Crime and deviance are acts that will elicit dissent from society. They take various forms and involve various concepts and theories. It will be the aim of this paper to explore those that are considered to be functional for society. It was Emile Durkheim who first clearly established the logic behind the functional approach to the study of crime and deviance[1] when he wrote The Rules of Sociological Method and The Division of Labour[2]. In those works, Durkheim argued that crime and deviance is “an integral part of all healthy societies”. He reasoned that crime and deviance are not only inevitable, but also functional for society and that they will only be considered dysfunctional when they …show more content…
As societies expanded due to the economic demands posed by the Industrial Revolution, Durkheim said that the moral ties which bounded society together were weakened. Therefore, as society became more complex, a mechanism was engineered to effectively regulate these relationships and the result was the legal system[5]. The codification of moral behaviour, through laws, created guide-lines for large-scale societies. The foundation of these boundaries is in effect a function of crime and deviance, because without crime and deviance, on what basis would these laws be drafted upon? It follows that when a crime is committed, the legal locomotive will set in to punish the convicted accordingly. Without dwelling into the functions of punishment, the concept of Durkheim’s Degrading Ceremonies must be explained. Through agencies like the mass media and the Courts (when conducting public hearings), criminal behaviour would be publicised. The publicising of these acts functions to make the public aware of the tolerance of society, and also reinforces the society’s opinion of such criminal behaviour. This promotion of “boundary maintenance”[6] brings upon the next function of crime and deviance – integration. When a crime is so deviant that it far exceeds society’s tolerance, it triggers public alarm and outrage[7] that draws the
However, while crime was a big offender in any society, Durkheim’s anomie theory was about how society gave little to no moral support to those individuals who were pressured into a life of crime— ironic, isn’t it?
Durkheim states that crime and deviance is inevitable and a certain level is necessary for society to exist. He also claims that it is a positive aspect of society as it shows examples of rights and wrongs within society and by punishing offenders, through ways such as public humiliation and portraying crime as wrong, raises awareness of crime and therefore deters others from committing crime along with creating a collective conscience. He also argues that crime and deviance allows social change to occur which is needed in order for society to remain stable. Durkheim’s
Furthermore Durkheim doesn’t specify how much crime is good for society before we fall into anomie. New Right sociologists such as Murray would be critical of this as they believe that subcultures which carry out criminal and deviant acts form an underclass which threatens society on the whole rather than strengthening ‘boundary maintenence.However Durkheim doesn’t state why people commit crimes, another functionalist who did was Merton.
Durkheim: Punishment is one of the main aims of the criminal justice system. As crime is an act that is in breach with the collective conscious the punishment of criminals plays a main role in the maintenance of social solidarity. When the state of collective conscience is violated, the response of the society is consisted of 'repressive sanctions ' that do not aim for retribution or deterrence, but aim to prevent the demoralisation of those who are making sacrifices for the interest of society. The punishment of criminals is required to sustain the commitment of citizens to the society (Pratt 1994, pp.2-3). If punishment is not present members of the community may lose their
‘Using material from item A and elsewhere, assess the usefulness of Marxist approach to an understanding of crime and deviance’ (21 marks)
The society generally has established customs and moral imperative to guide the conduct of each member of that particular society. These norms designating certain ways in which people ought to live in the society exist in societal laws and moral prescription. The justifications for the ideal practices in the society have been found in the desire to maintain peaceful coexistence in the society. The extent of freedom of an individual is therefore often curtailed for the greater good of the society. These utilitarian considerations have been discussed amidst the concept and rationale of punishment. John Stuart Mill, Michel Foucault and Kantian ethics have been used to justify or refute the notion and rationale of punishment in our society. These ethical perspectives provide useful insight into understanding punishment and its justifications or otherwise. Punishment is necessary as a social control tool and must be exerted with reasonableness and with due regard for the aim for which it is exerted.
Abnormal behavior in one society appears normal in the other society (Nairne, 426). Deviance is weighed by the society’s reactions to the particular behavior, also it is measured by the society’s way of life so that it defines the unwelcoming behavior. It ignores the social order and some organizations believe, the reality in society.
