Criminology - U2 - Left Realism Evaluation

Strength - Focus on Social and Economic Causes of Crime

Left realism highlights how poverty, inequality, and relative deprivation contribute to crime. By addressing these social and economic factors, crime rates could potentially be reduced.

Strength - Highlights Impact on Deprived Communities

Left realism draws attention to the reality of street crime and its disproportionate effect on victims from deprived backgrounds, ensuring their experiences are not overlooked.

Weakness - Overlooks White-Collar and Corporate Crime

Henry and Milovanovic argue that left realism largely accepts the authorities' definition of crime, which focuses on street-level offences such as theft and violence. This approach neglects crimes committed by the powerful, such as white-collar and corporate crimes, which can cause significant harm to society.

Weakness - Ignores the Harm of Elite Crime on the Poor

Left realism does not sufficiently address how the powerful commit crimes that harm the poor, such as financial fraud, environmental crimes, and corruption.

Weakness - Overpredicts Working-Class Crime

Left realism assumes that relative deprivation and marginalisation inevitably lead to crime, which could overestimate the actual crime rates among working-class individuals.

Weakness - Exaggerates Crime in Certain Areas

By focusing on high-crime inner-city areas, left realism may create a misleading impression that crime is a more widespread and serious issue than it actually is across society as a whole.

Weakness - Idealistic Rather Than Realistic

Left realism's core proposal—a fairer, more equal society to reduce crime—may be unrealistic. Critics argue this is no more practical than traditional Marxist calls for a revolution.

Weakness - Fails to Explain Gender Differences in Crime

If marginalisation causes crime, then women—who are often more marginalised than men—should commit more crimes. However, this is not the case, suggesting left realism does not fully consider gender as a factor in crime.

Weakness - Limited Impact of Police Reforms

The introduction of elected police and crime commissioners in 2012 did not increase public confidence in the police. Low voter turnout suggests little public interest in this reform, meaning it has not strengthened police-community relations as left realists hoped.