Marxist Summary of Crime and Deviance A Level Sociology by Platinum8
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Course
Crime and globalisation
Institution
OCR
- Marxism perspective of crime and deviance in sociology broken down into easy and digestible chunks.
- Studies, Sociologists, Ideologies, Examples and Keywords included.
- 1 page PDF document, coloured.
- easy to understand, and straight to the point facts and knowledge for your work/lessons.
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- Do not agree that crime and deviance function for the whole society
- View laws which are passed and enforced and who benefits from these laws.
- Look at how the capitalist system drives people to crime
- Crimes of the powerful - white-collar crime
Marxism, ideology and social control
- Dominant ideology in society - ideas which suit the powerful & their interests - make sure the powerless stay 'capitalist ideology' - blind acceptance - no
in that place questioning of the ideology.
- 'capitalist ideology' - 'fact' = everyone in society accepts these ideas + fails to question whether true or not - Repressive state apparatus - police,
- 'indoctrinated' into capitalist ideology = proletariat are always controlled by the bourgeoisie. government, armed forces and criminal
- Althusser (1970) - proletariat maintained through two institutions: justice system - is one of the main institutions
○ [RSA] - |The Repressive State Apparatus -( government, armed forces, police & criminal justice system) which makes sure that proletariats stay in
○ [ISAs] - The Ideological State Apparatuses - subtly - socialises to accept capitalist ideology (the family, their place
media, education and religion) - Ideological State Apparatuses - socialises
people to accept the capitalist ideology, it
- The RSA functions by violence, the ISAs function by ideology [have been applied to c&d]: includes the family, education system,
- ISAs - show us who are 'deviant' as a warning, to divide us and keep us scared - therefore to justify the use of religious institutions and mass media.
the RSA
- (1983) - explains how 'crime' is socially constructed - murder is seen as 'avoidable killing' but there are many
avoidable killings which do not get classifies as murder - we're encouraged to see murder as a particular act
involving a range of stereotypes. People who commit legally defined murder are usually poorer and less
powerful that those who commit other 'avoidable killings' Repressive State Apparatus - operates by violence
- 'avoidable killings' : deaths resulting from employers' act of negligence or failure to give priority to Ideological State Apparatus - operates by ideology
environmental or health and safety risks.
Study - Power, crime and mystification, Stephen Box (1983)
- Crime statistics are socially constructed & manipulated to criminalise the powerless
- Idea of W.C. - being criminals - is part of the capitalist ideology - used to scare us and to justify more control
- Encouragement of crime problem = justifies an increase in policing & surveillance, greater powers of
punishment & more prison places. - creates a culture of fear
- Encouraged to fear 'typical criminals' presented in official crime stats : young, male, working class and black.
- 'crime problem' - part of the ideology of the powerful -- an illusion to justify more control
- Illusion - divert our attention from serious crimes
- Criminal law - set of ideological constructs- instruments & tools designed to criminalise
- Real 'criminals' = powerful themselves - tell us criminals are evil & crimes are committed by mentally unstable
& uneducated working class people. = helps disguise the fact that the powerful create conditions for the
offering of the powerless.
- Capitalism, alienation and criminality
- Alienation - concept by Marx - describe sense of powerlessness - lack of control disconnectedness - felt by
proletariat - created by work and capitalism.
- ^- can drive people to criminality
- Bonger - crime - caused by poverty. - times of economic depression = increase in crime rates in poor
sections of society
- Capitalism - creates competition and inequality - unequal distribution of resources.
- ^ - promotes greed + individualism -
- Racism, materialism, false needs & false masculinity & domination = symptoms of capitalist system.
- Gordon (1973) - public fear & governmental control = on 'urban' or 'violent' crimes - little attention on white-
collar crimes-
- ^- criminal behaviour - a norm in America
- ^- criminal behaviour = rational response to situations people find themselves in.
- Capitalism - creates conditions in which crime is carried out
- ^- 'ghetto crime' - poor neighbourhoods - jobs that pay low and our demeaning - crime seen as a rational
response to this.
Activity - crime as a rational response to capitalism
- Crime is seen a rational response towards capitalism as people realise that they no longer want to participate
to an organisation which does not benefit them and exploits them. For example, the busboy saw crime as an
easy option to make money rather than serving and cleaning up after other people
Chambliss (1975) - capitalism creates - consumption, inability to earn enough money to meet these consumption
desires.
Evaluation -
Most people do obey the ,law suggesting a value consensus
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