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Topic 6- ethnicity, crime and justice - Coggle Diagram
Topic 6- ethnicity, crime and justice
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Left realists Lea and Young argue that ethnic differences in the statistics reflect real differences in the levels of offending.
- They see crime as the product of relative deprivation, subculture and marginalisation.
- Racism has led to the marginalisation and economic exclusion of minority ethnic groups
- Media emphasis on consumerism also promotes ups tun de reach by leglimate nated. goals that many members of minority ethnic groups cannot reach by legitimate means because of discrimination.
Lea and Young recognise that racist policing often leads to the unjustified criminalisation of some members of minority ethnic groups.
- However, even if the police do act in racist ways, Lea and Young argue that this is unlikely to account for the ethnic differences in the stats.
- similarily, police racism cannot explain the much higher conviction rates of Black than Asian people: they would have to be selectively racist against Black but not Asian people to cause these differences.
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- The statistics represent real differences in offending between ethnic groups, and
- These are caused by differences in levels of relative deprivation and marginalisation.
- Neo- Marxism: black crime as a construct
Neo-Marxists such as Gilroy and Hall et al reject the view that the statistics reflect reality. Rather, they are the outcome of a social construction process that stereotypes minority ethnic groups as more criminal than White people.
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Gilroy argues that the idea of Black criminality is a myth created by racist stereotypes of African Caribbean and Asian people.
- In reality, these groups are no more criminal than any other ethnic group.
- But because the CJS acts on these racist stereotypes, minority ethnic groups are criminalised and therefore appear in greater numbers in the official crime statistics.
Crime as political resistance Gilroy argues that minority ethnic group crime is a form of political resistance against a racist society, and this resistance has its roots in earlier struggles against British imperialism.
- Most Black and Asian people in the UK originated in former British colonies, where their anti-colonial struggles taught them how to resist oppression, e.g. through riots and demonstrations.
- When they found themselves facing racism in Britain, they adopted the same forms of struggle to defend themselves, but their political struggle was criminalised by the British state.
Gilroy's view is like that of critical criminology, which argues that much working-class crime is an act of resistance to capitalism.
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Hall et al argue that the 1970s saw a moral panic over 'Black muggers' that served the interests of capitalism in dealing with a crisis.
- Hall et al argue that the ruling class are normally able to rule society through consent.
- But in times of crisis, this becomes more dificult. In the early 19705, British capitalism faced a crisis: high inflation, unemployment and widespread strikes.
- The 1970s also saw a media-driven moral panic about the supposed growth of a 'new crime - mugging enter are sty citramtted by Black youth. In reality, according to Hal et al, there was no evidence of a significant increase in this crime.
- The emergence of the moral panic about mugging as a 'Black' crime at the same time as the crisis of capitalism was no coincidence. The myth of the 'young Black mugger' served as a scapegoat to distract attention from the true cause of societys problems such as unemployment - namely the capitalist crisis.
- By presenting Black youth as a threat to the fabric of society, the moral panic served to divide the working class on racial grounds and weaken opposition to capitalism, as well as winning popular consent for more authoritarian forms of rule that could be used to suppress opposition.
- However, Hall et al do not argue that Black crime was only a product of media labelling.
The crisis of capitalism was increasingly marginalising Black youth through unemployment, and this drove some into petty crime to survive.
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Neighbourhood factors FitzGerald et al (2003) found street robberies were highest in very poor areas but where the people had contact with richer groups. Young Black people were more likely to live in these areas and to be poor, but poor White people in these areas were also more likely to commit street crime. Thus, ethnicity as such was not a cause.
Getting caught Sharp and Budd (2005) found Black offenders were more likely than White people to have been arrested. This was because they committed crimes where victims could identify them (e.g. robbery), and had been excluded from school or associated with known criminals - factors that raised their visibility to police.
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Risk of being a victim varies with ethnic group. Differences may be due to racism and to factors such as being young, male and unemployed, so groups with a higher proportion of young unemployed males may have higher rates of victimisation.
Impact of racist victimisation Repeated instances of harassment and violence can cause psychological harm as well as physical injury and damage to property.
- Minority ethnic communities are often over-policed and under-protected, with institutional and individual racism in the police and failure to investigate offences. In some instances, this has led communities to organise their own defence.