Topic 5

Social Control

  • Social control: the mechanisms, processes and institutions used to maintain societal order and promote predictable behavior in society

    • Aims toward conformity

  • A fundamental component of society

  • Practiced beyond governments (i.e. communities, social groups, media)

  • There are various forms of social control



Forms of Social Control


  1. Internal: internalization of social norms -Occurs through socialization 

  2. External: external pressures 

    1. Negative sanctions (deterrence) 

      1. Jail

      2. Tortue

      3. Social punishment

    2. Positive sanctions (inducements) 

  3. Formal: see next slide 

  4. Informal: see below 

    1. Technical social control


Formal Social Control Characterized by:

  • Explicit rules and regulations

  • Institutionalized procedures for compliance and monitoring

  • Delegation of authority to specific institutional bodies

    • Examples: laws, regulations, organizational rules, binding codes, etc.

  • State is almost. 


Two types:

I. Those instituted by the state

II. Those instituted by non-state actors



Informal Social Control Characterized by:

  • Implicit norms and principles

  • Lack of institutionalized procedures

  • No designation of authority

    • Examples: social ridicule, popularity, social exclusion, discrimination, etc.

  • Most effective in smaller, more traditional communities (i.e. rural communities)

  • 83% felt safe


Two types:

I. Folkways

Established norms of common social practises

Social ethitcat 

II. Mores

Norms associated with ideas of right or wrong 


Administrative Law & Social Control

  • Administrative law is central to modern societies and law

    • A specific form of social control

3 types:
I. Self-governing bodies
II. Independent regulatory bodies
III. Government departmental regulatory bodies

Exerts control through:

  • Licensing

  • Inspection and surveillance

  • Sanctions

Crime & Criminal Law

  • Crime: ‘public wrongs’, ‘social injuries’, ‘social deviance’, etc.

  • Criminal law: defines and controls what the state regards as intolerable public deviance

    • Seeks conviction and punishment

3 categories of crimes:
I. Offences against persons
II. Offences against property
III. Offences deemed wrong in and of themselves

Criminal Law as Social Control

  • Criminal law is the most institutionalized and highly structured form of social control

    • Entails the most severe forms of enforcement

Sanctions include:

  • Suspended sentences

  • Fines

  • Probation orders

  • Community service

  • Imprisonment

  • Civil commitment

Functions:

  • Social retribution

  • Incapacitation

  • Public shaming

  • Specific deterrence

  • General deterrence

  • Attached to informal controls (social stigma)

The Death Penalty

  • Capital punishment: state-based execution as punishment for severe crimes

  • The most severe form of criminal punishment

  • Abolished in most countries

    • Exists primarily in non-democratic countries

  • Little empirical evidence supports capital punishment as a deterrent

  • Concerns over the possibility of executing innocent persons

  • Punishments better deterrent 

The Social Control of Victimless Crimes

  • Victimless crimes: ‘public order crimes’

    • Crimes deemed wrong in and of themselves

    • When harm is only brought to the participating individuals

    • Examples: drug possession, prostitution, gambling, public nudity, etc.

  • Justified in terms of social morality

  • Often difficult to enforce

The Social Control of White-Collar Crimes

  • White-collar crime: financially motivated crime committed by someone of higher occupational status in the course of their occupation

    • Includes:
      i) Occupational crimes

      • Occupational crime refers to offences committed against legitimate institutions (businesses or government) by those with "respectable" social status.

    • ii) Corporate crimes

      • Corporate crime refers to offences committed by legitimate institutions to further their own interests

    • Examples: theft, insider trading, tax evasion, money laundering, bribery, corruption, etc.

  • Some argue white-collar crimes are more serious than street crimes by decreasing faith in governments and markets

  • White-collar criminals are less likely to be identified and imprisoned

The Social Control of Defamation

  • Defamation: the intentional spread of false ideas about a person that result in harming the person’s reputation

    • Libel: written defamation

    • Slander: spoken defamation

  • Has serious psychological and social implications

  • Most cases are handled by civil tort law

    • Also covered by the Criminal Code (sections 300, 301)

  • Social media has made defamation more socially relevant

The Social Control of Contentious Politics

  • Contentious politics: social/political dissent-based politics occurring outside of formal government channels

    • ‘Social control of dissent’

  • Governments universally control dissent to varying degrees and through a variety of measures

  • Justified in terms of social order

  • Mechanisms include:

    • Repressive force

    • Surveillance

    • Suppression of speech and media

    • Political trials

  • Can be applied inconsistently

  • Emmergancie Act (Formerly War Measures act)

    • Time of crisis, certain gonna have to circumvent rights 

The Social Control of Fighting

  • Fighting: ‘street fighting’, ‘mutual combat’, ‘consented physical confrontation’, ‘throwing down’, etc.

  • Distinct from:
    i) Sanctioned combat sports (administrative law)
    ii) Assault (Criminal Code)
    iii) Self-defense (Criminal Code)

  • The legality of fighting depends on the jurisdiction

  • In Canada, there is no law against consensual fighting

    • However, there can be no consent to bodily harm (R. v. Jobidon)



  1. Intention: Deliberate and focused.


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LWSO 201 Introduction to Legal Studies

Topic 6: Social Change

Review

  1. Defined social control and outlined forms of social control

  2. Considered administrative law and criminal law as social control

  3. Debated particular approaches to social control

  4. Discussed the social control of white-collar crimes, contentious politics, and fighting

Objectives

  1. Unpack social change and the factors of social change

  2. Characterize the relationship between law and social change

  3. Consider social changes as an independent variable

  4. Focus on law as the independent variable

  5. Consider the limitations of law for social change and resistance to change

Social Change

  • Social change: changes to the patterns of activities and/or relations within society

  • Changes to the basic ways people live their lives and relate to each other

  • Regards people’s relations to social groups, the government, the economy, family, labor, religion, etc.

  • Is often inter-generational

  • Factors impacting social change: law, new technologies, new forms of work, new ideas/values, political and economic factors, education, mass media, etc.

Law & Social Change

  • There is a reciprocal relationship between law and social change

    • Law is both a dependent variable (outcome) and an independent variable (cause) of social change

  • Two opposing perspectives:

    • Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832)

    • Friedrich Karl von Savigny (1779–1861)

Law as the Dependent Variable

  • As the rate of social change has increased in modern societies, the law has become more likely and quicker to respond

  • Changes to social conditions impact law

  • Changes to societal values and attitudes impact law

  • Technological change is one of the greatest forces impacting law:

    • New ways to enforce law

    • New ways of applying the law

    • New content of law

  • As a response to social change, the law may aggravate existing problems or create new ones

Social Change as the Dependent Variable

  • Historically, the law has been used as an instrument to induce social change

  • In modern societies, law is often considered a necessary and effective means toward social change

  • While law can be a progressive force for social change, it can also be regressive/oppressive

Understanding Law as a Driver of Social Change

Ways to understand the role of law in social change:

  1. The direct effects of law

  2. The indirect effects of law

Types of change through law:
I. Planning
II. Disruption

The Efficacy of Law as an Instrument of Social Change

Law as an instrument of social change entails two processes:
I. Institutionalization
II. Internalization

  • Evans (1965) societal conditions shaping law’s efficacy for social change:

    • Must emanate from a legitimate source

    • Must be rationalized in terms of existing social values

    • Should reference where the law has been successful

    • Change made relatively quickly

    • Committed law enforcement

    • Positive and negative sanctions

    • Reasonable enforcement

  • Other factors: reflects local notions of justice; explicit/clear rules and enforcement; sufficient access to relevant information; even application of the law (especially across economic classes)

Advantages of Law for Social Change

  • Intention - Deliberate and focused

  • Legitimacy - Belief that a rule ought to be obeyed

  • Bindingness - Brings social order/stability, compels behavior, reduces costs/risks

  • Sanctions - Give the law ‘teeth’

Case Study: LGBTQ+ Rights in Canada

  • 1968-69: Criminal Law Amendment Act

    • Homosecuality is legal now

  • 1995: Egan v. Canada - discrimination based on sexual orientation

    • Read into the Canadian charter of rights and freedoms

  • 1996: Federal Human Rights Act amended

  • 1996: BC becomes the first province to allow same-sex couples to adopt children

  • 1998: Vriend v. Alberta - Supreme Court ‘read words’ into Alberta’s Individual Rights Protection Act

    • Supreme court ruling Sexual Orientation as discrimination into Alberta’s individual rights

  • 1999: M. v. H. - Ontario’s definition of ‘spouse’

    • Definition of Spouse was discriminatory 

  • 2005: Civil Marriages Act

    • Legalized Gay Marriage 

  • 2018: Expungement of Historically Unjust Convictions Act

    • Removed unjust convictions for same sex activities 

  • 2022: Bill C-4 criminalized conversion therapy

Case Study: The Law & Social Change for Indigenous People in Canada

  • 1970: R. v. Drybones - Indian Act violation of the Canadian Bill of Rights

  • 1973: Calder et al v. B.C. (AG) - set the stage for Indigenous land claims

  • 1983: Lovelace v. Canada - UN Human Rights Committee finds Indian Act discriminatory based on sex

  • 1996: R. v. Gladstone - Supreme Court decision upholding non-treaty Aboriginal rights

  • 1997: Delgamuukw v. BC - Supreme Court decision on the extent of Aboriginal title, use of oral history, and government duty to consult

  • 2004: Haida Nation v. BC - Supreme Court decision on the obligation to negotiate regarding exploitation of disputed land

  • 2016: Daniels v. Canada - Métis and non-status Indians recognized as ‘Indians’

The Limitations of Law for Social Change: Power

  • Power plays a central role in law

    • The powerful create the law

  • Limited representation and participation in law-making

  • Law often reflects the interests of the elite

  • The law is also an instrument for empowerment and emancipation

The Limitations of Law for Social Change: Societal Morality & Values

  • Societal morality and values place strong limitations on the law

  • Morals can conflict with law or proposed changes

    • The efficacy of the law to induce change depends on how well it is adapted to societal morals/values (Peach, 2002)

  • Divergent and contending values can undermine law’s development

Resistance to Change

  • Resistance to change is a common feature of modern societies

    • Hinders law as an instrument and law’s efficacy as an instrument

  • Resistance ranges from reasonable to unreasonable

  • A variety of factors impact resistance to change (e.g., traditional values, habits, costs, etc.)

Factors of Resistance to Social Changes

  1. Social factors - Vested interests, class structures, ideology, and organized opposition

  2. Psychological factors - Habit and custom, motivation, ignorance, selective perception, and moral development

  3. Cultural factors - Compatibility, fatalism, ethnocentrism, and superstition

  4. Economic factors - Limited resources and distribution of costs/benefit