Crime Prevention, Social Control, and Punishment

Crime Prevention and Control:

• Situational Crime Prevention

• Social and Community Prevention

• Environmental Crime Prevention

Situational Crime Prevention:

Clarke (1992): Rational Choice Theory

• Describes situational crime prevention as a ‘pre-emptive approach that relies, not on improving society or its institutions, but simply on reducing opportunities for crime’

• There are three features of measures aimed at situational crime:

• They are directed and specific crimes

• They involve managing or altering the immediate environment of the crime 

• They aim at increasing the effort and risks of committing crime and reducing the rewards 

• For example, ‘target hardening’ measures such as locking doors and windows increase the effort for burglars or CCTV/security guards in shops increases likelihood of shoplifters being caught 

• These types of preventions are opportunity or rational choice theories of crime, as criminals weigh up the costs and benefits of crime before committing it

• This contrasts many other theories claiming early socialisation or capitalism is the root cause of crime

• Clarke argues that most theories offer no realistic solutions to crime and so the most obvious thing to do is focus on the immediate crime situation

Felson (2002):

• Gives an example of a situational crime prevention strategy 

• Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York City was poorly designed and allowed for deviant conduct 

• E.g. toilets were a setting for luggage thefts, rough sleeping, drug dealing and homosexual liaisons 

• Reshaping the physical environment to ‘design crime out’ greatly reduced these activities 

• E.g. large sinks were replaced by small hand basins - this stopped homeless people bathing there

Chaiken et al. (1974) - Displacement

• One criticism of SCP is that it does not reduce crime, but simply displaces it

• If criminals are rational thinkers as Clarke suggests, then they would surely consider moving to where the targets of crime are softer 

• Chaiken found that a crackdown on subway robberies in New York merely displaced them to the streets above

• Displacement can take several forms:

• Spatial (moving elsewhere)

• Temporal (change time)

• Target (change victim)

• Tactical (change method)

• Functional (change type of crime)

• The clearest example of situational measures is about suicide 

• In the early 60s half of all suicides in Britain were the result of gassing 

• At the time Britain’s gas supply came from highly toxic coal gas

• From the 60s, coal gas was replaced by less toxic natural gas, and by 1997 suicides from gassing had fallen to near zero 

• Strikingly, the overall suicide rate fell, not just by gassing 

• Those who might have killed themselves by gassing seem to not have switched to another method

• In other words, there was no displacement

Evaluation:

• SCP works to some extent for certain kinds of crime - however displacement is a huge issue 

• Tends to focus on opportunistic petty street crime and ignores white-collar, corporate and state crime which are the most harmful crimes

• It assumes criminals make rational calculations which seems unlikely in many violent crimes committed under the influence of drugs and alcohol 

• It ignores the root causes of crime such as poverty or poor socialisation making it difficult to develop long term strategies for crime reduction 

Environmental Crime Prevention:

• The main background of this approach comes from Wilson’s Broken Windows theory

• Downes (1999) described it as ‘perhaps the most influential single article on crime prevention ever written’

A reminder:

• Neighbourhoods that have crime and deviance left alone self replicate these behaviours

• Tolerating behaviours such as graffiti, begging, dog fouling, littering and vandalism shows no one cares

• The absence of both formal and informal control drives out the do-gooders 

Zero-Tolerance Policing

• Wilson’s key idea is that disorder and absence of control leads to crime

• The solution is to crack down on any disorder using a two-fold strategy 

• First: environmental improvement strategy - broken windows must be repaired immediately, abandoned cars towed without delay etc

• Second: zero tolerance policing - instead of reacting to crime it must be proactively tackled if it is not criminal

• This combination will halt neighbourhood decline and prevent serious crime taking root

Social and Community Crime Prevention

• These strategies place the emphasis firmly on the potential offender and their social context

• This is different to Wilson whose main emphasis was in terms of policing 

• The aim of these strategies is to remove the conditions that predispose individuals to crime in the first place

• These are long-term strategies as they attempt to tackle the root cause of offending rather than removing the opportunity for crime

• Social roots in crime include poverty, unemployment and poor housing, so social reform programmes address these issues in the hope that a reduction in crime is a ‘side effect’

The Perry Preschool Project

• This experimental project for disadvantaged Black children in Ypsilanti, Michigan is one of the best known community programmes

• An experimental group of 3-4 year olds was offered a two year intellectual enrichment programme where the children also received home visits

• This created a longitudinal study following their progress, with striking differences with a control group who did not undergo the programme 

• By the age of 40, they have significantly fewer lifetime arrests for violent crime and drugs, more had graduated from high school and were in employment

• It was calculated that for every dollar spent on the programme, ~$17 were saved on welfare, prison and other costs

Surveillance

Panopticon Surveillance

Foucault:

• Punishment has changed from being a violent public spectacle (such as hanging) to being more covert
• There is also an increase of psychological harm done during punishment, instead of the swift and physical harm done on the body - there is a much more focus as well on redemption.
• Due to the change of power in society - ‘sovereign power’ (control = threat of force) to ‘disciplinary power’ (control = monitoring and surveillance).
• Shift of change of power (monarchy) at the end of 18th century
• Extreme public punishment to imprisonment
• Used Jeremy Bentham’s new design of prison - panopticon - as an example of the evolution of disciplinary power.
• Consists of central observation tower and prison cells arranged in such a way that all prisoners could be potentially observed at any time, but they could not see when they were being observed.
•  Prisoners had to self-monitor their behaviour - which caused them to discipline themselves due to constant surveillance.
• Foucault further stated that society has evolved even further with this disciplinary power with the creation of CCTV.
• Most people now obey the rules because of the fear of being watched.

Disciplinary Societies

Foucault:

As mentioned before, this derives from the shift of sovereign society into a disciplinary society:

• Physical punishment has been eradicated in most societies, causing the emergence of Carceral Culture (prison-like)
• There is now a constant fear of surveillance within society.
• Emphasised through other areas of society beyond the Criminal Justice System:
• Teachers
• Social workers
• Psychiatrists

Self Surveillance

Foucault:

• Further went on to say that the panopticon surveillance model creates self surveillance in between the prisoners.
• This is further reflected in wider society due to the introduction of CCTV cameras.
• People now have a fear of being watched which means they monitor themselves in order to regulate and control their behaviour.
• This can be also reflected outside of crime - for example, new mothers have a fear of being judged as a bad mother. Therefore, they may regulate their behaviour in order to fulfil the social norms to avoid judgement.

Synopticon Society

Mathieson (1997):

• Argues that surveillance has developed beyond the panopticon surveillance model that Foucault emphasised.
• The panopticon surveillance model allows the few to monitor the many, whereas the synopticon surveillance model allows the many to monitor the few.
• Eg. dash cams allow the public to monitor the rest of the public - which regulates the behaviour of others due to the fear of being watched (similar to panopticon surveillance).

Thompson (2000):

• Threatens control of ‘controllers’ - public now have power over the ‘controllers’.
• Eg. activists filming during protests may regulate police officers to not abuse their power.
• Eg. powerful groups may have slight fear of public uncovering damaging information.

Liquid Surveillance

Bauman and Lyon (2013):

• Surveillance has gone beyond visual and spatial observation (CCTV, etc.)
• Defined as ‘less a complete way of specifying surveillance and more an orientation, a way of situating surveillance development in the fluid and unsettling modernity of today’
• Liquid surveillance is a type of soft surveillance that has arisen due to the increase of consumerism.
• We are monitored everywhere through our everyday usage of technology:
• