Functionalists and subcultural theorists

Evaluation of Durkheim

Key idea: Society is bound together by shared norms and values, but some rule-breaking is inevitable because not all individuals are adequately socialised.

Strengths:

• Durkheim was the first to recognise that crime can have positive functions for society. E.g. reinforcing boundaries between right and wrong by uniting people against the wrongdoer.

Limitations:

• Durkheim claims society requires a certain amount of deviance to function but offers no way of knowing how much is the right amount

• While crime might be functional for some, it is not functional for victims.

Evaluation of Merton

Key idea: blocked opportunities to achieve society’s goals by legitimate means causes individuals to use criminal means.

Strengths:

• Merton shows how both normal ad deviant behaviour arise from the same goals. Conformists and innovators both pursue “money success”, but by difference means

• He explains the patterns shows in official statistics: most crime is property crime, because society values wealth so highly: Working -class crime rates ate higher, because they have less opportunity to obtain wealth legitimately.

Limitations:

• Merton ignores crimes of the wealthy and over-predicts the amount of working-class crime.

• He sees the deviance solely as an individual response, ignoring crimes with no economic motive. E.g. vandalism

• Merton focuses on ulitarian crime, e.g. theft, ignoring crimes with no economic motive, e.g. vandalism

Evaluation of subcultural theorists

Key idea: individuals whose legitimate opportunities are blocked may turn to deviant subcultures as an alternative means of achieving status

Strengths:

• These theories show how subcultures perform a function for their members by offering solutions to the problem of failing to achieve mainstream goals legitimately

• Cloward and Ohlin show how different types of neighbourhood give rise to different illegitimate opportunities and different subcultures

Limitations:

• Like Merton, they ignore crimes of the wealthy and over-predict the amount of working-class crime.

• They assume everyone starts with mainstream goals and turn to subcultures when they fail to achievement them. But some people don’t share those goals in the first place: They may be attracted to crime for other reasons.

• Actual subcultures ate not as clean-cut as Cloward and Ohlin claims. Some show characteristics of all three types: criminal, conflict and retreatists.

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