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Crime and Deviance - Ethnicity (flashcards done) - Coggle Diagram
Crime and Deviance - Ethnicity (flashcards done)
Statistics x
Police and Courts x
Prison v population x
Black
- 3% of pop, 13.1% of prison pop
Asian
- 6.5% of pop, 7.7% of prison pop
Black communities
- 7x more likely to be stop and searched, 3x more likely to be arrested, 5x more likely to be in prison
Crime statistics are counted as recorded events of crime. They may come from official agencies such as police and government records, but also from unofficial sources such as criminal surveys x
Sources of Crime Statistics x
Victim Surveys x
included reported and unreported crimes.
give a more accurate picture than official police statistics
Crime Survey of England and Wales (CSEW)
people are visited in their homes by surveyors and asked about their experiences of crime in the last 12 months
Self-Report Surveys x
anonymous questionnaires in which people are asked to own up to committing crimes, whether or not they have been discovered.
Home Office's
Offending, Crime and Justice Survey
which was carried out annually between 2003 and 2006
last major self-report survey of
ethnicity and offending
in 2003, using a sample of 12,000 respondents and added an extra 'booster' of ethnic minority groups. Focused on
20 core crimes (street crimes)
white
- 42% committed crimes in their lifetime
black
- 28% committed crimes in their lifetime
Asians
- 21% committed crimes in their lifetime
whites
- higher rates for serious offences
black
- highest in terms of robbery rates
The findings from self-report studies challenge the stereotype of black people as being more likely to offend than white
Court and Prison Records, and Police Caution Records x
Reveals some data on the criminals who have been caught committing a crime. May reveal statistics such as types of crime, gender, ethnicity, nature of crime, etc
Issues x
Dark figure x
around 60% of the crime found in the CSEW are not reported
Choose not to report:
too trivial
- involved no loss; police would not be interested; police couldn't do anything anyway
private matter
- public v private sphere - DV; family issues; relationships
inconvenient
to report
to over come self-report surveys and victims surveys are used
reported but not recorded x
not all crimes are entered into official figures
police priorities/targeting
status of the victim - rape and sexual assault
work relations - CC
Victim surveys x
people may exaggerate or full out lie about the crime they were involved in to impress the researcher
people may forget they were even a victim in their past, especially for trivial crimes
people may not even realise they have been a victim of a crime
these types of surveys tend to ignore business and corporate crime (victimless crime)
victims may feel guilt or embarrassment at being a victim of crime
Self-report studies x
validity
- truthfulness and accuracy. Offenders may lie, exaggerate and omit crimes they have been a part of (impress/embarrassed/regretful)
they rely on the participant's memory - not remember all aspects or more trivial crimes
may not think that some crime they have committed is not actually crime so don't report or talk about
Not representative - certain types of people are less likely to take part in these surveys
Victim surveys and ethnicity x
CSEW
show that a lot of crime is
intra-ethnic
Phillips and Bowling (2012) x
Black
people are over represented among those identified by victims as offenders
particularly true when the victim is white, tend to say the offender is
black
even when they are not sure.
Sociological approaches x
use of crime stats x
Functionalism / New Right / Right Realism x
broadly accept stats as accurate and representative of most crime
useful for establishing crime patterns and trends, and as a base for forming hypotheses and building theories.
Internationalism / labelling theory x
stats are social constructions - only useful to reveal the stereotypes, labelling and assumptions of the public (sexism, racism in the CJS)
the patterns shown in stats further fuel these stereotypes - SFP generated; guide the police and typification
Marxism / Neo-Marxist x
biased view of crime, as they under-represent crimes of the powerful and give the impression that the main criminals are W/C
Feminism x
under-represent the extent of female crime, and crimes by men against women (DV, rape)
Left Realsim x
broadly correct through they under-represent WCC and CC, and exaggerate the extent of W/C crime, particularly by some ethnic groups -
similar to Marxism
Left Realist x
Lea and Young (1984) x
whilst there are
racist practices
among the police, the ethnic differences in the crime stats are
real differences.
- reveal selective racism which is unlikely
this is because the UK is racist and places ethnic minority groups in more disadvantaged positions -
marginalisation and economic exclusion
this paired with the
media's
emphasis on
consumerism and materialist goals
that many ethnic minority groups cannot achieve lead to non/utilitarian crimes
(money/status)
young, black males
are more likely to be
unemployed, live in poverty and in poor housing
ethnic minorities are less likely to be represented in
politics, the police and other influential organisations
CRITIQUE x
while they argue that the difference in crime is real and not just down to the police,
typification and stereotypes are overlooked
by them, as the image that blacks are dangerous and Asians are passive relates t their conviction rates
9/11
has seen racism within the police increase as Asians are not longer labelled as passive but instead more dangerous and terrorists
Marginalisation + Relative Deprivation + Subculture = High Black Crime Rates
Merton - strain theory
Cohen - status frautration
Bowling and Phillips (2002) x
higher levels of robbery by
black
people could be linked to
poverty and social exclusion
- creates peer-group status and a sense of
black identity
CRITIQUE x
Asian
groups have lower levels of criminality due to a stronger sense of
cultural identity, with stronger community control
, reducing opportunities to commit crimes
Neo-Marxist
Gilroy - Myth of Black criminality x
Left realists
are wrong to assume that crime rates are higher for minority ethnic groups
argues that
black criminality
is a myth, created by racist stereotypes.
