Lastige begrippen advanced criminology:
⁃ Certainty (a person must know that the punishment will be imposed), Severity (the
punishment must be severe enough to deter people from committing the crime in the first
place) and Celerity (the punishment must be imposed quickly so that it is not too late to avoid
the consequences).
⁃ Detterence = afschrikking
⁃ Panopticon = prison with constant surveillance due a central guard tower, without prisoners
knowing.
⁃ Contemporary rational-choice theory = believe that scientific laws and research could
improve society (switched unintentionally to more state power)
⁃ Routine-activities theory = emphasizes that crime occurs when three elements converge: a
motivated offender, a suitable target and the absence of a capable guardian. Daily routines of
individuals create opportunities for offenders.
⁃ “just desserts’ model: limited discretion and punishment based on the severity of the crime,
equal approach.
⁃ Incapacitation = protect public from offenders who are seen as sufficiently dangerous that
they need to be removed from society.
⁃ Biogovernance = propensity (neiging) towards crime coded in our DNA?
⁃ Anthropologists -> explain criminal behavior through physical laws: body type, head shape,
genes, eyes and physiological imbalances etc.
⁃ In science:
Biological advancements: DNA analysis, biometrics, brain imaging and analysis of biological
processes for lie detection.
Psychological advancements: identification, diagnosis and treatment of what is recognized as a
mental disorder.
⁃ Data driven: Testable hypotheses that are supported or disproved are determined through
empirical research (in biological approach this forms the basis for understanding and
preventing crime).
⁃ Atavism = criminals as hereditary (erfgenaam) throwbacks to less developed evolutionary
forms (recurrence of traits of an ancestor in a subsequent generation) -> identifiable by:
physical abnormalities/‘atavistic features’ (asymmetry of the face, more than two nipples,
toes or fingers and enormous jaws.
⁃ Italian school: some people are more prone to crime than others (in conflict with the classical
school).
⁃ Early US Family - Type and Body-type theories: criminal behavior based on family
background and physical characteristics.
⁃ Contemporary biological perspectives: 21th century, significant role of genetic factors.
Twin studies, greater similarities in criminal convictions among identical twins (55% of 3.500 has
similar rates of criminality).
Adoption studies, revealing links between adoptive sons and criminal biological parents. The
choice of adoption agencies and the mother's habits before and after childbirth have an impact.
⁃ Biosocial criminology: genes play significant role in controlling human behavior. These
genetic predisposition interact with environmental factors. MAOA gene and XYY
, chromosome are more likely to commit crime, overrepresented in prison. -> genetic defect,
deletions, low IQ, learning disabilities, ADHD and duplications can increase violent/criminal
behavior.
“Behavior (criminal or otherwise) is not inherited; what is inherited is the way in which an
individual responds to the environment. Inheritance provides an orientation, predisposition, or
tendency to behave in a certain fashion.”
- Psychoanalytical explanations: criminality as the product of personality traits and is learned.
Attachment theory = forming a secure bond with the biological mother -> reactive attachment
disorder. Frustration Aggression = inability to nd a release for frustration in a socially
accepted manner -> maladaptation as an explanation of crime, failure to adjust appropriately to
the environment or situation.
- Trait-Based Personality (“criminal personality”) = abnormal behavior/personality traits,
triggered by environmental factors as drugs, alcohol, injury, illness etc. (not from the
unconscious).
Why are certain geographical areas (especially cities) more prone to criminal activities?
- Social ecology theory = how people gather in speci c areas with historical roots in the
movement, tendency for patterns to persist and therefore the possibility of adopting preventive
policies. Social ecologists -> see humans as social beings shaped by their environment, making
rational choices within environmental constraints (con ict and consensus views of social order).
- Concentric Zone Theory (Park & Burgess): used to understand social and crime patterns.
1. Central business district, heart of the city.
2. A Transitional Area and Industry, located just outside business district, deterioration of
residences (achteruitgang van woningen) -> Social challenges
3. Workin/Low-class homes, homes of working class individuals, many whom have moved form
zone 2 (second/third generation migrants).
4. Middle-class Residential, more expensive homes a step up from working class homes.
5. High-class Residential, highest priced residences, better living conditions (in uential middle to
upper income residents).
- Social disorganization = breakdown of community cohesion and weakening of social rules and
structure; less impact of social rules, lack of community feeling, lack of order, competing moral
values, alienation and con ict (children alienated from there parents culture).
- Human ecology = directly in uenced by plant biology, Park and Burgess used biological
concept symbiosis (interaction between organisms living close to each other). They also used
dominance and succesion = situation where a stronger group disrupt the community through
change, eventually reestablishing order by replacing (that is, succeeding) a group that was
previously dominant.
- British Environmental theories: ‘struggle of space’, the competition and differential access to
residential space. Emphasis on the class struggle for housing. Criminal area as a re ection of the
availability levels of opportunities in particular urban context.
- Urban design/development and environmental criminology: impact on crime from space, land
use and physical design. In uence by natural surveil lability = the placement of physical features
to maximize opportunities.
Territoriality = creating ownership and responsibility among residents and users of a space
Maintenance = ongoing care of physical environment
flfl fl fi fi fl fl fl
