandings are seen as its contribution to promote discussion. It involves essentially the relationships among the state, individual and society derived from dichotomized mainstream and alternative genealogies of thinking with such intra-variability that none of them can be convincing or complete(Howell & Pearce, 2002: 13-17). They both affect policy and practice differently, with the former addressing poverty issues in homogenous Tocquevillian/modernist lines and the latter in a more holistic fashion, looking at factors beyond the pursuit of commercial interests and well-defined “right” sets of policies. According to Howell and Pearce (2002: 37), alternative genealogy reinvented the concept of civil society by making it a space for contestation and challenge of the systemic capitalist spread, supported by values of reciprocal solidarity.
Crime can only be a social problem if it breaks rules in the social system. The human societies often have different minds to what a social problem consists of. There are many known definitions of social problems throughout different societies and worldwide. Criminology in the narrow sense is concerned with the study of the phenomenon of crime, and of the factors or circumstances which may have influence on or be associated with the criminal behaviour and the state of crime in general. The understanding of criminology is to see social problems and cause of the crimes and how they have affect on people in society.