Attributes the difference in stats to police stereotyping and police labelling - denies the cause of black crime being
relative deprivation
and instead sees it as a legacy of the struggle against white colonisation
All
black
crime is essentially political (protesting against the white state)
CRITIQUE - Lea and Young x
majority of
black
crime is
'interracial
- hard to see how this represents a struggle against
white dominance
romanticises
crime and therefore ignores the real harm it causes to people in society
Both were writing these theories a long time ago so maybe outdated - however, Gilroy and riots in America (BLM)
Hall et al: Policing the Crisis x
the new strain of crime under the name of
mugging
was associated with
black youth
by the media, police and politicians
argues that despite this new crime there was
not real increase
in street robbery - media was selective of what benefited them. There was only the narrative to make
black youth
a
scapegoat
for the current political and economic crisis.
This scapegoat
divided the W/C
on race and prevented a group opposition to capitalism and politicians - due to a moral panic created by the media about
black crime
this
moral panic
justified police force against the W/C and allowed capitalism to win
CRITIQUE x
very little empirical evidence that capitalism was the cause of moral panic
no evidence to support the assumption that the public was in fact blaming the black community
Left Realists
would argue that people were afraid of mugging due to marginalisation of ethnic groups - caused by capitalism, not because it was being used a gimmick by the ruling class.
Crisis of capitalism
is not still around, however demonetisation of ethnic groups is
Strain and sub-cultural theories x
ethnic minority groups are over-represented in poverty measures - 40% of ethnic minorities classified as below the poverty line
lack of resources leas to strain, but lack of legitimate opportunities leads to
retreatism or innovation (Merton x)
in order to achieve society's goals
Gunter (2008) x
development of 'road culture' amongst
young black males
Cloward and Ohlin x
limited opportunities leads to formation of
criminal, conflict and retreatist
subcultures
Cohen x
status frustration
felt by lack of status within education and society - status provided by gang cultures
Institutional Racism x
McPherson Report
- stated that MET Police operated on practices that were institutionally racists
Waddington and Fielding x
both found evidence of racial stereotyping in the attitudes of off-duty police and development of a
'canteen culture'
Whites
have lowest rate of stop and search -
black
9x higher (2019 CSEW)
Interactionalists x
role of the media in creating
folk devils
out of both
black and Asian males
Ethnic minority groups less likely to be able to
negotiate
the CJS than
white M/C
negative stereotyping of
black and Asian males
being associated with certain crimes - e.g. drug dealing, carrying knives, terrorism
Racism at each stage of the CJS
Policing x
Phillips and Bowling (2012) x
since the 1970s there have been many allegations of oppressive policing of minority ethnic communities.
Hoyle (2015) x
Asians
- chance of being involved in a taser incident was 3 in 10,000
Black
- chance of being involved in a taser incident was 18 in 10,000
Stop and Search x
minority ethnic groups are more likely to be stopped and searched -
blacks
are 7x more likely than
whites
due to
'reasonable suspicion'
x
Terrorism Act 2000
- police can stop and search persons or vehicles whether or not they have reasonable suspicion -
Asians
are most likely
Phillips and Bowling (2007) x
members of ethnic minority communities are more likely to think they are 'over-policed and under-protected' and have limited faith in the police
Arrests and cautions x
2014/15 -
blacks
were 3x more likely to be arrested than
whites
one possible reason for this, is the high level of distrust for the police leads ethnic minority groups to deny and seek legal council, preventing the opportunity for a caution to be issued instead of a charge.
Police Racism
Phillips and Bowling x
negative stereotypes held by officers lead to deliberate targeting for sto and searchers - however very few lead to arrests.
Macpherson Report (1999)
ethnic differences in offending
black
- highest in terms of robbery rates (2003)
demographic factors
ethnic groups are more likely to be stopped due to a higher proportion of young; unemployed; manual workers and urban dwellers - it is these groups which increase the proportion of ethnic minorities not the other way around
Prosecution and trial x
the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) is more likely to drop cases against ethnic groups.
Phillips and Bowling (2002) x
this maybe because the evidence presented to the CPS by the police is often weaker and based on stereotyping.
ethnic groups are more likely to elect for trial before a jury in the Crown Court, rather than in a magistrates' court (mistrust of the system and impartiality) - allows for harsher sentences than in a magistrates.
Convictions and sentencing x
black and Asian
defendants are less likely to be found guilty. - weaker/less serious cases which are more likely to be thrown out
Hood (1992) x
even when factors were taken into account (weaker cases; seriousness of offence; prior convictions; etc),
black men
were
8%
more likely to receive a custodial sentence and were give sentences on average
three months (Asian men - nine months)
longer than
white men
Pre-sentence reports x
Hudson and Bramhall (2005) x
PSRs allow for unwitting discrimination. reports on
Asian
offenders were less comprehensive and suggested that they were less remorseful than
white
offenders.
placed this bias in the context of the 'demonising' of Muslims in the wake of 9/11
Prison x
blacks
were 4x more likely to be in prison than
whites
.
Asian and black
offenders are more likely to be serving longer sentences than
whites
examples of ethnic criminality
Bradford Asian youths (2001)
9/11 - combined these two events placed a criminal stereotype on Asian (Muslim)
Ethnicity and Victimisation x
those of
mixed
ethnicity are
more likely
to be a victim of crime than Black, Asians or Whites.
Extent and risk of victimisation x
Sampson and Philips (1992) x
Racist victimisation tends to be on going and periods of minor incidents and major ones like physical violence
2014/15 - police recorded 54k racist incidents
2014/15 - CSEW estimates that most incidents are not reported as they found an estimate of 89k
Stats x
minority ethnic groups made up 23% of homicide - twice the risk facing White
CSEW
estimates that there were an average of 106,000 incidents of racially motivated hate crime per year - eqv. to 300 per day.
gender specific -honour crime and forced marriage (made illegal in 2012)
MacPherson Report 1999
revealed the racist intentions and practices of the Met Police after Steven Lawrences murder led to under-investigation