SD & SW

Module 2
1st Semester,LT2, SY 2023-24
Module 2 : Theoretical foundations on social deviation

Objectives:
1. Identify the different perspectives on social deviation.

2. Analyze a given situation using the theories and

perspectives on Deviation

3. Recognize the diversity in the interpretation of social

deviation
PRE TASK:

• Think of a recent time when you used informal negative

sanctions.
• To what act of deviance were you responding?
• How did your actions affect the deviant person or persons?
• How did your reaction help maintain social control?
Theoretical Explanations of Deviance

• The three major sociological paradigms offer different explanations for the
motivation behind deviance and crime. Functionalists point out that deviance is a
social necessity since it reinforces norms by reminding people of the consequences
of violating them. Violating norms can open society’s eyes to injustice in the system.

• Conflict theorists argue that crime stems from a system of inequality that keeps
those with power at the top and those without power at the bottom.

• Symbolic interactionists focus attention on the socially constructed nature of the

labels related to deviance. Crime and deviance are learned from the environment
and enforced or discouraged by those around us.

• Let’s review and understand each of the main theories associated with each
perspective below.
These theories can be grouped according to the three major
sociological paradigms: functionalism, symbolic interactionism,
and conflict theory

• Functionalism
• Sociologists who follow the functionalist approach are concerned
with how the different elements of a society contribute to the
whole. They view deviance as a key component of a functioning
society.
o Social disorganization theory,
o strain theory, and
o cultural deviance theory
• represent three functionalist perspectives on deviance in society.
Émile Durkheim: The Essential Nature of Deviance

• Émile Durkheim believed that deviance is a necessary part of a successful

society. One way deviance is functional, he argued, is that it challenges
people’s present views (1893).

• Moreover, Durkheim noted, when deviance is punished, it reaffirms currently

held social norms, which also contributes to society (1893).

• When social deviance is committed, the collective conscience is offended.

Durkheim (1897) describes the collective conscience as a set of social norms
by which members of a society follow. Without the collective conscience, there
would be no absolute morals followed in institutions or groups.
• Émile Durkheim would claim that deviance was in fact a normal
and necessary part of social organization. He stated four
important functions of deviance:
1."Deviance affirms cultural values and norms. Any definition of
virtue rests on an opposing idea of vice: There can be no good
without evil and no justice without crime."
2.Deviance defines moral boundaries, people learn right from
wrong by defining people as deviant.
3.A serious form of deviance forces people to come together and
react in the same way against it.
4.Deviance pushes society's moral boundaries which, in turn
leads to social change
• Social integration is the attachment to groups and institutions, while
social regulation is the adherence to the norms and values of
society.
• Durkheim's theory attributes social deviance to extremes of social
integration and social regulation. He stated four different
types of suicide from the relationship between social integration and
social regulation:

1.Altruistic suicide occurs when one is too socially integrated.

2.Egoistic suicide occurs when one is not very socially integrated.
3.Anomic suicide occurs when there is very little social regulation
from a sense of aimlessness or despair.
4.Fatalistic suicide occurs when a person experiences too much
social regulation.
Social Disorganization Theory
• Developed by researchers at the University of Chicago in the 1920s and 1930s, social
disorganization theory asserts that crime is most likely to occur in communities with weak
social ties and the absence of social control. In a certain way, this is the opposite of Durkheim’s
thesis. Rather than deviance being a force that reinforces moral and social solidarity, it is the
absence of moral and social solidarity that provides the conditions for social deviance to
emerge.

