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Social Control: Informal and Formal Methods, Prevention, Deterrence, and Justice

This chapter explores the various forms of social control, including informal and formal methods, prevention, deterrence, and the wheels of justice. It examines the principles that determine social control exerted over group members and the three methods of formal social control. The theory of deterrence, facts about crime, and the role of the police and the criminal justice system are also discussed.

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Social Control: Informal and Formal Methods, Prevention, Deterrence, and Justice

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  1. Chapter 8 Social Control

  2. Chapter Outline • Informal Control • Formal Control • Prevention • Deterrence • The Wheels of Justice • Reform and Resocialization

  3. Social Control • Collective efforts to ensure conformity to the norms. • Most of us conform most of the time to avoid offending those around us. • Others just don’t seem to care about others or what they think. • 70% of societies with more than 100 members have formal means of social control, including specialists in enforcement.

  4. Hechter and Kanazawa: Degrees of Social Control Three principles determine the social control groups exert over members: • principle of dependence: The more dependent members are on a group, the more they conform to group norms. • principle of visibility: The more the behavior of group members is observed by other members, the more they conform. • principle of extensiveness: The greater the scope of norms upheld by the group, the greater their contribution to overall social order.

  5. Three Methods of Formal Social Control • Remove opportunities for deviant acts to occur or eliminate their causes. • Deter deviance with the threat of punishment. • Reform or resocialize people so they no longer want to deviate.

  6. Gibbs:Theory of Deterrence • The more rapid, certain, and severe the punishment for a crime, the lower the rate at which such crimes will occur. • Severe sentences will not deter crimes if people think there is little risk of being caught or their punishment will be delayed. • Not even quick and certain punishment will deter crime if the punishment is very mild.

  7. Facts About Crime • It’s far from certain that you will bepunished for committing a crime. • If you are punished, it will likely be long after the crime. • It is likely that the punishment will not be severe, at least not the first few times you are caught.

  8. The Police • Only 6 out of every 10 crimes are unreported, because many people lack confidence in the police. • The majority of people in most Western European nations as well as Canada and the U.S. have a lot of confidence in their police. • There is less confidence in Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America. • In Russia and Mexico, only 1/3 have confidence in the police.

  9. The Police • Even when a crime is reported, the police are often unable to find the criminal. • The Canadian police have the best record for solving burglaries and they succeed in only 1 of 5 cases. • The American police solve slightly more than 1 burglary out of 10. • Police in Poland succeed in about 1 case out of 20.

  10. Percent of Crimes Reported to the Police

  11. “How Much Confidence Do You Have in the Policed?”

  12. Reported Crimes Cleared by Arrest

  13. Zeisel’s Summary of the American Criminal Justice System • Of every 1,000 felonies committed in the U.S., 540 are reported to the police. • Of these, 65 result in an arrest. • Of all those arrested, 36 are prosecuted and convicted. • Of those convicted, 17 are sentenced to serve time in jail or prison. • Of these, 3 are sentenced to serve more than one year.

  14. Prisons • It costs more than $50,000 a year to keep a person in prison in the United States. • The recidivism rate is as high among the new therapeutic prisons as the older punitive prisons: 60%.

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