Hall

Who is Stuart Hall?

• Founding member of Birmingham School of Cultural Studies

  • Influential in studies of media and representation of minority groups

• Examined the 'crisis of hegemony' in the 1970s in the UK in
  'Policing the Crisis'

• Applied Marxist ideas of structural inequality and Interactionist ideas of moral panics to the crisis

What is the crisis of hegemony?

• The 1970s saw many challenges to the established order

• High unemployment and economic crises

• Industrial action and activism

• Height of conflict in Northern Ireland

• OPEC Oil Crisis,

• Rise of international terrorism

What is the moral panic of black criminality?

• From the early 1970s, reports of black men attacking and stealing were reported in media and through parliament, which created a moral panic about black criminality

• These reports were exaggerated and seen as a threat to society alongside other actions such as protesting

• This demonised black men and led to the development of stop and search policies or the 'suss law'

What did Hall et al find out about policing the crisis in 1979?

• Using neo-Marxist explanations, Hall et al examined the reactions of individuals and social institutions to the reporting of mugging

• Hall et al suggested that the wider social origins of crime were rooted in the unequal capitalist system

• Social crisis accompanied this economic crisis - the 'crisis of hegemony' as people began to challenge the dominant norms of the ruling class

• This led to challenges to the dominant norms and values of society and, as such, people demonstrated and used industrial action to try and ensure their needs were met - this led to crime

• The reaction of the police and the government to these crimes was to act by utilising the media to generate a moral panic of black criminality

• With public support, this enabled the government to use force against the 'folk devils' - i.e. black men

• Hall et al found that there was little rise in black criminality in this period

• While Hall et al contended that 'scapegoating' was not an intended practice, they suggest that this became practice as a reaction to criminality

• Police procedures helped to create an environment where individuals would react to being victimised

What are the evaluations of Hall?

• Links to both new criminology of Taylor, Walton and Young and labelling theories

• Examined both the structural and social action reactions of criminality

• Critics have suggested that they suggest that black crime didn't rise, but that the reactions of police caused crime

• Can only partially explain why minority groups are over-represented in crime statistics