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Exploring Crime
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Government Intervention

In a market-oriented society, the question
becomes: Is the market performing
satisfactorily in this area, and if not, why
not?
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Defining Intervention or Policy
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Clarke E. Cochran, et al.: "The term public policy always
refers to the actions of government and the intentions
that determine those actions."
Clarke E. Cochran, et al.: "Public policy is the outcome of
the struggle in government over who gets what."
Thomas Dye: Public policy is "Whatever governments
choose to do or not do."
Charles L. Cochran and Eloise F. Malone: "Public policy
consists of political decisions for implementing programs
to achieve societal goals."
B. Guy Peters: "Stated most simply, public policy is the
sum of government activities, whether acting directly or
through agents, as it has an influence on the life of
citizens."
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
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Most policy-making in criminal
justice is based on criminological
theory, whether the people making
those policies know it or not. In fact,
most of the failed policies (what
doesn't work) in criminal justice are
due to misinterpretation, partial
implementation, or ignorance of
criminological theory.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Simply Put
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To understand criminal justice policy, it is
necessary to understand crime; or,
perhaps the theories of crime
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Every criminological theory
contains:
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Assumptions
Description of the phenomena to be
explained
Explanation, or prediction, of that
phenomenon. . .
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Assumptions
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(about human nature, social
structure, and the principles of
causation, to name a few), The
assumptions are also called metatheoretical issues and deal with
debates like those over free will v.
determinism or consensus v. conflict
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Description of the phenomena to
be explained

The description is a statistical profile,
figure, diagram, or table of numbers
representing the patterns, trends,
and correlates of the type of crime
taken as an exemplar (most
appropriate example) of all crime
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Explanation or Prediction

The explanation is a set of variables
(things that can be tweaked or
changed) arranged in some kind of
causal order so that they have
statistical and meaningful
significance
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
In the Beginning
Classical theory
A product of the Enlightenment, based on the
assumption that people exercise free will and are thus
completely responsible for their actions. In classical
theory, human behavior, including criminal behavior,
is motivated by a hedonistic rationality, in which
actors weigh the potential pleasure of an action
against the possible pain associated with it.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Classical Theory
In 1764, criminologist Cesare Beccaria wrote
An Essay on Crimes and Punishments, which
set forth classical criminological theory.
He argued that the only justified rationale for
laws and punishments was the principle of
utility.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Utility
The principle that a policy should provide “the
greatest happiness shared by the greatest number.”
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Classical Theory
Beccaria believed the basis of society, as well
as the origin of punishments and the right to
punish, is the social contract.
The only legitimate purpose of punishment is
special deterrence and general deterrence.
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Social Contract: An imaginary agreement to
sacrifice the minimum amount of liberty to prevent
anarchy and chaos.
Special Deterrence: The prevention of individuals
from committing crime again by punishing them.
General Deterrence: The prevention of people in
general or society at large from engaging in crime by
punishing specific individuals and making examples
of them.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Neoclassical Theory
Classical theory was difficult to apply in
practice. It was modified in the early 1800s
and became known as neoclassical theory.
A modification of classical theory in which it was
conceded that certain factors, such as insanity, might
inhibit the exercise of free will.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Neoclassical Theory
Neoclassical theory introduced the idea of:
Premeditation as a measure of the degree of free will.
Mitigating circumstances as legitimate grounds for
diminished responsibility.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Neoclassical Theory
Classical and neoclassical theory are the basis
of the criminal justice system in the United
States.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Legalistic or Normative
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Almost all criminologists today use a
legalistic rather than normative definition
of crime. A legalistic definition of crime
takes as its starting point the statutory
definitions
A normative definition sees crime as a
violation of norms (social standards of
how humans ought to think and behave),
However, there are times when
criminology can shed light on norms and
norm violators.Copy Right 2005 Hi Tech Criminal
Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Positivist Approaches to Explaining
Crime
The theory of the positivist school of
criminology grew out of positive philosophy
and the logic and methodology of
experimental science.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
The Positivist School of Thought
The key assumptions of the positivist school
of thought were:
1. Human behavior is determined and not a matter of free
will.
2. Criminals are fundamentally different from noncriminals.
3. Social scientists can be objective in their work.
4. Crime is frequently caused by multiple factors.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Positivist Approaches
Today, most criminologists believe that
criminal behavior is the product of a complex
interaction between biology and
environmental or social conditions.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Positivist Approaches
Biology or genetics gives an individual a
predisposition to behave in a certain way.
Whether a person actually behaves in that way
and whether that behavior is defined as a
crime depend on environmental or social
conditions.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Criminological Theory

