According to the Ministry of Justice, in April 2009 there were 2,126 15-17 year olds and 9,497 18-20 year olds held in custody in England and Wales. These are down 12% and 1% respectively year-on-year.

According to the Prison Reform Trust, over two-thirds are expected to re-offend within two years of release, with over 40% returning to prison. With men, the reconviction rate rises to 82%.

Troubled home life: violence and/or bad communication

between parents and teenagers.

Poor attainment at school, truancy and

school exclusion.

Drug or alcohol

misuse and mental illness.

Deprivation such as poor housing

or homelessness.

Peer group

pressure.

Lack of discipline at home and in school.

Money problems.

Bullying and alienation.

Hyperactivity.

Learning problems.

No responsibilities so focused on self-gratification.

Potentially dodgier lifestyle.

Reasons why young people are more likely to be involved in criminal activity…

According to a 1998 MORI survey of 11-16 year olds, reported in the Youth Justice Board’s ‘Annual Report’, only seven out of 10 school children can say with certainty that they have not offended in the past year and a quarter (24%) admit to committing an offence during that time.

However, only one in six of those who admitted offending said their last offence had been detected by the police. In its ‘Crime Reduction Strategy’, the Government estimates that young people under 18 commit around seven million offences a year.

* Researchers from University of Glamorgan interviewed offenders in prisons and young offenders’ institutions.

* They investigated a variety of violent offences, such as carjacking, street robbery, snatch thefts and certain kinds of aggravated burglaries, along with retaliatory, dispute-related, gang and disrespect violence.

* In particular, they looked at the role played by factors such as street culture.

* This study involved semi-structured interviews with 120 offenders (89 male and 31 female) serving sentences for violent offences in prisons and young offenders’ institutions in England and Wales. The majority were aged 26 or over and white, with 10 per cent defining themselves as black, 12 per cent as mixed race, and just one as Asian.

• Mean number of previous arrests = 45, one-third arrested 50 times or more. Previous convictions = 23, and more than a quarter said they had been convicted of 30 or more offences.

• Overall, 92 per cent had used illegal drugs.

• About a quarter (23 per cent) said that they were members of gangs or involved in them in some way.

• A further 11 per cent said they sometimes offended in groups, but did not define them as gangs. In total, one-third said that they were involved in gangs or criminal groups.

• More than a quarter (28 per cent) said that they had carried a firearm of some sort, including air guns and replica guns. An additional 35 per cent said that they carried some other weapon - usually a knife.

• Early analysis identified five main motives for street robbery: ‘goodtimes/partying’, ‘keeping up appearances/flash cash’, ‘buzz/excitement’, ‘anger/desire to fight’, and ‘informal justice/righting wrongs’.

• More detailed analysis revealed a range of individual and social benefits, including status and respect within the peer group. This is part of an emerging street culture in Britain that in some ways resembles its American counterpart.

• Some offenders went out alone with the intention to rob an easy target in order to buy drugs. Some robbed in groups or gangs for excitement, while others stole from individuals who had wronged them in some way, as a form of retaliation.

• Evidence collected so far suggests that being involved in street life and certain forms of street culture is an important factor in understanding violent street crime.

Task

• Answer the following questions• 1. Why do you think the culture of these

offenders is of interest?• 2. What norms and values were expressed

by the offenders when they were interviewed?

• 3. Why do you think they re-offended?• 4. List at least three strengths or

weaknesses of this research - GROVER

Sub-cultural theories of crime Starter

• Read handouts and discuss answers with a partner

Objectives

1. To be able to describe Walter B Miller’s sub-cultural theory of crime

2. To be able to evaluate Walter B Miller’s theory.

KEY CONCEPTS: lower class subculture; focal concerns; toughness; smartness; excitement;

fate; trouble; peer status.

Miller does not see deviant behaviour occurring due to the inability of the lower class groups to achieve success. Instead, he explains crime in terms of the existence of a distinctive lower class subculture – it’s not a reaction to poverty; it’s a way of life.

In his theoretical study Miller observes that this lower class group has for centuries possessed their own culture and traditions which are totally different from those in the higher classes. This thus suggests that this lower class culture has been passed on not by one generation but for much longer than this.

