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Functionalist Subcultural Theories of Crime - Coggle Diagram
Functionalist Subcultural Theories of Crime
Cohen: Status Frustration
W/c boys face
strain
and
anomie
in the mainstream, m/c culture of the education system, due to their cultural deprivation and different values.
This leads to
failure in education
= they are
unable to succeed and achieve mainstream using legitimate means
.
Their failure places them at the
bottom of the official status hierarchy
As a result, they suffer from
status frustration
. They form
delinquent subcultures
with alternative goals and values, largely the reverse of mainstream goals.
This provides them with an
alternative status hierarchy
where they can compete for status by breaking the most mainstream values, being most delinquent etc
Evaluation
Many w/c boy who fail in education do not reject mainstream values or form delinquent subcultures, many will be conformists.
Unlikely that delinquents commit criminal acts with the conscious aim of doing something mainstream society views as unacceptable.
Lyng and Katz
(Postmodernists): it is more likely influenced by boredom/ seeking a buzz.
Develops Merton's Strain Theory- explains why some groups commit crime while others don't and explains non-utilitarian crime as the subcultures inverting mainstream values and making them praiseworthy ways of achieving status.
Subcultural Theories
Subcultural strain theories see deviance as a result of delinquent subcultures with different norms and values from the mainstream culture in society
Subcultures provide an alternative opportunity structure for those who are aren't able to achieve through legitimate means
Cloward and Ohlin
3 types of deviant subculture.
Conflict subcultures:
Exist in socially disorganised areas with a lack of social cohesion, organised by young people themselves rather than organised crime
Difficult for a criminal culture to develop as different gangs battle with each other for territory and overall control.
Characterised by violence, muggings, gang warfare, turf wars etc.
Both approved and illegal means of achieving mainstream goals are blocked= express their frustration through violence/ street crime.
Retreatist subcultures
:
Some youths who want to be criminals don't succeed at crime- they are unable to access either legitimate or illegitimate opportunity structures.
Become ‘
double failures’
and drop out of society altogether, but might do so as a group rather than individually.
They retreat into drug addiction and alcoholism, paid for by petty theft, shoplifting and prostitution
Criminal subcultures:
Exist in areas where there is a dominant criminal culture/ established pattern of crime.
Easy for young delinquents to learn criminal skills as they have adult criminal role models who socialise them into their own criminal career that might result in material success- an
apprenticeship of crime.
They have the opportunity to practise their trade, providing an alternative to the legitimate job market.
Characterised by utilitarian crimes, such as theft.
Illegitimate Opportunity Structures
An illegitimate opportunity structure is the deviant means to achieving goals. It offers an alternative solution to the blocked opportunities from legitimate opportunity structures (failure of achieving through accepted means)
However not everyone can easily access the illegitimate opportunity structure, may also be unsuccessful at achieving goals illegitimately= face strain in the same way as trying to access a legitimate opportunity structure.
Evaluation
Present subcultures as distinct from one another but most criminal gangs have elements of two or more e.g. turf wars not only a feature of conflict subcultures, often also used in organised crime
Don't explain why in "meritocratic" societies w/c youth are denied access to legitimate opportunity structure.
Don't explain why girls who are also denied access don't react in the same way as boys do.
Matza: Subterranean Values and "Drift"
Matza
: we all share the "delinquent" values that lead some people to criminal/ deviant behaviour but most of us are mostly able to keep them suppressed- they are our subterranean values. However it's a learned skill= more likely to be deviant in younger years, less so as we age
Drift Theory:
People are neither conformist nor deviant, instead they "drift" between both throughout their life. Delinquents are less likely to be able to control subterranean values so they drift between delinquent and conventional behaviours.
The fact that delinquents seek to "neutralise" their deviant acts challenges Cohen’s theory that mainstream values are “overwritten” in subcultures. If people had wholly different values, they would believe their deviancy was correct/ appropriate, but they attempt to justify their behaviour and deny responsibility= clearly understand and share mainstream values. They attempt to "drift" back into mainstream values.
Techniques of Neutralisation:
Denial of responsibility
Denial of injury
Denial of Victim
Condemnation of Condemners
Appeal to higher loyalties
Evaluation
Techniques of neutralisation can simply be excuses to avoid punishment or disapproval, not actually attempting to drift back into mainstream values.
Techniques may just be deviant values e.g. blaming victims for their victimhood, justifying crimes= just deviant norms and values of a delinquent subculture.
Miller: Focal Concerns (1958)
W/c boys are socialised into particular norms and values that makes them more likely to engage in deviant behaviour/ commit crime. These values are "focal concerns".
Evaluation
Feminists: these qualities describe masculinity rather than a particular subculture of young w/c men.
Acknowledges that none of these values alone make crime inevitable, just more likely- many w/c boys socialised into focal concerns do not commit crime.
Unclear if w/c really have such distinct norms and values from rest of society- contradicts idea of value consenus.
Fails to explain whether focal concerns are also shared by young w/c women and, if so, why they are still less likely to commit crime
These are not essentially criminal but increase the risk of criminal behaviour:
Toughness
: wish to prove their masculinity
Smartness
: use wit/ smart remarks
Excitement
: seek a "buzz"
Trouble
: fighting
Anti-authoritarianism
: dislike for the gov
Fatalism
: believe actions won't influence the future
Evaluations
Postmodernists
: Subcultural theory assumes deviance comes from subcultures that go against mainstream norms and values, but in today's fragmented society, subcultures are so common that they are just a normal part of life. Deviance is normal= subcultural theory is irrelevant in understanding deviance.
Subcultural theory assumes that w/c boys start off sharing m/c success goals, then reject them when they fail, but ignores the possibility that they didn't share those goals in the first place so they never saw themselves as failures.
Marxists
: Paul Willis’ 1977 study of the lads shows that they formed a subculture in order to ‘have a laff’ in a m/c school system they felt was irrelevant to their futures. They never aspired to be m/c, they identified themselves as w/c and rejected the m/c system and aspirations of the school.