Even though the certainty of crime may exist, Durkheim and Moynihan’s views contrast in their theories concerning humanity’s acceptance of crime as well as crime ultimately serving for the good of humankind. Their view of crime continues to a dramatically differentiate in their vantage points of crime. Durkheim’s views are contextual, and his perspective of crime is one that considers the overall impact of the offense. Society must experience change, if not they are controlled and without freedom, overall crime serves a positive purpose. Moynihan views are much more compartmentalized, focusing on the front lines of change, as he identifies the impact of the tolerance of violence and behaviors that he believes have an adverse impact on society.
Imagine a ‘society of saints’, without crime, a notion put forward by Emile Durkheim a historical theorist who argued that this concept is unattainable within society. Social control is and has been present in all societies, organized groups, and cultures since the beginning of time. There are many historical and modern perspectives, which help draw conclusions on the study of deviance and social control, two concepts that go hand in hand. In discussing the connection between social control and deviance, it will reveal why Durkheim’s notion, that in a ‘society of saints’, crime will be found, is very true.
First of all, the capacity of some vested groups to assemble mass communications to impact the values of others through good campaigns focused toward specific behaviours, for example, homosexual relations, people suiciding, smoking in public places, illegal drug uses, etc., can easily influence the sorts of behaviours that are characterized as either criminal or accepted by the society (Henry, 2009: 2). This stands in correlation to the human attempt to make a moral social order in which some behaviour is characterized as deviant or unacceptable and other conduct is characterized as acceptable, through the making of rules that subject rule violators to sanctions and don 't allow some behaviours. Though deviance is taken to be an infringement of social standards, crime on the other hand is seen as an infringement of criminal law, and though deviance is behaviour seen as distinctive and also is contrarily evaluated as morally offensive and threatening, were crime on the other hand is seen as destructive financially, physically, mentally and socially bringing about people who have been victimized or who endure a loss, a constraint of what they were preceding the offence (Henry and Lanier, 2001).
This paper is on the Classical School theory that emerged in the eighteenth century; two writes of this period were Cesare Beccaria and Jeremy Bentham. Among the major ideas that descend from this theory are the concepts of humans as free-willed, rational beings, utilitarianism (the greatest good for the greatest number), civil rights and due process of law, rules of evidence and testimony, determinate sentencing, and deterrence. The writes during this period examined not only human nature but also social conditions as well. The Classical School, gave us a humanistic conception of how law and criminal justice system should be constructed. Law was to protect the rights of both society and individual, and its chief purpose was to deter criminal behavior, the law emphasized moral responsibility and the duty of citizens to consider full the consequences of behavior before they acted. This thinking required humans possessing free will and a rations nature.
Criminologists and sociologist have long been in debate for century's to explain criminal behaviour. The two main paradigms of thought are between 'nature' and 'nurture'. Nature is in reference to a learnt behaviour where a multitude of characteristics, in society influence whether a person becomes deviant such as poverty, physical abuse or neglect. Nurture defines biological features which could inevitability lead to a individuals deviant or criminal behaviour, because criminality is believed by biological positivist to be inherited from a persons parents. However, I believe that criminal behaviour is a mixture of characteristics that lead to deviant acts such as psychological illness & Environmental factors. Therefore, this essay
In the United States of America, societal deviance changes nearly on a daily basis. Depending on the current culture, deviance is modified to make societal heroes like celebrities, political figures, and sport players look less deviant and more like role models for the public. The change in what is considered “normal” is customarily a result of society in general. By using a reference group of people, individuals tend to identify with those who are in the lime light. Then when that role model does something appalling, the public becomes desensitized to this behavior and its abnormality and becomes less distinct thus adding to the change in social deviances.
If I were hired by the Waterloo Regional Police to educate the general public about deviance, criminality, and policing. I would choose concepts that the general public (anyone from grade school to seniors) can relate to, in order for the message being conveyed to have a lasting impact. The five concepts that I would educate the community about are; why/what is deviance and the why it matters, strain theory, rational choice theory, labeling theory, and theoretical perspectives on crime (techniques of neutralization).
Emile Durkheim focused his social article investigation mainly on criminal acts. In his view the punishment established within a culture helps to define acceptable behavior in this contributes to sustainability.