Social Structure Theory

Chapter 6
SOCL220
• It is social forces—not individual traits—that cause
crime.
• Stratified society
– People grouped according to economic or social class;
characterized by the unequal distribution of wealth,
power, and prestige.
• Social class
– Segment of the population whose members are at a
relatively similar economic level and who share
attitudes, values, norms, and an identifiable lifestyle.
• Oscar Lewis argued that the crushing lifestyle of lower-class
areas produces a culture of poverty that is passed from one
generation to the next
– A separate lower-class culture, characterized by apathy, cynicism,
helplessness, and mistrust of social institutions such as schools,
government agencies, and the police, that is passed from one
generation to the next.
• Underclass
– The lowest social stratum in any country, whose members lack the
education and skills needed to function successfully in modern
society.
– Child poverty
– Minority poverty
• According to social structure theory, the root cause of crime
can be traced directly to the socioeconomic disadvantages that
have become embedded in society.
• Social and economic forces operating in deteriorated lower-
class areas push many of their residents into criminal behavior
patterns.
• View the existence of unsupervised teenage gangs, high crime
rates, and social disorder in poor inner-city areas as major
social problems.
• The social structure perspective encompasses three
independent yet overlapping branches: social disorganization
theory, strain theory, and cultural deviance theory.
• Social disorganization theory
– Branch of social structure theory that focuses on the breakdown in inner-
city neighborhoods of institutions such as the family, school, and
employment.
• Strain theory
– Branch of social structure theory that sees crime as a function of the
conflict between people’s goals and the means available to obtain them.
• Strain
– The anger, frustration, and resentment experienced by people who believe
they cannot achieve their goals through legitimate means.
• Cultural deviance theory
– Branch of social structure theory that sees strain and social disorganization
together resulting in a unique lower-class culture that conflicts with
conventional social norms.
• Subculture
– A set of values, beliefs, and traditions unique to a particular social class or
group within a larger society.
• Cultural transmission
– Process whereby values, beliefs, and traditions are handed down from one
generation to the next.
• Social disorganization theory links crime rates
to neighborhood ecological characteristics.
• Crime rates are elevated in highly transient,
mixed-use (where residential and commercial
property exist side by side), and changing
neighborhoods in which the fabric of social life
has become frayed.
• Results in gang formation
 Theory of Shaw and McKay
• Shaw and McKay explained crime and delinquency within the context
of the changing urban environment and ecological development of the
city.
• They saw that Chicago had developed into distinct neighborhoods
(natural areas), some affluent and others wracked by extreme poverty.
• These poverty-ridden transitional neighborhoods suffered high rates
of population turnover and were incapable of inducing residents to
remain and defend the neighborhoods against criminal groups.
• In transitional areas, successive changes in population composition,
disintegration of traditional cultures, diffusion of divergent cultural
standards, and gradual industrialization dissolve neighborhood culture
and organization.
• The continuity of conventional neighborhood traditions and
institutions is broken, leaving children feeling displaced and without a
strong or definitive set of values.
 Social Ecology School
• Community disorder
• Community fear
• Siege mentality
• Community change
• Poverty concentration
– Concentration effect: As working- and middleclass families flee
inner-city poverty-ridden areas, the most disadvantaged
population is consolidated in urban ghettos.
• Collective efficacy
– Social control exerted by cohesive communities and based on
mutual trust, including intervention in the supervision of children
and maintenance of public order
• Informal, Institutional, and Public Social Control
 Theory of anomie
• Anomie theory: The view that anomie results
when socially defined goals (such as wealth
and power) are universally mandated but
access to legitimate means (such as education
and job opportunities) is stratified by class and
status
• Some people have inadequate means of
attaining success; others, who have the
means, reject societal goals.
 Institutional Anomie Theory
• The view that anomie pervades U.S. culture
because the drive for material wealth
dominates and undermines social and
community values.
• American Dream
– The goal of accumulating material goods and
wealth through individual competition; the
process of being socialized to pursue material
success and to believe it is achievable.
• Institutions that might otherwise control the exaggerated
emphasis on financial success, such as religious or charitable
institutions, have been rendered powerless or obsolete.
– Noneconomic functions and roles have been devalued.
Performance in other institutional settings—the family, school, or
community—is assigned a lower priority than the goal of financial
success.
– When conflicts emerge, noneconomic roles become subordinate
to and must accommodate economic roles
– Economic language, standards, and norms penetrate
noneconomic realms. Economic terms become part of the
common vernacular
 Relative Deprivation Theory
• Envy, mistrust, and aggression resulting from
perceptions of economic and social inequality
• General Strain Theory
• The view that multiple sources of strain interact
with an individual’s emotional traits and
responses to produce criminality.
• Negative affective states: Anger, frustration, and
adverse emotions produced by a variety of
sources of strain.
 Theory of Delinquent Subcultures
• Delinquent behavior of lower-class youths is
actually a protest against the norms and values of
middleclass U.S. culture
• Because social conditions prevent them from
achieving success legitimately, lower-class youths
experience a form of culture conflict that Cohen
labels status frustration
– A form of culture conflict experienced by lower-class
youths because social conditions prevent them from
achieving success as defined by the larger society.
• According to Cohen, the development of the
delinquent subculture is a consequence of
socialization practices in lower-class environments.
• Children lack the basic skills necessary to achieve
social and economic success, including a proper
education, which renders them incapable of
developing the skills they need to succeed in
society.
• Lower-class parents are incapable of teaching
children the necessary techniques for entering the
dominant middle-class culture
 Middle-Class Measuring Rods
• One significant handicap that lower-class
children face is the inability to positively
impress authority figures, such as teachers,
employers, or supervisors.
• The conflict and frustration that lower-class
youths experience when they fail to meet
these standards is a primary cause of
delinquency
 Formation of Deviant Subcultures
• Lower-class boys rejected by middle-class decision makers
usually join one of three existing subcultures: the corner
boy, the college boy, or the delinquent boy
– The corner boy is not a chronic delinquent but may be a truant
who engages in petty or status offenses, such as precocious sex
and recreational drug abuse.
– The “college boy” embraces the cultural and social values of the
middle class. Rather than scorning middle-class measuring rods,
he actively strives to succeed by those standards
– The “delinquent boy” adopts a set of norms and principles that
directly oppose middle-class values. He engages in short-run
hedonism, living for today and letting “tomorrow take care of
itself.”
• Reaction formation: Irrational hostility evidenced by young delinquents,
who adopt norms directly opposed to middleclass goals and standards
that seem impossible to achieve.
Theory of Differential Opportunity
• Richard Cloward and Lloyd Ohlin combined
strain and social disorganization principles to
portray a gang-sustaining criminal subculture
• Differential opportunity: The view that lower-
class youths, whose legitimate opportunities
are limited, join gangs and pursue criminal
careers as alternative means to achieve
universal success goals.
• Criminal gangs: These gangs exist in stable
neighborhoods where close connections among
adolescent, young adult, and adult offenders create an
environment for successful criminal enterprise
• Conflict gangs: These gangs develop in communities
unable to provide either legitimate or illegitimate
opportunities. They attract tough adolescents who
fight with weapons to win respect from rivals and
engage in unpredictable and destructive assaults on
people and property
• Retreatist gangs: Retreatists are double failures,
unable to gain success through legitimate means and
unwilling to do so through illegal ones.