criminological theories
CRIM 2650: Labeling Theory Part 1
“Social groups create deviance by creating the rules whose infraction constitutes deviance, and by applying those rules to particular people and labelling them as outsiders …. The deviant is one to whom that label has successfully been applied; deviant behavior is behavior that people so label.’
Howard Becker (1963)
Lecture Overview
1. Labeling Theory: An Introduction
2. Labeling theory’s starting premises: Social construction
3. Early labeling Theory
4. Assessing early labeling theory
5. Contemporary labeling theory
6. Policy Implications (for tutorial discussions)
The first thing we do is question the concept of deviancy itself. Who makes the rules and who benefits from those rules? Second component of labeling theory (the connecting rod of the early school and the more contemporary side) is how does the CJS itself contribute to criminality? What are the limitations of the CJS, specifically how we police and how we punish? Labeling theory is not necessary interested in addressing the primary causes of deviancy. We are looking at who gets to label people as criminal/deviant and how those labels get internalized, which becoming path dependant, meaning a personal is labeled a thief, anti social etc. That label becomes real (manifestation).
Theory begins in the 40s, but takes root in the late 60s/70s. The reason for this is that specifically in the United States, by 1967-68, the legitimacy of the state is being called into question and with it the idea that there is a social consensus that everyone agrees to and is legitimacy held by the state is then questioned by the state.
Labeling Theory: An Introduction
Labeling theory is interested in the ‘social process of labelling’: argument is that crime is socially constructed. Crime does not exist naturally. In the absence of law, a third part that has the authority to define what is legal and illegal and then enforce those rules in the absence of the law, we have a sense of
“Social groups create deviance by creating the rules whose infraction constitutes deviance, and by applying those rules to particular people and labelling them as outsiders …. The deviant is one to whom that label has successfully been applied; deviant behavior is behavior that people so label.’
Howard Becker (1963)
Lecture Overview
1. Labeling Theory: An Introduction
2. Labeling theory’s starting premises: Social construction
3. Early labeling Theory
4. Assessing early labeling theory
5. Contemporary labeling theory
6. Policy Implications (for tutorial discussions)
The first thing we do is question the concept of deviancy itself. Who makes the rules and who benefits from those rules? Second component of labeling theory (the connecting rod of the early school and the more contemporary side) is how does the CJS itself contribute to criminality? What are the limitations of the CJS, specifically how we police and how we punish? Labeling theory is not necessary interested in addressing the primary causes of deviancy. We are looking at who gets to label people as criminal/deviant and how those labels get internalized, which becoming path dependant, meaning a personal is labeled a thief, anti social etc. That label becomes real (manifestation).
Theory begins in the 40s, but takes root in the late 60s/70s. The reason for this is that specifically in the United States, by 1967-68, the legitimacy of the state is being called into question and with it the idea that there is a social consensus that everyone agrees to and is legitimacy held by the state is then questioned by the state.
Labeling Theory: An Introduction
Labeling theory is interested in the ‘social process of labelling’: argument is that crime is socially constructed. Crime does not exist naturally. In the absence of law, a third part that has the authority to define what is legal and illegal and then enforce those rules in the absence of the law, we have a sense of