4.1: Crime and Social Control

Crime is ubiquitous; no countries are completely devoid of crime.
Most countries organize justice systems by police, courts, and prisons.
Adult males make up the largest category of crime suspects.
Theft is the most common crime and violent crime is relatively rare.
Crime rates are usually expressed as number/100,000 people.
- Violent and property crimes are two major types of crimes.
- Transnational crime: a crime that occurs across one or more national borders

Inequality in society, emphasis on material well-being, and corporate profit produce societal strains and individual frustrations
There has been a recent decline in crime rates.
- A shift from punitive to prevention policies will reduce the human and economic costs of crime.
Restorative justice: a philosophy concerned with reconciling conflict among the victim, the offender, and the community
- Response to the current state of criminal justice
- Focuses on repairing the relationship between the victim, offender, and community

Crime: a violation of a federal, state, or local criminal law
- The offender must have acted voluntarily and with intent and have no legally acceptable excuse.

Sheriff and police departments voluntarily report to the FBI annually the number of reported crimes and arrests.
Clearance rate: a percentage of cases in which arrests, charges, and referrals to courts have been made
- Large numbers of crimes go unreported.
- Police might not record reported crimes.
- Crime rates might be exaggerated due to external pressures and policing motivations.

Phases out UCR system
Details on every crime incident and separate offenses within incident
Collects data on victims, known offenders, relationships between victims and offenders, arrestees, and property involved in crimes

Attempts to account for unreported crimes
- Dark figure of crime: unreported crime
Large scale annual survey interviews a representative sample of 150k people over 12 years old in 95k households to collect data about victimization, relationship to and characteristics of offender, and harm.

Surveys that collect data from people about their criminal behaviors.
Attempt to bridge the gap between unreported crimes but are still subject to exaggeration and concealment.
Reveal that almost every adult has engaged in some criminal behavior.
Crime funnel helps us understand why only some are convicted.
- Behavior must become known to have occurred.
- Behavior must come to the attention of the police, who then file a report, investigate, and make an arrest.
- Arrestees must go through a preliminary hearing, an arraignment, and a trial, at which they may or may not be convicted.

Functions of crime include group cohesion and social change (Durkheim).
Anomie Theory
- When society limits legitimate means to acquire cultural goals, the resulting strain leads to criminal behaviors.
- Conformity occurs when culturally defined goals are accepted and socially legitimate means to achieve them exist.
- Innovation, ritualism, retreatism, and rebellion are expressions of strain.
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General Strain Theory (Agnew)
- When a person experiences strain this leads to criminal behavior.
Subcultural Theories
- Some groups have values and attitudes conducive to violence.
- Members adopt the crime-promoting attitudes of the group.
Control Theory (Hirschi)
- Social bond: the bond between individuals and the social order that constrains some individuals from violating social norms
- Social bonds prevent some people from criminal behaviors.
- Social bonds include attachment, commitment, involvement, and belief.

Focus is on how laws are created and enforced by those in power to protect the interests of the ruling class
Connection between societal social inequality and crime rates.
- The greater the income inequality, the higher the homicide rate.
- In cities with high unemployment, unemployed defendants have a substantially higher probability of pretrial detention.
- Female prostitutes are more likely to face arrest compared to the men who seek their services.

Labeling Theory (Becker)
- Being labeled deviant leads to further deviant behavior.
- Primary deviance: deviance committed before a person is labeled an offender
- Secondary deviance: deviance which results from being caught and labeled
Differential Association Theory
- Individuals learn the values and attitudes associated with crime as well as the techniques and motivations for criminal behavior through interactions with others