Chapter 6 Social Structure Theory

Chapter 6: Social Structure Theory Social Structure Theories - Overview - These theories seek to explain group crime rates rather than why particular individuals commit crime - Believe that people are the product of their environment - View crime through lens of poverty, inequality, hopelessness, and despair - 3 main social structure theories - Social Disorganization - Strain/Anomie - Cultural Conflict - To understand these theories and related empirical research, it is necessary to understand economic structure in our society Economic Structure - Stratified Society - People grouped according to economic or social class - Unequal distribution of wealth, power, and prestige - Social Class - - Segment of population whose members share similar economic level, attitudes, values, norms, and identifiable lifestyle Socioeconomic Status - APA definition: social standing or class of an individual or group - Measured as a combination of education, income, and occupation - Problems of the Lower Class - Inadequate housing, poor health care, disrupted family lives, underemployment - More prone to depression, less likely to have achievement motivation, unable to put off immediate gratification - Child Poverty - Less likely to achieve in school - More likely to drop out - More likely to suffer from health problems and to receive inadequate health care The truth about “privilege” - Privilege describes the circumstances of one’s life that gives them benefits that were never asked for - A consequence of an entire system, NOT individual people - - Having some form of privilege (based on race, family background, education, residence location, career, peer groups, etc) does not mean that the individual has not experienced oppression in some way - Does not mean that they have not had to work hard for what they have and/or what they have achieved Empirical research reveals racial disparities within the criminal justice system after controlling for SES and crime type (Cole, 1999; Star & Rehavi, 2014; Hetey & Eberhardt, 2016) Social Disorganization Theory - Derived from the Chicago School - Links crime rates to neighborhood ecological characteristics - - Crime rates are highest in transient, mixed-use, and changing neighborhoods where fabric of social life has become frayed - High unemployment and school dropout rates, deteriorated housing, low income levels, large amount of single-parent households Residents in crime-ridden neighborhoods flee at earliest opportunity - - Continuous resident turnover weakens communications and blocks attempts at solving neighborhood problems or establishing common goals Parks and Burgess (1925) theorized that Chicago’s rapid growth was somehow connected to increasing crime rate.  - - Shaw and McKay (1920s) applied Burgess and Park’s concentric circle map to explain crime patterns - Areas within, or immediately adjacent to, areas of heavy industry had the highest delinquency rates  - Found crime was highest in “slum” neighborhoods regardless of which racial or ethnic group resided there - As groups moved to other zones, crime rates decreased significantly - Conclusion: the nature of the neighborhood regulates involvement in crime What is social disorganization? - Community disruption that occurs in presence of diverse/transient residents resulting in lack of functional integration brought on by a breakdown in social control - Institutions of social control have broken down - - - In transitional areas, successive changes in population composition, disintegration of traditional cultures, diffusion of divergent cultural standards, and gradual industrialization dissolve neighborhood culture and organization Because social institutions are frayed/absent, law-violating youth groups and gangs form and are free to recruit neighborhood youth - Forced to choose between conventional and deviant lifestyles, many slum kids opt for deviant lifestyles Value conflict reinforces deviant goals and behavior The Social Ecology School - Contemporary social disorganization theory seeks to identify the ecological conditions– poverty, disorganization, instability, incivility, economy– that produce high crime rates - Community disorder - Crime rates are associated with community deterioration - Communities characterized by residential instability and disadvantage have lower social control and a correspondingly lower risk of detection - Community fear - As fear increases, quality of life deteriorates, and people withdraw from community life - Siege mentality - - - Results in an expanding mistrust of social institutions Community change - Urban areas undergoing rapid structural changes in racial and economic composition also seem to experience the greatest change in crime rates Poverty concentration - Urban areas marked by concentrated poverty become isolated and insulated from the social mainstream and more prone to criminal activity, violence, and homicide Collective Efficacy - Social control exerted by cohesive communities based on mutual trust, including intervention in the supervision of children and maintenance of public order. - As the number of people who have a stake in the community increases, crime rates decrease 3 Forms of Collective Efficacy - Informal social control - Family, relatives, and peers exert informal social control by either awarding or withholding approval, respect, and admiration - Includes direct criticism, ridicule, ostracism, desertion, and physical punishments Institutional social control - Businesses, stores, schools, churches, social service, and volunteer organizations may lower crime rates by addressing individual-level traits (i.e. self-control) and encouraging informal social controls - Public social control Resources “external” to the neighborhood, such as police, increase the ability of neighborhoods to reduce the effects of disorganization and maintain lower levels of crime Effects of Collective Efficacy - Street Efficacy: - A concept in which more cohesive communities with high levels of collective efficacy foster the ability for kids to use their wits to avoid violent confrontations and to feel safe in their own neighborhood - Adolescents with high street efficacy are less likely to resort to violence themselves or to associate with delinquent peers Social Disorganization Theory Theory Major Premise Shaw and McKay’s concentric zones theory Crime is a product of transitional neighborhoods that manifest social disorganization and value conflict. Strengths Research Focus Identifies why crime rates are highest in slum areas. Points out the factors that produce crime. Suggests programs to help reduce