Interactionist theories of crime- key sociologists

Key sociologists and theories relating to social distribution of crime

Becker- Labelling theory

Negative label → Self concept → label reinforced → master status → Deviant Career.

Being labelled as deviant leads to deviance amplification, causing label to be master status., becoming career criminals.

Labelling also impacts on the creation of laws- governments and legal systems apply labels to deviant activities through criminalising them.

Becker- Evaluation

Focus on the “underdogs” of society which gave sociology a greater understanding of how criminals were stigmatised.

Did little to explain why initial acts of crime occurred, or comment on the impact of crime on the real vicitms.

Often sided with criminals rather than the “real” victims of crime, but didn’t note why they turned to crime in the first place.

Lemert- Primary and Secondary Deviance

Primary deviance- refers to the acts that people commit before they are labelled as deviant.

Social reactions of society define whether the act is deviant or not.

Societal reaction- how individuals react determines the reaction of the individual.

Secondary deviance- identifying the person as deviant could impact on future deviance (re-offending).

With high rates of re-offending- focus on societal reaction could aid rehabilitation- possibly reducing crime rates.

Lemert- Evaluation

links to other applications of labelling theory (education and mental heath)

Soft determinism- one label can change a person’s future forever.

Critics- deviance is seen negatively temporarily then overcome.

Cicourel- Negotiation of Justice

MC were able to “negotiate the justice system” better than WC.

Stereotypes from roles in the CJS meant low-income backgrounds people more likely to be charged.

Stage 1- police interpretation of someone’s behaviour.

Stage 2- If arrested or reported, further interpretations are made (typical delinquent?)

More consistent in “bad” areas- low income, minority ethnic etc.

MC- “youthful high spirits" e.g. Bullingdon Club vs WC- “typical delinquent”

Cicourel- Evaluation

Assumption that all members of justice label delinquents in the same way, rather than judging cases on individual merit.

Offers limited explanations of why crimes were committed in the first place.

Cohen- Moral Panic + Folk Devils

Mods v Rockers

Folk Devil- media reports on deviant behaviour construct a narrative which features a clear villain (folk devil)- over-simplified, ill-informed generalisations.

Moral Panic- sensationalist, over the top reaction to an issue that appears to relate to morality.

Media created moral panic over mods and rockers, creating deviancy amplification.

Media is one agency that takes on the role of moral entrepreneur.

Folk devils are the opposite of dark figure of crime- “over-labelled”, “over-represented” and “over-exposed”.

Examples- Knife crime, urban music- paint WC and MEGs as folk devils.

Cohen- Evaluation

McRobbie and Thornton- moral panics have diminished due to diversity of media saturation.

Some youth subcultures are mainstream- Race culture.

Elements in contemporary society- Reaction to Covid (Covidiots).

Braithwaite- shaming

positive labelling

disintegrative shaming- where only the crime, but also the criminal, is labelled as bad and the offender is excluded from society.

Reintegrative shaming- labels the act but not the actor- as if to say “they have done a bad thing”, than “they are a bad person”.

Avoids stigmatisation, allowing offender and community to separate offender from offence and re-admit the wrongdoer back into society.

Avoids pushing offender into secondary deviance.

Argues that crime rates tends to be lower in societies where reintegrative shaming is dominant.

Braithwaite- Evaluation

Makes the offender seem like the victim, ignoring effect of crime on the real victim.

Doesn’t explain why offenders commit crime in the first place.