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Chapter 7. Deviance, Crime and Social Control. Social Control. Attempts by society to regulate people’s thought and behavior. Conformity – going along with peers Obedience – compliance with higher authorities in a hierarchical structure. Informal and Formal Social Control.
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Chapter 7 Deviance, Crime and Social Control
Social Control • Attempts by society to regulate people’s thought and behavior. • Conformity – going along with peers • Obedience – compliance with higher authorities in a hierarchical structure
Informal and Formal Social Control • Informal social control: Used casually to enforce norms • Smiles, laughter, raised eyebrows, ridicule • Formal social control: Carried out by authorized agents • Informal social control can undermine formal social control, encouraging people to violate social norms
Sanctions • Penalties and rewards for conduct concerning a social norm
Deviance • Recognized violation of cultural norms.
Social Foundation of Deviance • Deviance varies according to cultural norms. • People become deviant as others define them that way. • Both norms and the way people define them involve social power.
Durkheim’s 4 Functions • Deviance affirms cultural values and norms. • Responding to deviance clarifies moral boundaries. • Responding to deviance brings people together. • Deviance encourages social change.
Crime • violation of society’s formally enacted criminal law • criminal justice system – a formal response by police, courts, and prison officials to alleged violations of the law
5 criticisms of the criminal justice system • Tendency of police to arrest suspects from minority groups at substantially higher rates than those from the majority group in situations where discretion is possible. • The overrepresentation of certain dominant social, ethnic, and racial groups on juries. • The difficulty the poor encounter in affording bail. • The poor quality of free legal defense. • The disparity in sentencing for members of dominant and minority groups.
Merton’s Anomie Theory • The strain between our culture’s emphasis on wealth and the limited opportunity to get rich gives rise to crime and other forms of deviance.
Labeling Theory • Deviance and conformity result, not so much from what people do, as from how others respond to those actions. • Primary deviance – passing episodes of norm violation • Secondary deviance – repeated violation of norm. Takes on a deviant identity. • Stigma – a powerfully negative social label that changes a person’s self-concept and social identity, operating as a master status.
Differential Association • Deviance is learned in groups • Exposure to attitudes favorable to criminal acts leads to a violation of the rules.
Routine Activities Theory • In order to have crime you must have motivated offenders and suitable targets.
Social disorganization theory • Increases in crime and deviance can be attributed to the absence or breakdown of communal relationships and social institutions.
Control Theory • Social control depends on imagining the consequences of one’s behavior
FBI Index of Crime • 8 types of crimes that are tabulated each year by the FBI • Murder, rape, assault, robbery, theft, grand motor theft, arson, and burglary.
Types of crime • Organized crime – a business supplying illegal goods or services. • Professional crime – pursues crime as a day –to-day occupation • Corporate crime – the illegal actions of a corporation or those acting on its behalf • White collar crime – crimes committed by persons of high social position in the course of their occupations. • Hate crimes – a criminal act against a person or a person’s property motivated by bias.
Types of Crimes • Transnational crime – crime that occurs across multiple national borders • Crimes against the person – direct violence or the threat of violence against others. • Crimes against property – involve theft of property belonging to others. • Victimless crimes – violations of law in which there are no readily apparent victims.
4 reasons to punish • Deterrence – attempt to discourage criminality through punishment. • Societal protection – rendering an offender incapable of further offenses.
4 reasons to punish • Rehabilitation – reforming the offender to prevent subsequent offenses. • Retribution – an act of moral vengeance by which society subjects an offender to suffering comparable to that caused by the offense.
Figure 25-3: Executions by State since 1976 Source: Death Penalty Information Center 2011.