Zusammenfassung der Ressource
Subcultural Theory
- What is a subculture?
- Group of individuals who
share the same norms and
values, they have a distinct
identity often manifested in
clothing/music etc as a
symbolic meaning, they are
often criminal/distorted and
can be m/c or w/c
- Example of a study = James Patrick (1973) - "A Glasgow Gang
Observed" which used a mix of covert and overt PO
- E.g. Mods and the Rockers
- Differ from mainstream society
and are NOT a new phenomenon
- Albert Cohen (1955) - The Delinquent Subculture
- Sctuctural
Functionalsim/develped
Merton's Strain Theory
- Crime is a collective response
- Status frustration from peers due to
blocked opportunity therefore
people innovate
- Cannot access legitimate success goals
- Explains non-utilitarian crime
- Cloward and Ohlin (1965) -
Delinquency and
Opportunity
- Developed ideas of Merton and Cohen
- Meton and Cohen failed to explain the 3 types of
subculture including conflict (i.e. socialised life of crime
- Patrick (1983) - 'A Glasgow Gang Observed', criminal
(i.e. apprentice criminals) and retreatist (i.e. petty
criminals)
- Taylor, Walton and
Young (1973)
- Critical of Merton, Cohen,
Cloward and Ohlin for assuming
that all members of society are
committed to materialistic success
goals.
- Matza (1984)
- Interpretivist approach,
people have free will to drift in
and out of crime
- BUT, how can the concept of drift be operationalised (i.e. defined?)
- However, Matza ignores that if
youths wish to create their own
identity then why commit crime in
the first instance. Secondly , we
live in a wider framework/structural
location of economic, social and
political circumstances which often
forces people into crime
(DETERMINISM)
- Miller (1962)
- Crime is not a reaction against m/c success goals/values but
part of a distinct subculture passed on from one generation to
the next.
- Looks at focal concerns e.g. toughness, trouble,
masculinity and excitement.
- Subterrenean Values - Surface values that underpin society
- E.g. the dominant middle
class
- Subcultures emphasise alternative
values
- Neutralization
Techniques
- Denial of responsibility,
denial of a victim/injury,
appealing to higher
(moral) loyalities e.g.
Islamic freedom fighters
in the name of
Allah/Jihad (Holy War)
- Marxism
- Working class gangs, resistant to
capitalism, e.g. Willis' the Lads,
symbolically embracing, class
conflict
- There are also affluent middle class gangs
- Women and ethnicity
- Often excluded from these theories
- Gender blind - links to
malestream sociology
- Methods - Smith and Bradshaw (2005)
- Longitudinal Study
- Studied gang membership and teenage offending
using methods such as questionaaires,
semi-structured interviews, parental questionaires
and public documents/
- 20% of respondents report member of a gang at 13 but by 17 this fell to 5%
- Reinforces maturity with age