I’ve taught my lad to duck and dive, laugh

at the police and drink White

Lightening in parks. I’ll teach my kids to fight, have a laugh and be streetwise.

Crime and Deviance Chapter 5: Functionalist and Subcultural Theory

16 20/04/23

Walter B. Miller (1962)Walter B. Miller (1962)

Trouble

Toughness

Excitement

Smartness

Fatalism

Autonomy

Focalconcerns

Miller saw the lower working-class socialised into deviant subcultural values he called ‘focal concerns’

Miller saw the lower working-class socialised into deviant subcultural values he called ‘focal concerns’

What are the Focal Concerns of this working class subculture?

Toughness: this involves a concern for masculinity and finds expression in courage in the face of physical threat and a rejection of timidity and weakness. In practice this can result in assault, and battery as the group attempt to maintain their ‘reputation’.

I’m a geezer.Come and have a go.

Excitement: Involves the search for ‘thrills’, for emotional stimulus. Inpractice it is sought in gambling, sexual adventures and booze, which can be obtained by a traditional night out on the town.

Fate: They believe that little can be done about their lives – and what will be will be; they have no power to change anything.

I’ll prob’ly be in prison in a couple of

years.

There’s nowt to do except play with my own dribble.

Life’s pretty crap, so I’ve nothing to loose.

Smartness: this involves the ‘capacity to outfox, outwit, dupe, take others. Groups that use these techniques, include the hustler, conman, and the cardsharp, the pimp and pickpocket and petty thief.

Trouble: young working class males accept their lives will involve violence, and they will not run away from fights.

Miller notes that two factors tend to emphasise and exaggerate thefocal concerns of the lower class subculture.

1. Close conformity to group norms within a peer group

2. Desire for status within the peer group.

We walk the same, dress the same and live life the same...

It’s my mission to make people scared of me. It’s the only

way I’ll gain respect seeing as I’ll never

get power or status in a job.

Your brain is a muscle –Alphabet edit

• A B C D E F G H I J K L

• L T R R T T L L R T T R

• M N O P Q R S T U V W X

• L L T T L R T R R T L L

• Y Z

• L R

Choose a partner – One listens and one describes Miller’s

theory. How clear was the description?

Discuss!

Evaluations• Is this study empirical or theoretical? Why is this a

problem?• What would Feminists say about Miller’s ideas?• Do you think the ‘Focal concerns’ only apply to

lower-class?• Is Miller saying that youth’s are frustrated by their

lack of success?• Do you think that young offenders have the same

goals as the rest of us?

Crime and Deviance Chapter 5: Functionalist and Subcultural Theory

26 20/04/23

Critique of Walter B. MillerCritique of Walter B. Miller

IgnoresFemales

Many middle-class also adopt‘focal concerns’

Many middle-class also adopt‘focal concerns’

And not all lower working-class adopt ‘focal concerns’

And not all lower working-class adopt ‘focal concerns’

Re-cap

• How did Walter B Miller’s theory differ to Merton’s Strain Theory?

• What was one criticism of Miller’s theory?

• What were the 6 focal concerns?

• Why is this called a sub-cultural theory?

Your brain is a muscle –Alphabet edit

• A B C D E F G H I J K L

• L T R R T T L L R T T R

• M N O P Q R S T U V W X

• L L T T L R T R R T L L

• Y Z

• L R

Objectives

• To describe and evaluate Albert Cohen’s sub-cultural theory of crime.

• To describe and evaluate Cloward and Ohlin’s Sub-cultural theory of crime.

SCY6 Crime & Deviance: Structural/subcultural theories

He wrote delinquent boys. 1955.

KEY CONCEPT: non-utilitarian crime; cultural deprivation; status

frustration; delinquent subculture.

This is a structural theory because it argues that criminal behaviour is the result of an individual’s place

in the social class structure.

SUMMARY OF STUDY: He argues that delinquency is a collective rather than an individual response to status frustration and their position in the class structure.

These guys give me the only chance of

excitement and status.