• Early Chicago School sociologists used an ecological model to map the zones in Chicago
where high levels of social problem were concentrated. During this period, Chicago was
experiencing a long period of economic growth, urban expansion, and foreign immigration.
They were particularly interested in the zones of transition between established working class
neighborhoods and the manufacturing district. The city’s poorest residents tended to live in
these transitional zones, where there was a mixture of races, immigrant ethnic groups, and non-
English languages, and a high rate of influx as people moved in and out. They proposed that
these zones were particularly prone to social disorder because the residents had not yet
assimilated to the American way of life. When they did assimilate they moved out, making it
difficult for a stable social ecology to become established there.
Social disorganization theory points to broad social factors as the
cause of deviance. A person is not born a criminal, but becomes
one over time, often based on factors in his or her social
environment.
Robert Merton: Strain Theory
• Sociologist Robert Merton agreed that deviance is, in a sense,
a normal behavior in a functioning society, but he expanded on
Durkheim’s ideas by developing strain theory, which notes that
access to socially acceptable goals plays a part in determining
whether a person conforms or deviates.
• He discussed deviance in terms of goals and means as part of
his strain/anomie theory.
• Merton goes further and states that anomie is the state in
which social goals and the legitimate means to achieve them do
not correspond.
• He postulated that an individual's response to societal
expectations and the means by which the individual pursued
those goals were useful in understanding deviance.
Specifically, he viewed collective action as motivated by strain,
stress, or frustration in a body of individuals that arises from a
disconnection between the society's goals and the popularly
used means to achieve those goals.

Often, non-routine collective behavior (rioting, rebellion, etc.) is said

to map onto economic explanations and causes by way of strain.

These two dimensions determine the adaptation to society

according to the cultural goals, which are the society's perceptions
about the ideal life, and to the institutionalized means, which are the
legitimate means through which an individual may aspire to the
cultural goals.
Merton described 5 types of deviance in terms of the acceptance or
rejection of social goals and the institutionalized means of achieving them:
1.Innovation is a response due to the strain generated by our culture's
emphasis on wealth and the lack of opportunities to get rich, which
causes people to be "innovators" by engaging in stealing and selling
drugs. Innovators accept society's goals, but reject socially acceptable
means of achieving them. (e.g.: monetary success is gained through
crime). Merton claims that innovators are mostly those who have been
socialized with similar world views to conformists, but who have been
denied the opportunities they need to be able to legitimately achieve
society's goals.

2.Conformists accept society's goals and the socially acceptable means of

achieving them (e.g.: monetary success is gained through hard work).
Merton claims that conformists are mostly middle-class people in middle
class jobs who have been able to access the opportunities in society such
as a better education to achieve monetary success through hard work.
3. Ritualism refers to the inability to reach a cultural goal thus embracing the rules to
the point where the people in question lose sight of their larger goals in order to feel
respectable. Ritualists reject society's goals, but accept society's institutionalized
means. Ritualists are most commonly found in dead-end, repetitive jobs, where they
are unable to achieve society's goals but still adhere to society's means of
achievement and social norms.

4. Retreatism is the rejection of both cultural goals and means, letting the person in
question "drop out". Retreatists reject the society's goals and the legitimate means to
achieve them. Merton sees them as true deviants, as they commit acts of deviance to
achieve things that do not always go along with society's values.

5. Rebellion is somewhat similar to retreatism, because the people in question also

reject both the cultural goals and means, but they go one step further to a
"counterculture" that supports other social orders that already exist (rule breaking).
Rebels reject society's goals and legitimate means to achieve them, and instead
creates new goals and means to replace those of society, creating not only new goals
to achieve but also new ways to achieve these goals that other rebels will find
Clifford Shaw and Henry McKay: Cultural Deviance Theory

• Cultural deviance theory suggests that conformity to the prevailing cultural norms
of lower-class society causes crime. Researchers Clifford Shaw and Henry McKay
(1942) studied crime patterns in Chicago in the early 1900s. They found that
violence and crime were at their worst in the middle of the city and gradually
decreased the farther someone traveled from the urban center toward the suburbs.
Shaw and McKay noticed that this pattern matched the migration patterns of
Chicago citizens. New immigrants, many of them poor and lacking knowledge of
the English language, lived in neighborhoods inside the city. As the urban
population expanded, wealthier people moved to the suburbs and left behind the
less privileged.

• Shaw and McKay concluded that socioeconomic status correlated to race and
ethnicity resulted in a higher crime rate. The mix of cultures and values created a
smaller society with different ideas of deviance, and those values and ideas were
transferred from generation to generation.
• The theory of Shaw and McKay has been further tested and
expounded upon by Robert Sampson and Byron Groves (1989).
They found that poverty, ethnic diversity, and family disruption in
given localities had a strong positive correlation with social
disorganization.

