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Neo-Marxism and Crime - Coggle Diagram
Neo-Marxism and Crime
CCCS Case Studies
Focus on SYMBOLIC RESISTANCE- the oppressed do not always have to challenge the powerful in an obvious way. They can challenge the ideology of the powerful through symbolic gestures carrying a particular message embedded with meaning. E.g. Taking the knee for BLM.
Paul Gilroy- The Empire Strikes Back (1982): Black youth are in conflict with their white oppressors in modern Britain and therefore have to 'win space' and overcome pains of racism. Rebellion and deviance are forms of symbolic resistance- fighting back. E.g. Rastafarian subculture- distorting 'white religion' against the oppressor.
Gilroy argued criminal activities like mugging and burglary may be another form of political resistance but that 'black criminality' is a myth and that black youths are no more prone to committing crime than anyone else. He argued there was a crisis of capitalism and unemployment and that black youths were focused on as the 'source of the problem'.
Criticism: Stuart Hall argued that if this was the case, most victims would be white, rich people. Lea and Young argued idea of black youth committing crimes as a continuation of anti-colonial struggle is unrealistic.
Stuart Hall- Policing the Crisis (1979): Black Britons were the scapegoats for economic problems like unemployment in the 1970s after immigrants from the commonwealth were welcomed for essential low-paid semi-skilled work. Politicians like Enoch Powell began to make speeches against a multi-cultural Britain. Right wing parties were on the increase. E.g. The National Front (NF).
Hall argues black Britons were facing poverty due to unemployment and struggle to get re-employed and so turned to crime to survive. Crime driven by poverty and economic strain, not symbolic resistance.
Hall argues that crime was re-marketed with a new imagine which fed into a moral-panic. There was a crisis of hegemony in the 1970s where the working class were no longer in a state of false consciousness. Capitalism needed to regain control by finding a scapegoat in the media, and flooding cities with extra 'heavy handed police'. Selective stop and search policing made the public feel more at ease that social problems were being dealt with but it fed a deviance amplification spiral
Criticism: Downes (1988) argued Hall is contradictory. On the one hand they are doing more crime but on the other it's the fault of the police and the media. Argues the link between moral panic and crisis of capitalism is weak.
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Clarke- The Skinheads (1973) argued this style emerged as a result of changes in the social structure and the breaking up of working-class communities through the replacement of terraced houses with high rise apartments. This was symbolic of an ultra-working class culture and latterly a form of resistance within capitalism.
OVERALL EVALUATION: Paul Walton (1998) argued the central aim of The New Criminology was to undermine 'correctionalism' (the belief that the sociology of crime and deviance should be used to try and get rid of such behaviour). He also believes that the following criminologies were a continuation of this one- ie. feminist and postmodernist criminology. Walton defends its role in attacking conventional theories of crime and deviance, despite the criticism from left realism. Jock Young stresses that The New Criminology emphasised the importance of explaining both the actions of offenders and the workings of the criminal justice system. But critics think it over-emphasises the way the state defines some people's behaviour as criminal and ignores the crimes of others.
The New Crimonology
Taylor et al (1973) accepted that the key to understanding crime was the 'material basis of society'. They believe that inequalities in wealth and power lie at the root of crime. They support a radical transformation of society to liberate individuals from living under capitalism.
Taylor et al insist that criminals choose to break the law and reject theories that see human behaviour as directed by external forces. They see the individual as turning to crime in an attempt to self-conceptualise.
The New Criminology denies that crime is caused by biology, anomie, subculture, social disorganisation, labelling, or poverty. It stresses that crimes are often deliberate and conscious acts with political motives. Deviants are not just the passive victims of capitalism; they are actively struggling to alter capitalism.
Taylor et al wished to see the overthrow of capitalism and its replacement with a different type of society. But unlike conventional Marxists, they referred to this preferred society as 'socialist' rather than 'communist'. They wrote that those deemed deviant (hippies, homosexuals etc) should simply be accepted in an ideal society, not turned into criminals by persecution.
Taylor et al identified 7 aspects of crime that they believed should be studied as 'a fully social theory of deviance'. 1. The Wider Origins of the Act (capitalism). 2. The Immediate Origins of the Deviant Act (motivation). 3. The Act Itself (meaning). 4. The Immediate Origins of the Societal Reaction (social/ police response). 5. The Wider Origins of the Deviant Reaction (law creation/ enforcement/ media- circumstances leading to legalisation). 6. The Outcome of the Societal Reaction on Deviant's Further Actions (MASTERSTATUS- response to labelling). 7. The Nature of the Deviant Process as a Whole (complex process so no single theory can explain).
Neo-Marxism
They accept that society is characterised by competing groups with conflicting interests and are critical of existing capitalist societies. They share a concern about the unequal distribution of power and wealth in such societies.
Though the basic principle is that class inequality exists within the very structure of society, neo-Marxists also consider interactionist ideas that criminal acts have individual meanings, not just a product of class inequality (less deterministic than traditional Marxism).