There are basically thirteen (13)
identifiable types of criminological
theory, only three (3) of which are
considered "mainstream" or
conventional criminology (strain,
learning, control).
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Biological Theories
Biological theories of crime causation
(biological positivism) are based on the belief
that criminals are physiologically different
from noncriminals. The cause of crime is
biological inferiority.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Modern Biocriminology
Ongoing research has revealed numerous
biological factors associated either directly or
indirectly with criminal or delinquent
behavior:
• chemical, mineral, and vitamin deficiencies in the diet
• diets high in sugar and carbohydrates
• hypoglycemia
continued…
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Psychological Theories
There are many theories regarding
psychological causes of crime, including:
Intelligence and crime
Psychoanalytic theories
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Intelligence and Crime
The idea that crime is the product primarily of
people of low intelligence has been popular
occasionally in the United States.
A study in 1931 showed no correlation
between intelligence and criminality.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Psychoanalytic Theories
Psychoanalytic theories of crime causation are
associated with the work of Sigmund Freud
who believed that people who had unresolved
deep-seated problems were psychopaths.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Sociological Theories
Sociologists emphasize that human beings
live in social groups and that those groups and
the social structure they create influence
behavior.
Most sociological theories of crime causation assume that a
criminal’s behavior is determined by his or her social
environment and reject the notion of the born criminal.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
The Theory of the
Chicago School
In the 1920s, a group of sociologists known as
the Chicago School attempted to uncover the
relationship between a neighborhood’s crime
rate and the characteristics of the
neighborhood.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
The Theory of the
Chicago School
Studies found that neighborhoods that
experienced high delinquency rates also
experienced social disorganization.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Anomie or Strain Theory
Robert Merton in 1938 wrote about a major
contradiction in the U.S. between cultural
goals and social structure. He called the
contradiction anomie.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
anomie
For Merton, the contradiction between the cultural
goal of achieving wealth and the social structure’s
inability to provide legitimate institutional means for
achieving the goal.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Anomie or Strain Theory
Merton argued that the limited availability of
legitimate institutionalized means to wealth
puts a strain on people. People adapt through:
1. Conformity—playing the game.
2. Innovation—pursuing wealth by illegitimate
means.
continued…
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Anomie or Strain Theory
3. Ritualism—not actively pursuing wealth.
4. Retreatism—dropping out.
5. Rebellion—rejecting the goal of wealth and the
institutional means of getting it.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Learning Theories
Edwin H. Sutherland—in his theory of
differential association—was the first 20thcentury criminologist to argue that criminal
behavior was learned.
This theory, modified, remains one of the
most influential theories of crime causation.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
differential association
Sutherland’s theory that persons who become
criminal do so because of contacts with criminal
patterns and isolation from anticriminal patterns.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Learning Theories
Among the policy implications of learning theory is
to punish criminal behavior effectively, according to
learning theory principles. This is not done
effectively in the U.S.
• Probation does not function as an aversive
stimulus.
• Most offenders are not incarcerated.
continued…
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Learning Theories
• Punishment is not consistent and immediate.
• Offenders are generally returned to the
environments in which their crimes were
committed.
• There is no positive reinforcement of alternative,
prosocial behaviors.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Social Control Theories
The key question in the social control theory
is not why people commit crime and
delinquency, but rather why don’t they? Why
do people conform?
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Social Control Theories
The most detailed elaboration of modern
social control theory is attributed to Travis
Hirschi who wrote the 1969 book, Causes of
Delinquency.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Social Control Theories
Hirschi argued that delinquency should be
expected if a juvenile is not properly
socialized by establishing a strong bond to
society, consisting of:
1. Attachment to others
2. Commitment to conventional lines of action
3. Involvement in conventional activities
4. Belief in the moral order and law
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Social Control Theories
More recently, Hirschi wrote with Michael
Gottfredson that the principal cause of deviant
behaviors is ineffective child rearing, which
produces people with low self-control.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Critical Approaches to
Explaining Crime
Critical theories grew out of the changing
social landscape of the American 1960s.
Critical theories assume that human beings
are the creators of institutions and structures
that ultimately dominate and constrain them.
Critical theories assume that society is
characterized primarily by conflict over moral
values.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Labeling Theory
The focus of labeling theory is the
criminalization process rather than the
positivist concern with the peculiarities of the
criminal.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Labeling Theory
The labeling theory argues that once a person
commits a first criminal act and gets
processed in the system, they are labeled
negatively as a criminal.
The label becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Conflict Theory
Conflict theory focuses on the conflict in
society between rich and poor, management
and labor, whites and minorities.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Radical Theory
Radical theories argue that capitalism
requires people to compete against each other
in the pursuit of material wealth.
The more unevenly wealth is distributed, the
more likely people are to find persons weaker
than themselves that they can take advantage
of in their pursuit of wealth.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Legal positivism
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is a school of thought in modern and
contemporary jurisprudence and the
philosophy of law. The principal claims of
legal positivism are:
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that laws are rules made by human beings;
and
That there is no inherent or necessary
connection between law and morality
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Relativism
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The view that the meaning and value of
human beliefs and behaviors have no
absolute reference. Relativists claim that
humans understand and evaluate beliefs
and behaviors only in terms of, for
example, their historical and cultural
context. Philosophers identify many
different kinds of relativism depending
upon which classes of beliefs allegedly
depend upon what.
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Hermeneutics

is a particular approach used in the study
and interpretation of texts. It seeks to
understand what an author of a particular
text is attempting to convey to
others. The term refers to the act of
interpreting
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster
Is there interpretation in…
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Assumptions
Description of the phenomena to be
explained
Explanation, or prediction, of that
phenomenon. . .
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Justice, Raymond E. Foster