crime. Poverty; disorganization. The conflicts and problems of Social ecology theory urban social life and communities (including fear, unemployment, deterioration, and siege mentality) influence crime rates. Accounts for urban crime rates and trends. Social control; fear; collective efficacy; unemployment. Strain Theory: Anomie - A lack of legitimate opportunities produce strain - Crime viewed as a direct result of frustration and anger among lower socioeconomic classes - The ability to achieve goals is harder for some than others - Theory of Anomie - Normlessness results when socially defined goals are universally mandated but access to legitimate means of achieving those goals is stratified by one’s place in society - Anomie refers to the social condition in which there is a disintegration or disappearance of the norms and values that were previously common to society - Merton argued each person has their own concept of society’s goals and their own degree of access to the means to obtain them, resulting in a variety of social adaptations - Conformity - Law abiding Innovation - - Creating illegitimate means to obtain the accepted goals of society Ritualism - Show little interest in goal achievement and symbols of success Retreatism - Reject both the accepted goals and conventional means of society Rebellion - Substitute an alternative set of goals and means for conventional ones Evaluation of Strain Theory: Anomie - Extensive support throughout criminological research - Attempts to pinpoint the cause of the conflict that engenders personal frustration and consequent criminality - Helps explain the existence of high-crime areas and the apparent predominance of delinquent and criminal behavior in the lower class - Critiques: - Doesn’t explain why people choose to commit certain types of crime - Can’t explain why ASB diminishes over time Strain: Institutional Anomie Theory - Messner and Rosenfield (1994): anomie pervades US culture because the drive for material wealth dominates and undermines social and community values - Relatively high American crime rates can be explained by the interrelationship of culture and institutions - American Dream: the goal of accumulating material goods and wealth though individual competition AND the process of being socialized to pursue material success and to believe it is achievable - Leads to the desire to succeed at any c ost - Drives people apart, weakens the collective efficacy, fosters ambition, and restricts the desire - to achieve anything other than material wealth In America, the exaggerated emphasis on financial success undermines the ability of other social institutions (such as church) to achieve social control - Noneconomic functions and roles have been devalued - Performance in other institutional settings is assigned lower priority than the goals of financial success status (example: salary of teachers and nurses vs pro sports players) - When conflicts emerge, noneconomic roles become subordinate to and must accommodate economic roles - Demands of workplace override those of home and community (example: working while sick, leaving family for job opportunities) - Economic language, standards, and norms penetrate noneconomic realms Evaluation of Institutional Anomie Theory - Research has found support for IAT - On a macro-level, research shows that there is an association between national homicide rates and cultural stress on individual achievement and the fetishism of money - On an individual level, commitment to economic success is positively related to crime Critiques: - Cannot explain gender or age differences in crime rates - May not be equally applicable to all types of crime Agnew’s General Strain Theory - Individual-level theory that states multiple sources of strain interact with an individual’s emotional traits and responses to produce criminality - Criminal behavior is a direct result of negative affective states - Anger, frustration, and adverse emotions are the result of a variety of strain sources - Multiple sources of strain: - Failure to achieve positively valued goals - Disjunction of expectations and achievements - Removal of positively valued stimuli - - - Presentation of negative stimuli The greater the intensity and frequency of strain experiences, the greater their impact and the more likely they are to cause delinquency - Strains may overlap General Strain Theory      - The coping process (Agnew, 2013) - Individuals experience or anticipate experiencing strain - Individuals subjectively evaluate the strain. - Evaluations of the magnitude and injustice of the strain are particularly important in the prediction of criminal coping - Individuals experience a negative emotional reaction to strain. - Anger: produces a desire for revenge, energizes individuals to take action, and lowers inhibitions - Individuals cope with their strain in either a criminal or prosocial manner - Criminal coping will be affected by individual characteristics and by situational characteristics that determine the costs and benefits of a criminal act Consequences of Strain - Factors that increase the likelihood of criminal coping include: - poor conventional coping skills and resources - the availability of criminal skills and resources - low levels of conventional social support - routine association with criminal others personal beliefs and values that are favorable to crime frequent exposure to situations where the costs of crime are low low levels of social control, including weak bonds to conventional others - lack of investment in conventional institutions - When combined with strain, these factors increase the odds of criminal behavior Evaluating Agnew’s General Strain Theory - Widespread empirical support for general strain theory - Early indicators of strain are associated with long-term social problems, including sexual exploitation - - Kids who report feelings of stress and anger are more likely to interact with delinquent peers and to engage in criminal behaviors - Minority group members are forced to live in difficult and unique social conditions that produce strain, and they may cope with strain and negative emotions through crime - People who perceive strain because their success goals are blocked are more likely to engage in criminal activities - The interactions predicted by GST have cross-cultural validity Critiques of General Strain Theory - No clear pattern has emerged with regards to what variables might serve to either exacerbate or attenuate the effects of general strain on crime - Unable to determine whether individual factors or strain are the driving cause behind antisocial behavior     Strain