• They also determined that social disorganization was, in turn,

associated with high rates of crime and delinquency—or deviance.
Recent studies Sampson conducted with Lydia Bean (2006) revealed
similar findings. High rates of poverty and single-parent homes
correlated with high rates of juvenile violence.
• Conflict theory looks to social and economic factors as the causes of crime and deviance. Unlike
functionalists, conflict theorists don’t see these factors as positive functions of society. They see
them as evidence of inequality in the system. They also challenge social disorganization theory
and control theory and argue that both ignore racial and socioeconomic issues and oversimplify
social trends (Akers 1991). Conflict theorists also look for answers to the correlation of gender
and race with wealth and crime.

• In sociology, conflict theory states that society or an organization functions so that each individual
participant and its groups struggle to maximize their benefits, which inevitably contributes to social
change such as political changes and revolutions. Deviant behaviors are actions that do not go
along with the social institutions as what cause deviance. The institution's ability to change norms,
wealth or status comes into conflict with the individual. The legal rights of poor folks might be
ignored, middle class are also accept; they side with the elites rather than the poor, thinking they
might rise to the top by supporting the status quo. Conflict theory is based upon the view that the
fundamental causes of crime are the social and economic forces operating within society.
However, it explains white-collar crime less well.

• This theory also states that the powerful define crime. This raises the question: for whom is this
theory functional? In this theory, laws are instruments of oppression: tough on the powerless and
less tough on the powerful.
Karl Marx: An Unequal System

• Conflict theory was greatly influenced by the work of German

philosopher, economist, and social scientist Karl Marx. Marx
believed that the general population was divided into two groups.
He labeled the wealthy, who controlled the means of production
and business, the bourgeois. He labeled the workers who
depended on the bourgeois for employment and survival the
proletariat. Marx believed that the bourgeois centralized their
power and influence through government, laws, and other
authority agencies in order to maintain and expand their positions
of power in society. Though Marx spoke little of deviance, his
ideas created the foundation for conflict theorists who study the
intersection of deviance and crime with wealth and power.
C. Wright Mills: The Power Elite
In his book The Power Elite (1956), sociologist C. Wright Mills described the
existence of what he dubbed the power elite, a small group of wealthy and
influential people at the top of society who hold the power and resources.

Wealthy executives, politicians, celebrities, and military leaders often have access
to national and international power, and in some cases, their decisions affect
everyone in society.

Because of this, the rules of society are stacked in favor of a privileged few who
manipulate them to stay on top. It is these people who decide what is criminal and
what is not, and the effects are often felt most by those who have little power.

Mills’ theories explain why celebrities such as Chris Brown and Paris Hilton, or
once-powerful politicians such as Eliot Spitzer and Tom DeLay, can commit
crimes and suffer little or no legal conflict.
Crime and Social Class

• While crime is often associated with the underprivileged, crimes

committed by the wealthy and powerful remain an under-punished and
costly problem within society.
• This imbalance based on class power is also found within criminal law.
• A conflict theorist would note that those in society who hold the power
are also the ones who make the laws concerning crime. In doing so,
they make laws that will benefit them, while the powerless classes who
lack the resources to make such decisions suffer the consequences.
• The crack-cocaine punishment disparity remained until 2010, when
President Obama signed the Fair Sentencing Act, which decreased the
disparity to 1 to 18 (The Sentencing Project 2010).
Michel Foucault

