Criminology and the common sense of crime

Q: In what ways, if any, does criminology challenge the common sense understanding of the
problem of crime?

This essay shall present a topic that is commonly dealing with every society of the 21st century.
Moreover, this essay shall present a few criminological theories that has been use to combat
crime. The problem of crime is not something that anyone can understand unless a deeply
research is made and took to the point where it cannot be said that is not just a theory or a
rumor that has spread from generation to generation due to the various facts that can be proven
as a result of the theory that has been written. Writing about crime can be found from the
earliest times. Sometimes they were in the form of novels and on other occasions they were
accounts, such as the consequences of deprivation in slums and the evils of drink (Jones,
2009: 1) The problem of crime is not just a matter of ones society or culture, it is a matter of
word wide problem to whom everyone has taken party at least once. It seems that nowadays
people think that dealing with crimes is just a matter of the justice system and laws despite that
it is not so. Based on criminal facts, many sociologists have tried to find out and explanation to
their behavior and reasoning for acting. For this, many theories have been conceived in the
hope to fight against criminal behavior.
There has been a certain number of theories that have tried to explain different social problems
caused by deviant behavior of people. One of the most compromising theories to develop
deviance has been the labelling theory which has appeared in the 1960s and it produced a
great deal in research and inspired many further theories and debates on this topic. Labeling
theory highlights social responses to crime and deviance and asks the problem to what happens
to criminals after they have been labeled. As the sociologist Rock says there has been an
enduring strain of analysis, linked most particularly to symbolic interactionism and
phenomenology which insists that people do not, and cannot, respond immediately, uncritically
and passively to the word as it is. Rather they respond to their idea of that world, and the
business of sociology is to capture, understand, and reproduce those ideas; examine their
interaction with one another; and analyse the processes and structures that generated them.
(Rock, 2007:255.) In other words, labeling theory is the theory of how the self-identity and
behavior of individuals may be determined or influenced by the terms used to describe or

classify them. It is associated with the concepts of self-fulfilling prophecy and stereotyping and
holds that deviance is not inherited to an act, but it concentrates on majority tendency of
labeling negatively minorities or those seen as deviant from standard cultural norms (Wikipedia,
Labeling theory). According to Gove, labeling theory is often referred to as the societal reaction
perspective (Gove, 1980) meaning that due to this theory, without societal deviance, it would
remain only sporadic and unorganized because societal reaction is the one that causes
deviance to stabilize into a deviant carrier. For this reason, once a person commits a crime or a
deviance, that person is labeled according to the facts that he or she committed following to be
segregated from the society within lives. As a reaction from societys responses for the facts that
they have committed, individuals tend to behave as the society begun to view them, deviants
and criminals even that it might be wrong sometimes, but the impact that society view has on
individuals it is way too strong to deny it. Labeling theory focuses its attention on the process of
criminalization. It is sequential theory or perspective in which factors that explain initial
involvement in crime or deviance are not necessarily factors that explain continued or
systematic involvement. (Kubrin et al, 2009:201) Such forms of deviance can arrive from
different sources like genetic, psychological, physiological and sociological origins which
sometime tend to be ignored once a label is made to an individual. As a result of the labeling
process people become however aware of the deviant acts that they have committed, but still
continuing to commit them as a response of the labeling process that has been made against
them, turning them into labeled deviant.
The effects of labeling theory has concerned into three ways which can lead to secondary
deviation according to Kubrin: by altering ones self-concept, by limiting ones range of
conventional opportunities, and by encouraging movement into a deviant subculture. Each path
reinforces the others, leading to greater involvement in crime and deviance for the labeled
individual. (Kubrin et al, 2009:203). Because of ones self-conceptualization, people that have
committed crimes tend to think of themselves as criminals or deviants. The effect of labeling
theory depends also on who is being labeled. While the label can affect a persons selfconcept, the individual can also reject or fight the label. (Paternoster and Ivovanni, 1989:376).
According to labeling theory, self-concepts are constructed in an active way because identity is
not fixed. Rather ones self-concept is formed and re-formed in an interactive process where
the individual is reflexive, role-playing, and negotiating his or her identity. (Akers and Sellers,
2004:137). One effect of labeling is that it can affect relationships with the other to the point of

reducing opportunities and harm the social relationship until pushing them into subcultures
where they learn criminal motives and skills from peers.
To be labeled as a criminal takes to commit only a single criminal offence because this is all the
term formally refers to. For instance, a man who has been convicted of housebreaking and
thereby labeled criminal is presumed to be a person likely to break into other houses.
Furthermore, when the deviant is being caught, he is treated in accordance with the popular
diagnosis of why is he that way and the treatment itself may increase deviances.
Having looked at labeling theory, we shall now move onto another theory that will help us in
understanding the common sense of crime. The theory that shall do that is social control theory,
which can be defined as it follows: Social control theory proposes that people's relationships,
commitments, values, norms, and beliefs encourage them not to break the law. Thus, if moral
codes are internalized and individuals are tied into and have a stake in their wider community,
they will voluntarily limit their propensity to commit deviant acts. The theory seeks to understand
the ways in which it is possible to reduce the likelihood of criminality developing in individuals. It
does not consider motivational issues, simply stating that human beings may choose to engage
in a wide range of activities, unless the range is limited by the processes of socialization and
social learning. The theory derives from Hobbesian view of human nature as represented
in Leviathan, i.e. that all choices are constrained by implicit social contracts, agreements and
arrangements among people. Thus, morality is created in the construction of social order,
assigning costs and consequences to certain choices and defining some as evil, immoral and/or
illegal (Wikipedia, Social Control Theory).
The social control theory is the theory that tries to understand why the deviant behavior does
seems to be so attractive and exciting when it comes to achieving other ends. According to
Kubrin, control theorists see no need to explain why people commit deviant behavior; they
participate in deviant activities because they are attracted to them. However, he asks a question
which says that why would people not participate in those activities? Why would people not do
something that was fun, rewarding, exciting, or an efficient means to a desired end? (Kubrin et
al, 2009: 167). For this, he gives the answer as well which says that the answer to this question
from a social control perspective is that something constrains or prevents the individual from
participating. There are many potential on our behaviors. (Kubrin et al, 2009: 167).
The social control theory has started to arise with the year 1969 at the contribution of Travis
Hirschi, who has been the most influential in promoting social control theory. Hirschi concerned

