Week 4 SEP 27 Deviance and Crime Overview PDF

**SOCI/CRIM 1P91\ September 27, 2024\ Deviance and Crime** Deviance - Medical aid in dying - Dr. Kevorkian: Humanitarian or Criminal? - Norms, Time, Place, Person Audience Symbolic Interactionism: - Labelling Theory Conflict theory: - Deviance and Inequality Movie clip: The Corpor...

**SOCI/CRIM 1P91\ September 27, 2024\ Deviance and Crime** Deviance - Medical aid in dying - Dr. Kevorkian: Humanitarian or Criminal? - Norms, Time, Place, Person Audience Symbolic Interactionism: - Labelling Theory Conflict theory: - Deviance and Inequality Movie clip: The Corporation "Elite Deviance" - White collar crime - corporate crime "Elite deviance" vs. "street crime" **Deviance** Dr. Kevorkian assisted terminally ill people to die before it became legal. Is he a humanitarian or criminal? The answer depends on several factors to determine whether any given behaviour is defined as deviant and/or criminal: - social norms - time - place - person - audience Deviance: sociologists use the term deviance to refer to any acts that involve the violation of accepted social norms **Norms** Norms: the shared and accepted standards and social expectations that guide people's behaviour. - No thought or action is inherently deviant. It becomes deviant only in relation to particular norms - norms are considered important enough to be codified into laws, whose violation then, is considered a crime **Time** What is considered deviance or criminal varies from one historical period to another. Changes in society, such as technological development, create new concerns that can either, 1. produce new definitions of deviance or 2. alter and challenge existing definitions of deviance **Place** Whether a given behaviour is defined as deviant or not varies from one place to another - For example - Canada, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and Switzerland allow physicians to physically assist in the death of patients. The United States has authorized medical aid in dying in only six states. **Person** - Even when behaviour is defined as deviance, it does not mean the person engaging in that behaviour will be considered a deviant - Many factors play crucial roles in defining who is deviant: - Age, sex, race, ethnicity, social class, as well as physical and mental states **Audience** - What behaviour is defined as deviance and which people are perceived as deviant depend, to a large extent, on who is doing the defining and who has the power to make the definitions stick - **Moral entrepreneurs** can influence/change the creation/enforcement of what constitutes deviance through **moral panics** **Deviance: a few points to emphasize** - *No behaviour is inherently deviant -- it is socially constructed; that is, it is a matter of definition* - *Deviance is relative to time and place among the other factors mentioned* - *Defining something/someone as deviant depends to a large extent on the social context (social control plays a role)* - *People and behaviours become defined as deviant through a socially defining process that gives unequal weight to powerful/dominant groups* **Deviance, Nonconformity, Social Control** - Deviance does not always mean nonconformity; nor is deviance synonymous with rule violation - Nonconformity becomes deviance when it produces a negative social reaction and when there are concerted public efforts to change the behaviour or punish the person. - These efforts are what sociologists call social control and it takes on many forms. - Informal social control occurs through interactions among individuals - Formal social control is that practiced by the state through official organizations and agents, primarily within the criminal justice system. **Crime** - Crime: concept used to designate particular behaviours or actions that are believed to require social control and social intervention codified in law. - Although crime represents only one form deviance, it generates the most concern and fear in today's general population **(often manufactured by moral entrepreneurs)** - **Often there is a greater consensus about the wrongfulness of "crime" than other forms of deviance (although this, too, is manufactured)** **Symbolic Interactionism** Labelling Theory: - the assertion that once labelled as deviant, people come to accept the label as part of their identity. 1. *Primary* deviance refers to passing episodes of norm violation; and *secondary* deviance is when an individual repeatedly violates a norm and begins to take on a deviant identity. 2. A stigma is a powerfully negative social label that radically changes a person's self-concept and social identity, operating as a master status. **Conflict Theory** Conflict theorists argue examining who or what is labelled deviant or criminal depends on who holds the power. They explain deviance and power in three ways: 1. The norms of any society generally reflect the interests of the rich and powerful. 2. The powerful have the resources to resist deviant labelling. 3. The laws may be inherently unfair. **"Elite Deviance"** Elite deviance: wrongdoing by the wealthy and powerful individuals and organizations (older sociological term) - White-collar crime refers to crimes committed by person of respectability and high status in the course of their occupations. - i.e., embezzlement, fraud, bribery, and employee theft - Corporate crime refers to the illegal actions of a corporation or people acting on its behalf - i.e., includes knowingly selling faulty or dangerous products to deliberately polluting the environment **"Elite deviance" vs. "Street" Crime** White collar and corporate crime are generally more profitable, less likely to be detected or punished and more likely to result in considerably lighter sentences than "street" crimes. There are several reasons: 1\. Elite deviants are usually white, middle, and upper class and well-educated. They do not fit the widely accepted stereotypical profile of a "criminal." 2\. Since white collar and corporate crimes often involve many parties at different levels, it may be difficult to affix individual responsibility in any one case. 3\. Elite deviants are typically more powerful than their victims and have the resources to make and argue their case more effectively.