Cohen argues Merton doesn’t discuss non-utilitarian crime such as joy riding and vandalism so he sets out to explain this type of crime.

Why do I like to just ruin things for no

money?

According to Cohen, working-class boys reject mainstream culture. Because of their cultural deprivation and ensuing educational failure, they are denied access to these cultural goals.

Hated school, failed everything, no job, can’t live a normal life. For me, crime pays.

Working class boys experience status frustration because they are stuck at the bottom of the stratification system with most avenues to success blocked.

I sit around all day wi’ nowt to do, no money

and no dignity. I’ve nothing to loose.

They resolve their status frustration by rejecting the success goals of mainstream culture and replacing them with an alternative set that they can achieve within a delinquent subculture in which they can achieve status & prestige. It’s a collective response to the problems of working class teenagers.

We haven’t got a chance in hell of being invited to a cocktail party...

So we get wasted in the stairwell of our council flat block,

instead.

“The delinquent subculture takes its norms from the larger culture but turns them upside down”.

Teachers and the papers want us to get

jobs, be polite, try hard at school and be

nice to old ladies...

...so we’re going to do exactly the

opposite.

5 minutes !

• Can you describe the theory?

• What criticisms can you think of ?

• Feminists

• Marxists

• Interactionists

RESEARCH METHOD: this was a theoretical study.

WEAKNESSES: •Box questions Cohen’s claim that delinquent boys reject mainstream culture. •Cohen ignores working class delinquent girls altogether.•Matza backs up Box’s critique by arguing that not all delinquents are strongly opposed to the values of mainstream values, they tend to drift in and out of mainstream society’s moral bind.

Your brain is a muscle –Alphabet edit

• A B C D E F G H I J K L

• L T R R T T L L R T T R

• M N O P Q R S T U V W X

• L L T T L R T R R T L L

• Y Z

• L R

SCY6 Crime & Deviance: Structural/subcultural theories

CLOWARD AND OHLIN (1960) They wrote Delinquency & Opportunity, (1961).

KEY CONCEPT: legitimate opportunity structure; illegitimate opportunity structure; criminal subcultures; conflict subcultures; retreatist

subcultures; utilitarian crime; non-utilitarian crime.

SUMMARY OF STUDY: They focused on how peoples’ opportunities to be deviant are also

different: not everyone gets the same chances to be crooks; some have better opportunities to enter into a criminal career, particularly if they have access to a criminal subculture.

Can you take my son under your wing? I want him to know

everything there is to know about protection

racketeering.

By examining access to, and opportunity for entry into, illegitimate opportunity structures, they provide explanations for different forms of deviance.

They begin by arguing that amongst working-classes there is limited or no access to legitimate opportunities like education. So they turn to illegitimate opportunities more easily.

We were all expelled from school.

So we’ve no chance of getting work.

We’ve got time and no self-respect and

that’s why we get up to no good.

Clo and Oh state that depending on the availability of illegitimate opportunities, young people can enter into one of three deviant subcultures:

Criminal subcultures are established and organized criminal networks which provide a learning environment for young criminals from criminal role models. They are largely concerned with utilitarian crime that derives financial rewards.

Conflict subcultures develop in areas of limited access to either the legitimate or the illegitimate opportunity structures.

There is little organized adult crime to provide an apprenticeship in criminality.

Gang violence is a predominant response.

Retreatist subcultures have failed to succeed in both the legitimate and illegitimate opportunity structures and are therefore double failures.

Their activities centre mainly around illegal drug abuse.

I’ve no qualifications, no job and no future in the normal world...

And we’re too soft and stupid to be

gangsters. So we just get wasted instead.

RESEARCH METHOD: this was a theoretical study that combined the ideas of both Merton and Cohen.

WEAKNESSES: Burke identifies three main criticisms of their work:

1) the idea of the criminal subculture is based on gangs in Chicago in the 1920s and 30s so isn’t particularly applicable to modern British society;

2)Again the theory focuses on MALE deliquency.

3) the idea of retreatist subcultures is a ‘grossly simplistic’ explanation of drug abuse which is actually really common among middle class people.

Plenary

• Describe Albert Cohen’s theory including one criticism to a listening partner.