his work on the delinquent acts that scholars might commit. As a result of his theory, he
suggests that the only reason that holds people from committing crimes are the social bonds
that they have with the others. Once those social bonds are being broken, the individual starts
to feel free and no more constraint about his behavior, which will lead him to committing
delinquent behavior, but not necessarily will.
Most theorists ask why someone commits a crime whilst control theories look at why most
people choose not to commit crime. Control theorist believe that it is easier to explain why
people commit crimes, as all humans are prone to weakness, making them unable to resist
temptation which is why their center of attention is on the controlling factors that could be absent
in a criminal, which is usually due to society. For this reason, they named it Social Control
Theory. Social control theory has been classified as well as the self-control theory, becoming am
unlikely place for social policy.
However, a number of theorist have written specifically from a control perspective. Most of them
have attributed crime and deviance to a weakness in the level of control exercised over or by
offenders. More recently, an alternative control-based explanation has been put in use, the
opportunity to exercise sufficient control over their lives.
Last but not least theory that would help us understand the commission of crime is the theory
that has its basis on the Chicago School. Founded in the last decades of the nineteenth
century, the sociology department became popular for its theoretical and methodological
innovations among the sociology field. The aims of the Chicago School sociologist were to
observe and give an interpretation to the phenomena in which the city of Chicago was involved
in the 19th century after the waves of immigrants that came from Europe but not only.
In sociology, the social disorganization theory is one of the most important theories developed
by the Chicago School, related to ecological theories. The theory directly links crime rates to
neighborhood ecological characteristics; a core principle of social disorganization theory is that
place matters. In other words, a person's residential location is a substantial factor shaping the
likelihood that that person will become involved in illegal activities. The theory suggests that,
among determinants of a person's later illegal activity, residential location is as significant as or
more significant than the person's individual characteristics (e.g., age, gender, or race). For
example, the theory suggests that youths from disadvantaged neighborhoods participate in
a subculture which approves of delinquency, and that these youths thus acquire criminality in
this social and cultural setting.

Larry Gaines and Roger Miller state in their book Criminal Justice in Action that "crime is largely
a product of unfavorable conditions in certain communities." According to the social
disorganization theory, there are ecological factors that lead to high rates of crime in these
communities, and these factors linked to constantly elevated levels of "high school dropouts,
unemployment, deteriorating infrastructures, and single-parent homes" (Gaines and Miller). The
theory is not intended to apply to all types of crime, just street crime at the neighborhood level.
The theory has not been used to explain organized crime, corporate crime, or deviant
behavior that takes place outside neighborhood settings (Wikipedia, Social disorganization
theory).
In the search for answers relating crimes, the Chicago school asked a pertinent question as it
follows: What is it about some neighborhoods that consistently breed crimes rates? (Kubrin et
all, 2009: 87). When it comes to referring at social disorganization, people were unable to
combat crimes because of the diversity that the society was formed, most of them being
immigrants who were in poverty. This was the key factor that influenced crimes rates to reach
such a high level during that period. In other words, disorganized communities are more likely to
commit crimes due to the lack of solidarity and social cohesion or integration between residents,
which is the main reason that allows crimes to happen.
Social disorganization can be demonstrated by the presence of people using drugs on the
streets, dealing drugs, fighting in public, crime, prostitution, or other criminal or deviance
activities that created a feeling of danger and making it seen by neighborhood as a sign of the
collapse in the social control therefore showing that the members that their neighborhoods are
dangerous places. Social disorganization theory continues to dominate in clarifying the impact
of neighborhood characteristics such as, poverty, ethnic diversity, and residential stability, on
crime rates. Regarding the future, social disorganization theory will still be applied to various
forms of crime and will continue to be the motivation behind criminologists and social scientists
in their exploration of criminal behavior.

The problem of crime has been explained by many sociologists from a perspective that that tries
to understand the causes of the crime. But what they might not be sure about a theory is that
things can evolve in the future. Trying to understand people decisions of committing crimes can
be a difficult because of the diversity of reasons that made people. What this theories cannot
figure is how to stop this crimes. People are pushed to such behavior sometimes not for the
benefits that the crime might provide, but for their pleasure. To answer to the question if

criminology does challenge the common sense of the problem of crimes, the answer is quite
simple. What criminology as a filed does help us understanding crime by evolving us directly to
the core of the problem, finding the sources and trying to explain them. Moreover, it divides the
problem to pieces so we can have a clearly view of what does crimes mean.

References
Jones, S. (2009). Criminology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Knepper, P. (2007). Criminology and social policy. Los Angeles: SAGE.
Kubrin, C., Stucky, T. and Krohn, M. (2009). Researching theories of crime and deviance. New
York, NY: Oxford University Press.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_control_theory#Definition
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_disorganization_theory