• Michel Foucault believed that torture had been phased out from
modern society due to the dispersion of power; there was no need
any more for the wrath of the state on a deviant individual. Rather,
the modern state receives praise for its fairness and dispersion of
power which, instead of controlling each individual, controls the mass.
• He also theorized that institutions control people through the use of
discipline. For example, the modern prison (more specifically the
panopticon) is a template for these institutions because it controls its
inmates by the perfect use of discipline.
• Foucault theorizes that, in a sense, the postmodern society is
characterized by the lack of free will on the part of individuals.
Institutions of knowledge, norms, and values, are simply in place to
categorize and control humans.
Biological theories of deviance
• Praveen Attri claims genetic reasons to be largely responsible for social deviance. The
Italian school of criminology contends that biological factors may contribute to crime and deviance.
• Cesare Lombroso was among the first to research and develop the Theory of Biological Deviance
which states that some people are genetically predisposed to criminal behavior. He believed that
criminals were a product of earlier genetic forms.
• The main influence of his research was Charles Darwin and his Theory of Evolution. Lombroso
theorized that people were born criminals or in other words, less evolved humans who were
biologically more related to our more primitive and animalistic urges. From his research,
• Lombroso took Darwin's Theory and looked at primitive times himself in regards to deviant
behaviors. He found that the skeletons that he studied mostly had low foreheads and protruding
jaws. These characteristics resembled primitive beings such as Homo Neanderthalensis. He stated
that little could be done to cure born criminals because their characteristics were biologically
inherited. Over time, most of his research was disproved.
• Pearson and Charles Goring discovered that Lombroso had not researched enough skeletons to
make his research thorough enough. When Pearson and Goring researched skeletons on their own
they tested many more and found that the bone structure had no relevance in deviant behavior. The
statistical study that Charles Goring published on this research is called "The English Convict".
Other theories
• The classical school of criminology comes from the works of
Cesare Beccaria and Jeremy Bentham.
• Beccaria assumed a utilitarian view of society along with a
social contract theory of the state. He argued that the role of the
state was to maximize the greatest possible utility to the maximum
number of people and to minimize those actions that harm the
society. He argued that deviants commit deviant acts (which are
harmful to the society) because of the utility it gives to the private
individual. If the state were to match the pain of punishments with
the utility of various deviant behaviors, the deviant would no longer
have any incentive to commit deviant acts. (Note that Beccaria
argued for just punishment; as raising the severity of punishments
without regard to logical measurement of utility would cause
increasing degrees of social harm once it reached a certain point.)
Symbolic interaction
• Symbolic interaction refers to the patterns of communication, interpretation, and adjustment
between individuals. Both the verbal and nonverbal responses that a listener then delivers
are similarly constructed in expectation of how the original speaker will react. The ongoing
process is like the game of charades, only it is a full-fledged conversation.
• The term "symbolic interactionism" has come into use as a label for a relatively distinctive
approach to the study of human life and human conduct.
• With symbolic interactionism, reality is seen as social, developed interaction with others.
Most symbolic interactionists believe a physical reality does indeed exist by an individual's
social definitions, and that social definitions do develop in part or relation to something
“real.” People thus do not respond to this reality directly, but rather to the social
understanding of reality. Humans therefore exist in three realities: a physical objective
reality, a social reality, and a unique. A unique is described as a third reality created out of
the social reality, a private interpretation of the reality that is shown to the person by others.
• Both individuals and society cannot be separated far from each other for two reasons. One,
being that both are created through social interaction, and two, one cannot be understood
in terms without the other. Behavior is not defined by forces from the environment such as
drives, or instincts, but rather by a reflective, socially understood meaning of both the
internal and external incentives that are currently presented.
Herbert Blumer (1969) set out three basic premises of the perspective:

1. "Humans act toward things on the basis of the meanings they ascribe to
those things;“

2. "The meaning of such things is derived from, or arises out of, the social
interaction that one has with others and the society;" and

