Harm PDF - Social Science Concepts

So, crime…. What we consider crime is not static but changes across time and place. Crime is a social construction. Crime is not a natural phenomenon but it is the result of a complex process of law making and crimin...

So, crime…. What we consider crime is not static but changes across time and place. Crime is a social construction. Crime is not a natural phenomenon but it is the result of a complex process of law making and criminalisation. Some behaviours are not defined as such by the law but they cause harm. Examples? 1 Disasters or crimes? Disasters or crimes? Trafigura’s Probo Koala https://www.dailymot ion.com/video/xbintv https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=kGYP y3ruZGU (France 24 - from 2.50 to 5.24 mins) Amnesty international on the Probo Koala case. 4 Hurricane Katrina https://www.vpm.org/npr-news/2015-08- 03/10-years-after-katrina-new-orleans- recovery-is-tale-of-two-cities https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/hurricane-katrina- powerful-photos-storm-that-devastated-new- orleans-9-years-ago-1463168 Not all crimes produce harm and there is harm without crimes Pollution may be the result of perfectly legal activity. Harm is also provoked by «legal behaviours» These cases radically challenge the conventional idea of “crime” as a well- defined behaviour that occurs in a definite context, with a victim and an offender. What can we do? 6  1. Crime has no ontological reality 2. Criminology perpetuates the myth of crime 3. Crime consists of many petty events 4. Crime excludes many serious harm 5. Constructing crime Criticism of the 6. Criminalisation and Punishment concept of crime 7. Crime Control is ineffective and criminology 8. Crime legitimizes the expansion of the criminal control industry 9. Crime’ serves to maintain power relations 7 Extend the definition of crime beyond the legal definition Crime includes violation of law other than criminal law. Crime includes behaviours which are punishable even though not punished Edwin Suterland Crime includes those harms provoked by the criminal justice system (which do not prosecute some people). Crime includes invisible crimes that we make visible by name them (and then advocate for the introduction of new crimes) 8 Change the category Struggle to analyse harmful laws/policies/behaviours difficult to conceptualise as crime Social harm had never seriously been incorporated into criminology (Muncie, 2000) “Social harm” as an alternative to “crime” “Zemiology” as an alternative to “Criminology”