• Discuss the clarity of the explanation

• Swap round and now the other person describes Cloward and Ohlin’s study including a criticism.

• Discuss the clarity.

Key word check

• Illigitimate/legitimate opportunity structure

• non-utilitarian crime

• status frustration

• conflict subcultures

• retreatist subcultures

SCY6 Crime & Deviance: Structural/subcultural theories

KEY CONCEPT: underclass; welfare dependency;

He wrote underclass. 1989.

SUMMARY OF STUDY: Murray argues that crime is a cultural phenomenon – among particular groups that share deviant norms and values.

He focuses on the underclass; a group in society that are at the bottom of the socio-economic structure as they do not and cannot participate in mainstream cultural activities such as education and / or employment and are instead, reliant upon the welfare state.

He does not accept the idea that the underclass share the same morals and values as the rest of mainstream society.

When we grow up, we want good jobs and nice houses.

When we grow up, we want to go on the

dole and rob your houses.

Murray sees the underclass as responsible for a high proportion of crime and explains their criminality in terms of their rejection of mainstream norms and values.

The over-generous payments of the welfare state have made it possible for young women to see single motherhood as a lifestyle choice and for young men to cast away the idea that they should be a breadwinner.

Children are brought up in an underclass culture that deviates away from the mainstream ideals of individual responsibility and morality. So this is a cultural explanation of crime as people are brought up to hold underclass and therefore deviant norms and values.

RESEARCH METHOD: this was a theoretical study.

WEAKNESSES: Not everyone on benefits is persistently welfare dependent – most go out and find employment. What about white collar crime? The underclass only make up a very small proportion of the British population so it can’t be used as a general cultural explanation of crime.

SCY6 Crime & Deviance: Structural/subcultural theories

KEY CONCEPT: juvenile delinquency; subterranean values; techniques of neutralization; mood of humanism; mood of fatalism;

He wrote delinquency & drift.

This American sociologist has attacked some of the assumptions on which sub-cultural and structural theories are based, and provided his own explanation.

Matza claimed that delinquents are similar to everyone else in their values and voice similar feelings of outrage about crime in general as the majority of society.

Matza’s theory also brings in an element of the action approach, which focuses on the way behaviour is adaptable and flexible and involves dimensions of choice and free will.

Thus Matza is suggesting that male delinquents to be…committed to the same values and norms as other members of society.

Society has a strong hold on them and prevents them from being delinquent, most of the time.

He exemplifies this point by noting that delinquents often express ‘regret’ and ‘remorse’ at what they have done.

And when in ‘training school’ shows disapproval to crimes such as mugging, armed robbery, fighting with weapons and car crime.

Far from being deviant this group are...casually, intermittently, and transiently immersed in a pattern of illegal activity to put it into Matza’s words.

They drift into deviant activities. In other words, there is a lot ofspontaneity and impulsiveness in deviant actions.

I’m BORED.I feel like being naughty today.

Subterranean Values

The first point that Matza made is that we all hold two levels of values.

1. Conventional Values, roles such as father, occupation

2. Subterranean Values values of sexuality, greed and aggressiveness. These are however, generally controlled, but we all hold them, and we all do them.

Matza thus suggests that delinquents are simply more likely than most of us to behave according to subterranean values in ‘inappropriate’ situations.

Techniques of NeutralisationIf delinquents are as much committed to conventional values as anyone else and, furthermore, express condemnation of crimes similar to the ones they themselves commit, why do they commit them at all?

Matza suggests that delinquents justify their own crimes as exceptions to the rule.‘Yes, what I did was wrong, but...’They are thus able to convince themselves that the law does not applyto them on this particular occasion.

We’re not at school cos it’s boring and it won’t do us any

good. We know it’s wrong and that, but we don’t need to go.

Denial of responsibility for the deviant act – the delinquents may remove responsibility from themselves by blaming their parents or the area in which they live.Denial of injury – resulting from the act – the delinquents may argue that joy-riding does not harm anyone, it is just a bit of mischief and that they were borrowing the car.