Theories   Theory Major Promise Strengths Research Focus Anomie theory People who adopt the goals of society but lack the means to attain them seek alternatives, such as crime. Points out how competition for success creates conflict and crime. Suggests that social condition, and not personality, can account for crime. Explains high lower-class crime rates. Frustration; anomie:; effects of failure to achieve goals. Institutional anomie theory Material goods pervade all aspects of American life. Explains why crime rates are so high in American culture. Frustration; effects of materialism. Relative deprivation theory General strain theory Crime occurs when the wealthy and the poor live close to one another. Strain has a variety of sources. Strain causes crime in the absence of adequate coping mechanisms. Explains high crime rate in deteriorated inner-city areas located near more affluent neighborhoods. Identifies the complexities of strain in modern society. Expands on anomie theory. Shows the influence of social events on behavior over the life course. Explains middle-class crimes. Relative deprivation. Strain; inequality; negative affective states; influence of negative and positive stimuli.  Cultural Deviance Theory - Combines effects of social disorganization and strain to explain how people living in deteriorated neighborhoods react to social isolation and economic deprivation - Members of the lower socioeconomic class create an independent subculture with its own set of rules and values Subcultural norms often clash with conventional values Focal concerns: Values, such as toughness and street smarts, that have evolved specifically to fit conditions in lower-class environments  - Clinging to lower-class focal concerns promotes illegal or violent behavior - Cultural Transmission: process whereby values, beliefs, and traditions are handed down from one generation to the next - Code of the Streets (Anderson, 1999): a set of informal rules setting down both proper attitudes and ways to respond if challenged, if the rules are violated there are penalties and sometimes violent retribution - At the heart of the code is the issue of respect - Gang culture: frequently found in disorganized areas - Offer a place for adolescents who are alienated from mainstream society Theory of Delinquent Subculture - Cohen (1955) argued that delinquent behavior of lower-class youths is actually a protest against the norms and values of middle-class US culture - Status frustration: a form of culture conflict experienced by lower-class youths because social conditions prevent them from achieving success as defined by the larger society - Middle-class measuring rods: the standards by which authority figures, such as teachers and employers, evaluate lower-class youngsters and often prejudge them negatively - - The conflict and frustration that lower-class youths experience when they fail to meet these standards is a primary cause of delinquency Three subcultures: the corner boy, the college boy, and the delinquent boy - Reaction formation– irrational hostility evidenced by young delinquents, who adopt norms directly opposed to middle-class goals and standards that seem impossible to achieve Theory of Differential Opportunity - Cloward and Ohlin (1960): The view that lower-class youths whose legitimate opportunities are limited, join gangs and pursue criminal careers as alternative means to achieve universal success goals - All opportunities for success, both illegal and conventional, are closed for the most disadvantaged youths - Criminal gangs: gang membership is a learning experience for a successful criminal career - - - Exist in stable neighborhoods Conflict gangs: attract tough adolescents with weapons who engage in unpredictable and destructive assaults on people and property - Exist in unstable, disorganized neighborhoods Retreatist gangs: members are unable to gain success through legitimate means and are unwilling to do so through illegal ones - Cultural Deviance Theory       Members focus is on getting high, and often develop a “hustle” Theory Major Promise Citizens who obey the street rules of lower-class life (focal concerns) find themselves in conflict with the dominant culture Miller’s focal concern theory Cohen’s theory of delinquent subculture Cloward and ohlin's theory of opportunity Status frustration of lower-class boys, created by their failure to achieve middle-class success, causes them to join gangs. Blockage of conventional opportunities causes lower-class youths to join criminal, conflict, or retreatist gangs. Strengths Identifies the core values of lower-class culture and shows their association to crime. Shows how the conditions of lower-class life produce crime. Explains violence and destructive acts. Identifies conflict of lower class with middle class. Shows that even illegal opportunities are structured in society. Indicates why people become involved in a particular type of criminal activity. Presents a way of preventing crime. Research Focus Cultural Norms;focal concerns. Gangs;ccc culture conflict; middle-class measuring rods; reaction formation. Gangs; cultural norms; culture conflict; effects of blocked opportunity.  Social Structure Theory and Public Policy - If the cause of criminality is viewed as a division between lower-class individuals and conventional goals, norms, and rules, it seems logical that alternatives to criminal behavior can be provided by giving inner-city youth opportunities to share in the rewards of conventional society - Funding for programming must be concentrated in the most impoverished areas - Public assistance or welfare - Improving community structure in inner-city high-crime areas - War on poverty programs – Head Start, Neighborhood Legal Services, Community Action Program - Communities That Care (CTC) model Community-Oriented Policing - Focus on community preservation, public safety, and order maintenance—not crime fighting - Police should help maintain an intact community structure rather than simply fighting crime - Emphasizes sharing power with local groups and individuals - Citizens MUST actively participate with police to fight crime - Increased informal social control is created by a concerned citizenry coupled with effective policing Decentralization of police departments - Because each neighborhood has its own particular needs, police decision making must be flexible and adaptive Does it work? - Results from Lowell, MA found substantial reductions in crime, disorder, and calls for service in the treatment areas vs the control areas - Found to increase trust between police officers and community members - 