3. "These meanings are handled in, and modified through, an interpretative

process used by the person in dealing with the things he/she encounters;“

Symbolic interactionism is a theoretical approach that can be used to explain

how societies and/or social groups come to view behaviors as deviant or
conventional. Labeling theory, differential association, social disorganization
theory, and control theory fall within the realm of symbolic interactionism.
Labeling Theory
• Although all of us violate norms from time to time, few people
would consider themselves deviant. Those who do, however,
have often been labeled “deviant” by society and have gradually
come to believe it themselves.
• Labeling theory examines the ascribing of a deviant behavior
to another person by members of society. Thus, what is
considered deviant is determined not so much by the behaviors
themselves or the people who commit them, but by the
reactions of others to these behaviors.
• As a result, what is considered deviant changes over time and
can vary significantly across cultures.
Labeling theory
• Frank Tannenbaum and Howard S. Becker created and
developed the labeling theory, which is a core facet of symbolic
interactionism, and often referred to as Tannenbaum's
"dramatization of evil." Becker believed that "social groups create
deviance by making the rules whose infraction constitutes
deviance".
• Labeling is a process of social reaction by the "social audience,"
wherein people stereotype others, judging and accordingly
defining (labeling) someone's behavior as deviant or otherwise. It
has been characterized as the "invention, selection, manipulation
of beliefs which define conduct in a negative way and the
selection of people into these categories."
As such, labeling theory suggests that deviance is caused by the deviant's being labeled as
morally inferior, the deviant's internalizing the label and finally the deviant's acting
according to that specific label (i.e., an individual labelled as "deviant" will act accordingly).
As time goes by, the "deviant" takes on traits that constitute deviance by committing such
deviations as conform to the label (so the audience has the power to not label them and
have the power to stop the deviance before it ever occurs by not labeling them). Individual
and societal preoccupation with the label, in other words, leads the deviant individual to
follow a self-fulfilling prophecy of abidance to the ascribed label.

This theory, while very much symbolically interactionist, also has elements of conflict
theory, as the dominant group has the power to decide what is deviant and acceptable, and
enjoys the power behind the labeling process. An example of this is a prison system that
labels people convicted of theft, and because of this they start to view themselves as by
definition thieves, incapable of changing. "From this point of view," Howard S. Becker
writes:

Deviance is not a quality of the act the person commits, but rather a consequence of
the application by others of rules and sanctions to an "offender". The deviant is one to
whom the label has successfully been applied; deviant behavior is behavior that people
• In other words, "behavior only becomes deviant or criminal if defined and
interfered as such by specific people in [a] specific situation."
• It is important to note the salient fact that society is not always correct in its
labeling, often falsely identifying and misrepresenting people as deviants, or
attributing to them characteristics which they do not have. In legal terms, people
are often wrongly accused, yet many of them must live with the ensuant stigma
(or conviction) for the rest of their lives.
• On a similar note, society often employs double standards, with some sectors of
society enjoying favoritism. Certain behaviors in one group are seen to be
perfectly acceptable, or can be easily overlooked, but in another are seen, by
the same audiences, as abominable.
• The medicalization of deviance, the transformation of moral and legal deviance
into a medical condition, is an important shift that has transformed the way
society views deviance. The labelling theory helps to explain this shift, as
behavior that used to be judged morally are now being transformed into an
objective clinical diagnosis. For example, people with drug addictions are
considered "sick" instead of "bad."
Primary and secondary deviation
• Edwin Lemert developed the idea of primary and secondary deviation
as a way to explain the process of labeling. Primary deviance is any
general deviance before the deviant is labeled as such in a particular
way. Secondary deviance is any action that takes place after primary
deviance as a reaction to the institutional identification of the person as
a deviant.

• When an actor commits a crime (primary deviance), however mild, the

institution will bring social penalties down on the actor. However,
punishment does not necessarily stop crime, so the actor might commit
the same primary deviance again, bringing even harsher reactions from
the institutions. At this point, the actor will start to resent the institution,
while the institution brings harsher and harsher repression. Eventually,
the whole community will stigmatize the actor as a deviant and the actor
will not be able to tolerate this, but will ultimately accept his or her role
• Primary and secondary deviation is what causes people to become harder
criminals. Primary deviance is the time when the person is labeled deviant
through confession or reporting. Secondary deviance is deviance before and
after the primary deviance. Retrospective labeling happens when the deviant
recognizes his acts as deviant after the primary deviance, while prospective
labeling is when the deviant recognizes future acts as deviant.