Denial of that the act was basically wrong – an assault on a homosexual (‘Queer Bashing’ was ubiquitous in the 1980s) or attack on an expensive shop seen as ‘rough justice’. Condemnation of those who make the rules – the police may be seen as corrupt or teachers as unjust hypocrits.

Appeal to higher loyalties - the delinquents may argue that they broke the law not out of self interest but to help family or friends.

I smashed up the phone box because my mum’s giving me

a hard time.

Chill, the bloke got his car back.

No harm done.

He deserved a slap, that’s what happens when you’re queer.

Mum didn’t get our giro this week, so I

got us some beers in. Didn’t actually pay for

‘em, mind.

The bizzies are constantly picking on

me so of course I chucked a brick at

their van.

1. Subculture2. lower class subculture 3. focal concerns4. peer status5. non-utilitarian crime6. cultural deprivation7. status frustration8. delinquent subculture9. legitimate opportunity structure10. illegitimate opportunity structure11. criminal subcultures12. conflict subcultures 13. retreatist subcultures14. utilitarian crime15. underclass16. welfare dependency17. edgework18. paradox of inclusion19. ASBO

What is meant by the concept of subculture?

What type of crime does subcultural theory focus on?

What is the central goal which people attempt to attain in

modern societies, according to Albert Cohen?

Why are working class boys more likely to fail at school,

according to Cohen?

A social group that supports norms and values that are different from mainstream culture,

usually because members of the group are non-achievers in mainstream society.

Juvenile delinquency.

Parents fail to equip them with the necessary skills.

Status – feelings of self-worth or esteem, both in the eyes of others

and the individual.

Why does Cohen blame education as well as parents

for working class delinquency?

What concept does Cohen suggest to explain the disaffection

of working class boys?

How do they compensate for the disaffection they feel?

What alternative sociological term can be used for

delinquent subcultures that reverse social norms and

values?

Schools deny working class children status by placing them in bottom streams/sets and

labelling them as failures.

Status frustration.

Counter cultures.

They form anti-school subcultures and award status to each other on the basis of anti-school and delinquent activities.

How might you use Paul Willis’s study of working class lads to criticise Cohen’s ideas?

What criticism might be made of the way that Cohen views

working class parenting?

What role do working class girls play in Cohen’s analysis?

How might the concept of drift be used to criticise subcultural

theory?

The lads chose to fail and engage in delinquent activities because they saw qualifications as

irrelevant to their futures, rather than because they had experienced status frustration.

His view suggests that all working class parents are inadequate.

Young people often drift between conformity and deviance.

He ignores working class girls altogether.

How does Walter B Miller view lower class culture?

Why do lower-class youths engage in crime, according to

Miller?

Give three examples of the focal concerns that lead to

juvenile delinquency, according to Miller’s theory.

What does Matza mean when he criticises subcultural theory

for over-predicting delinquency?

It is ‘naturally’ deviant, in that it subscribes to values and norms that are likely to lead to

confrontation with mainstream middle class society.

To compensate for the boredom of the working class experience of

school and work.

It implies that all working class youth is involved in delinquency, but in reality, only a small minority is.

Toughness and aggression; looking for excitement; being streetwise; being very

masculine; autonomy; fatalism etc.

What are subterranean values and who has them?

Why is labelling theory critical of subcultural theory?

What is meant by the paradox of inclusion?

Why do Postmodernists reject subcultural theory for being

too rational?

Values such as the need for excitement or to be outrageous and

most people subscribe to this.

Powerless groups, such as working class and ethnic minorities are more likely to be

stereotyped as criminal or deviant for behaviour that most groups engage in.

There are no rational reasons, such as status frustration or rejection, for delinquency –

delinquency is an irrational behaviour.

Black youths are excluded from society, but over-compensate by identifying themselves with

consumer culture through buying high-status material goods and logos.

What do postmodernists mean when they say that crime is

‘seductive’?

What does Lyng mean when he describes delinquency as

‘edgework’?

Why might feminists be critical of subcultural theories of

delinquency?

Young males quite simply get involved in delinquency because it’s

thrilling.

Delinquency involves danger and taking risks – going to the edge of

acceptable behaviour.

Subcultural theory generally ignores female delinquency.