Crime and Deviance Functionalist

Durkheim
1. Collective Conscioussness
  1. This creates social solidarity
2. His main arguments
  1. All societies have to have rules. Rules are inevitably broken, therefore deviance is normal.
  2. Deviance needs to be controlled in order to preserve social order
  3. Deviance can also be functional for society
    1. deviant behaviour can be a source of beneficial social changes
    2. the condemnation and punishment of deviants helps to unify the rest of society and establish moral boundaries.
3. Problems with Durkheim
  1. How do we distinguish between beneficial and non-beneficial forms of deviance?
  2. Are the rules of society the result of moral consensus or do some groups have more influence than others?
  3. How do we explain the fact that some individuals are more deviant than others?
Merton
1. Social Structure
  1. Deviance forms from pressures of social structure
    1. Deviance does not arise from within the deviant, but arrives due to a pressure from within the social structure
      1. This is the strain to anomie
2. Anomie
  1. Definiton: when individuals become uncertain about what norms to follow
3. Criticisms
  1. Does not fully explain why different individuals adopt different responses
  2. Focuses on individuals rather than groups. Some forms of deviance eg juvenile crime may involve a group response to social position (subcultural explanation)
  3. Does not explain crime which is not motivated by monetary gain
  4. Laurie Taylor
    1. Fruit Machine
      1. Conformists
      2. Innovators
      3. Ritualists
      4. Retreatists
      5. Rebels
4. Evaluation
  1. Moves away from idea of deviants as abnormal individuals (biological and psychological approaches)
  2. Recognises links between social structure and deviance
  3. Provided the basis for later theories of deviance eg subcultural theories and left realism

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Crime and Deviance Functionalist

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	Created by Olivia Hogan about 10 years ago