Introduction to Criminology

• Criminology studies criminal phenomena within the social sciences
• Criminologists study all aspects of criminal phenomena, including individual and social factors.
• Criminalistics uses exact sciences like chemistry and physics to investigate how crimes occur.
• Criminalists are considered experts in this field.
• The first criminology degree in Mexico was offered by the Autonomous University of Nuevo León around 1984.
• The second criminology degree was offered by the Autonomous University of Tamaulipas in 1994.
• The third criminology degree was offered by the Autonomous University of Queretaro, 2000.
• Criminology originated in Italy in April 1876.
• Cesare Lombroso is considered the father of criminology, worked alongside Enrico Ferri and Rafael Garofalo.
• Lombroso claimed that criminals are born that way, based on studies of criminals' skulls, publishing his results in 1876.
• Malinowski is considered the father of anthropology in the 1900s.

Objects of Study in Criminology

• Crime
• Criminal
• Criminality
• Victim
• Social reaction
• Social control
• The first three are levels of interpretation (behavioral, individual, and social), and the last three are more modern.

Crime (Juridical Meaning)

• Serious offense, highly grave behaviors.
• In Mexico, the concept of "crime" does not exist and would be the same as "delito" (offense).

Crime (Social or Journalistic Meaning)

• Similar to the juridical meaning but with a social focus, for example, organized crime.

Crime (Criminological Meaning)

• Must have three characteristics: it may or may not be typified, it causes harm or impact, and it generates rejection from society.
• "The general concept is crime and the specific/particular concept is offense"
• An example of non-typified crimes is school violence; gang violence in Mexico also meets the criteria for criminological significance.

Criminality

• It stands for a collection of crimes occurring at a specific time and place.
• It is not random; it's causal.
• It is projective.
• Risks are unevenly distributed.
• Probabilities exist.
• Criminality has two dimensions.

Objectivity of Criminality

• Divided into three figures:
• Official Figure: Crimes known to authorities.
• Black Figure: Crimes unknown to authorities.
• Real Figure: Objective criminality.
• ENVIPE: Victimization and perception survey.
• ENSU: Urban safety survey.

Subjectivity of Criminality

• The "perception of insecurity" encompasses:
• Routine
• Sex
• Transportation
• Environment

Victim

• A person or group of people whose human rights or legally protected assets are violated.
• There are three types of victims.
• Direct: The holder of the right, for example, the person kidnapped.
• Indirect: Family members who depend directly.
• Potential: Those who are victimized as a result of assisting a victim.

Victimization Processes

• Primary: Produced by the criminal event.
• Secondary: Consequences resulting from security attention.
• Tertiary: Produced by society in general (family, media, etc.).

Social Reaction

• How society responds to criminal phenomena:
• Culture of (il)legality
• Changes in habit
• Perception of insecurity
• Lynchings

Social Control

• All institutions, mechanisms, or strategies to control criminal phenomena.
• There are two types of social control.

Formal Social Control

• Mechanisms, organizations, and institutions that directly address criminal phenomena (police, prison, penalties, criminalization processes).

Processes of Criminalization

• Primary: Typification of behaviors.
• Secondary: Actions of authorities in interpreting the law.
• Tertiary: Internalization of the label.

Informal Social Control

• Elements that indirectly contain criminal phenomena, e.g., schools and art.

Paradigms of Criminology.

• Causalist and Positivism focus on why someone commits a crime, looking at factors like physical, biological, social, and environmental influences.
• Causalist and Positivism existed from the 19's to 50's

Critical or Marxist Criminology

• Critical or Marxist Criminology existed from the 50's to 80's
• Focuses on critic of positivism.
• Claims that crime is a social construct and emphasizes the reaction to conduct rather than the conduct itself.
• A criminal is defined by being labeled and treated as such.
• Aims to prevent re-offending.

Environmental, Actuarial, Managerial Criminology, or Crime Management

• Focuses on the crime being a product of opportunity and opportunity that exists in the environment.
• The managerial criminology paradigm occured from 1989- present.

Cultural Criminology

• Focuses on crimes being part of the culture and the culture being part of the crime.
• Cultural criminology occured from the 90's to the present.
• Environmental Criminology involves making decisions based on information from the environment.

Factors in Criminology

Ideas:

• Factors add up, but never determine an outcome.
• Includes inhibitors/prosocial factors (protection) and impulse/antisocial factors (risk).

Endogenous or Predisposing Factors

• Factors produced within the individual:
• Biological, genetic, biochemical, and nutritional factors.
• Psychological factors.

Exogenous or Preparatory Factors

• Factors produced outside the individual:
• Drugs.
• Environmental, geographical, and social factors.

Triggering Factors

• Can be endogenous or exogenous.
• The "last straw" or "detonator."