• The steps to becoming a criminal are:

1. Primary deviation;
2. Social penalties;
3. Secondary deviation;
4. Stronger penalties;
5. Further deviation with resentment and hostility towards punishers;
6. Community stigmatizes the deviant as a criminal;
7. Tolerance threshold passed;
8. Strengthening of deviant conduct because of stigmatizing penalties; and
9. Acceptance as role of deviant or criminal actor.
Broken windows theory
• Broken windows theory states that an increase in minor crimes
such as graffiti, would eventually lead to and encourage an
increase in larger transgressions.
• This suggests that greater policing on minor forms of deviance
would lead to a decrease in major crimes. The theory has been
tested in a variety of settings including New York City in the 90s.
Compared to the country's average at the time, violent crime
rates fell 28 percent as a result of the campaign. Critics of the
theory question the direct causality of the policing and statistical
changes that occurred.
Edwin Sutherland: Differential Association

In the early 1900s, sociologist Edwin Sutherland sought to

understand how deviant behavior developed among people.
He established differential association theory, which suggested
that individuals learn deviant behavior from those close to them
who provide models of and opportunities for deviance.

According to Sutherland, deviance is less a personal choice and

more a result of differential socialization processes. A tween
whose friends are sexually active is more likely to view sexual
activity as acceptable.
Sutherland's differential association
• In his differential association theory, Edwin Sutherland posited that criminals
learn criminal and deviant behaviors and that deviance is not inherently a part of
a particular individual's nature. When an individual's significant others engage in
deviant and/or criminal behavior, criminal behavior will be learned as a result to
this exposure. He argues that criminal behavior is learned in the same way that
all other behaviors are learned, meaning that the acquisition of criminal
knowledge is not unique compared to the learning of other behaviors.
• Sutherland outlined some very basic points in his theory, including the idea that
the learning comes from the interactions between individuals and groups, using
communication of symbols and ideas. When the symbols and ideas about
deviation are much more favorable than unfavorable, the individual tends to take
a favorable view upon deviance and will resort to more of these behaviors.
• Criminal behavior (motivations and technical knowledge), as with any other sort
of behavior, is learned. One example of this would be gang activity in inner city
communities. Sutherland would feel that because a certain individual's primary
influential peers are in a gang environment, it is through interaction with them
that one may become involved in crime.
Neutralization theory

• Gresham Sykes and David Matza's neutralization theory explains

how deviants justify their deviant behaviors by providing alternative
definitions of their actions and by providing explanations, to
themselves and others, for the lack of guilt for actions in particular
situations.
• There are five types of neutralization:
1.Denial of responsibility: the deviant believes s/he was helplessly
propelled into the deviance, and that under the same circumstances,
any other person would resort to similar actions;

2.Denial of injury: the deviant believes that the action caused no

harm to other individuals or to the society, and thus the deviance is
not morally wrong;
3. Denial of the victim: the deviant believes that individuals on
the receiving end of the deviance were deserving of the result
due to the victim's lack of virtue or morals;

4. Condemnation of the condemners: the deviant believes

enforcement figures or victims have the tendency to be
equally deviant or otherwise corrupt, and as a result, are
hypocrites to stand against; and

5. Appeal to higher loyalties: the deviant believes that there

are loyalties and values that go beyond the confines of the
law; morality, friendships, income, or traditions may be more
important to the deviant than legal boundaries
Control theory
• Control theory advances the proposition that weak bonds between the
individual and society free people to deviate. By contrast, strong bonds make
deviance costly.
• This theory asks why people refrain from deviant or criminal behavior,
instead of why people commit deviant or criminal behavior, according to
Travis Hirschi. The control theory developed when norms emerge to deter
deviant behavior. Without this "control", deviant behavior would happen more
often.
• This leads to conformity and groups. People will conform to a group when
they believe they have more to gain from conformity than by deviance. If a
strong bond is achieved there will be less chance of deviance than if a weak
bond has occurred.
• Continuing with an examination of large social factors, control theory states
that social control is directly affected by the strength of social bonds and that
deviance results from a feeling of disconnection from society. Individuals who
believe they are a part of society are less likely to commit crimes against it.
Travis Hirschi (1969) identified four types of social bonds that connect people
to society:

1.Attachment measures our connections to others. When we are closely

attached to people, we worry about their opinions of us. People conform to
society’s norms in order to gain approval (and prevent disapproval) from
family, friends, and romantic partners.
2.Commitment refers to the investments we make in the community. A well-
respected local businesswoman who volunteers at her synagogue and is a
member of the neighborhood block organization has more to lose from
committing a crime than a woman who doesn’t have a career or ties to the
community.
3.Similarly, levels of involvement, or participation in socially legitimate activities,
lessen a person’s likelihood of deviance. Children who are members of little
league baseball teams have fewer family crises.
4.The final bond, belief, is an agreement on common values in society. If a
person views social values as beliefs, he or she will conform to them. An
environmentalist is more likely to pick up trash in a park, because a clean
• Containment theory is considered by researchers such as
Walter C. Reckless to be part of the control theory because it also
revolves around the thoughts that stop individuals from engaging in
crime.
• Reckless studied the unfinished approaches meant to explain the
reasoning behind delinquency and crime. He recognized that societal
disorganization is included in the study of delinquency and crime
under social deviance, leading him to claim that the majority of those
who live in unstable areas tend not to have criminal tendencies in
comparison those who live in middle-class areas.
• This claim opens up more possible approaches to social
disorganization, and proves that the already implemented theories
are in need or a deeper connection to further explore ideas of crime
and delinquency.
• These observations brought Reckless to ask questions such as,
"Why do some persons break through the tottering (social)
controls and others do not? Why do rare cases in well-
integrated society break through the lines of strong controls?"
• Reckless asserted that the intercommunication between self-
control and social controls are partly responsible for the
development of delinquent thoughts. Social disorganization was
not related to a particular environment, but instead was involved
in the deterioration of an individuals social controls.
• The containment theory is the idea that everyone possesses
mental and social safeguards which protect the individual from
committing acts of deviancy. Containment depends on the
individuals ability to separate inner and outer controls for
normative behavior
• More contemporary control theorists such as Robert Crutchfield take the
theory into a new light, suggesting labor market experiences not only affect
the attitudes and the "stakes" of individual workers, but can also affect the
development of their children's views toward conformity and cause
involvement in delinquency.

• This is an ongoing study as he has found a significant relationship between

parental labor market involvement and children's delinquency, but has not
empirically demonstrated the mediating role of parents' or children's attitude.

• In a study conducted by Tim Wadsworth, the relationship between parent's

employment and children's delinquency, which was previously suggested by
Crutchfield (1993), was shown empirically for the first time. The findings
from this study supported the idea that the relationship between
socioeconomic status and delinquency might be better understood if the
quality of employment and its role as an informal social control is closely
Functionalism Associated Theorist Deviance arises from:
Strain Theory Robert Merton A lack of ways to reach socially accepted goals by accepted methods

Social Disorganization University of Chicago Weak social ties and a lack of social control; society has lost the
Theory researchers ability to enforce norms with some groups

Social Control Theory Travis Hirschi Deviance results from a feeling of disconnection from society;
social control is directly affected by the strength of social bonds
Cultural Deviance Theory Clifford Shaw and Conformity to the cultural norms of lower-class society
Henry McKay
Conflict Theory Associated Theorist Deviance arises from:
Unequal System Karl Marx Inequalities in wealth and power that arise from the economic
system
Power Elite C. Wright Mills Ability of those in power to define deviance in ways that maintain
the status quo
Symbolic Interactionism Associated Theorist Deviance arises from
Labeling Theory Edwin Lemert The reactions of others, particularly those in power who are able to
determine labels
Differential Association Edwin Sutherlin Learning and modeling deviant behavior seen in other people close
Theory to the individual
Control Theory Travis Hirschi Feelings of disconnection from society
Summary:
The three major sociological paradigms offer different explanations
for the motivation behind deviance and crime.
Functionalists point out that deviance is a social necessity since it
reinforces norms by reminding people of the consequences of
violating them. Violating norms can open society’s eyes to injustice in
the system.
Conflict theorists argue that crime stems from a system of inequality
that keeps those with power at the top and those without power at the
bottom.
Symbolic interactionists focus attention on the socially constructed
nature of the labels related to deviance.
Crime and deviance are learned from the environment and enforced
or discouraged by those around us.
POST TASK

• Choose a public figure who has effected a major, controversial political

and/or legal change.
• To what extent were this person’s actions or beliefs considered deviant
when they first emerged?
• How can the process by which they were eventually accepted and
became new norms be explained by applying the major sociological
paradigms?
• What norms needed to be re-examined? Which paradigm seems most
useful? Why?