Chapter 6: Complexity of Control, Hirschi's 2 Theories and Beyond

Hirschi’s 1st Theory: Social Bonds and Delinquency

• Explains why people do not commit crime

  • People are equally motivated to offend

• Delinquency arises when social bonds are weak or absent

  • Social bonds are the social controls that regulate when crime occurs

  • Variation in social bonds may explain variation in crime

4 Social Bonds

1. Attachment - direct and indirect control

   • Emotional closeness - how close youth are with their parents

2. Commitment - stake in conformity - too much to lose

   • High aspirations

3. Involvement - time and energy

   • Participation

4. Belief - assent to certain values and norms

   • Accept norms, laws and rules

Hirschi’s 2nd Theory : Self-Control and Crime

• Created with Gottfredson

  • General Theory of Crime (1990)

• Self-control is internalized early in life

  • Determines who will fall prey to the seductions of crime

• 6 Elements

  1. Crime provides short time gratification

  2. Those who engage in crime exhibit other similar behaviors

  3. Criminals do not plan their conduct

  4. Crimes are not specialized or sophisticated

  5. Offenders fail in social domains

  6. Involvement in crime appears to be stable

• The six elements comprise a single general propensity for crime called criminality

Self-control and Crime

• Lower levels of self control perpetuate higher levels of crime, deviant behavior and social failure

• A persons level of self-control (criminal propensity) is stable across the life course

• Self-control is a product of:

  • Direct control/parent supervision

  • Lower self-control is natural

    • Humans seek immediate gratification

  • To instill self-control, parents must:

    1. monitor their child

    2. recognize deviant behavior

    3. punish and correct the misconduct

Hirschi’s Revised Social Control Theory

• Rejected the instability thesis

  • Social bonds are stable

  • The source and strength of bonds is almost exclusively within the person displaying them

• Rejected self-control theory being a psychological trait explanation of crime

Self-Control Theory: Four Points

Gottfredson and Hirschi

• Modern Control Theory and Limits of Criminal Justice

  1. Self-control affects perceptions of opportunity

  2. Introduced morality

  3. Disadvantage and advantage over the life course

  4. Explained why immigrated linked to less crime

Self-Control and Vulnerability to Victimization

Schreck (1999)

• Low self-control may increase the risk of victimization

  1. Engage in risky lifestyles

  2. Fail to engage in effective crime avoidance

  3. Less likely to develop close, reciprocal relationships

  4. Lack of skills to resolve personal conflicts

Hagan (1989) - Power-Control Theory

• Gender and Delinquency

  • Power relations between spouses shape how children are controlled

• Patriarchal families:

  • Greater control over female children than male children

• Egalitarian families:

  • Supervise female and male children more similarly

Tittle (1995) - Control Balance Theory

Each person has a certain amount of control that they are under and a certain amount of control that they exert

• Control Ratio

  • Balanced control: Results in conformity

  • Control deficit

  • Control surplus

• Autonomy, goal blockage and control imbalance

Why some develop a motivation to deviate:

1. Become aware of control imbalance

   • Deviant behavior can alter imbalance

2. Must be provoked to experience a negative emotion

Once deviant motivation has emerged:

• Deviant behavior still might not occur

• Opportunity to engage in a given act

• Overcome constraints to do so

Continuum of Deviance

• Middle of continuum: Conformity

• Left side of the continuum (control deficit): repression

  • Submission: extreme

  • Defiance: moderate

  • Predation: marginal

• Right side of the continuum (control surplus): Autonomy

  • Decadence: Maximum

  • Plunder: Medium

  • Exploitation: Minimum

Deviant act can be rated by:

• Degree of control balance desirability

Deviant acts:

1. Vary in long-range effectiveness in altering control imbalance

2. Vary in the degree to which committing them requires that a person is directly involved with a victim or an object is affected by the deviance

Colvin (2000) - Differential Coercion Theory

• People are exposed to varying levels of coercion

• Two types of coercion that often intersect:

  • Interpersonal coercion:

    • Compliance through fear

  • Impersonal coercion:

    • Compliance through uncontrolled factors

Controls aimed at securing compliance varying along two dimensions:

1. Controls may be coercive or non-coercive

2. Controls may be applied either in a consistent or erratic way

   • Role of coercive ideation

Cullen (1994) - Social Support Theory

Social support is the tool to help another person cope

1. Instrumental

2. Expressive

Social support:

1. Reduces crime

2. Makes controls more effective

3. Increases prosocial and decreases antisocial influences

Policy Implications

• Regulation of the individual must come through policies fostering integration into the social order

  • Early intervention programs

    • Parenting programs

    • School programs

    • Reentry movement