Lecture Notes: Crime and Deviance

Introduction to Crime and Deviance

• Explores concepts of crime and deviance.
• Applies these concepts to various issues and situations.

Different Explanations of Crime and Deviance

Defining Deviance

• Deviance: Rule-breaking behavior violating social norms.
  • Formal norms: Laws and organizational rules.
  • Informal norms: Social expectations without formal punishment.
• Sociological perspectives on deviance include good, odd, and bad behavior.
• Involves subjective judgments and power dynamics.

Functionalist Perspectives

• Consensus: Societal agreement on norms and values.
• Control: Deviance explained by breakdown of social controls.
• Deviance is seen as normal and functional for boundary setting and social change.
• Criticisms include conflict theory views on manufactured consensus.

Strain Theory

• Merton's concept of anomie: Social strain leads to deviance.
• Structural tensions: Goals and means are misaligned.
• Responses include conformity, innovation, and rebellion.

Ecological Theories

• Relation between individuals and their environments affects crime.
• Social disorganization theory: Crime linked to community disorganization.
• Concentric zone theory: Crime concentrated in transition zones of cities.

Critical Theories

• Focus on how deviance is constructed and criminalized in capitalist societies.
• Orthodox Marxist theories: Rule creation reflects capitalist interests.
• Socialization controls behavior by aligning with ruling class interests.

Social Construction of Crime and Deviance

• Interactionist views: Deviance is socially constructed.
• Labelling theory: Labels affect identity and behavior.
• Deviancy amplification: Media and social reaction amplify deviance.

Postmodern Criminology

• Discourse: Media shapes narratives of crime and control.
• Spectacle: Media creates spectacles around crime (e.g., World Trade Center attacks).

Power, Social Control, and Crime

• Power: Central to rule creation and enforcement.
• Social control: Formal (laws) and informal (norms) control mechanisms.
• Surveillance and control: Methods of monitoring and controlling populations.

Social Distribution of Crime and Deviance

• Patterns of crime by age, class, gender, ethnicity, and locality.
• Victim surveys: Capture unreported crimes and risk factors.
• Challenges: Underreporting, victimization, and biases in official statistics.

Suicide: Sociological Perspectives

• Use of suicide to explore sociological issues of definition, classification, and causality.
• Durkheim's types of suicide: Egoistic, altruistic, anomic, and fatalistic.
• Realist and interpretivist perspectives on understanding suicide.
• Challenges in data collection and classification of suicide.

Conclusion

• Crime and deviance are complex phenomena influenced by social structures, power dynamics, and cultural contexts.
• Various theoretical perspectives provide insights but also face criticisms and limitations.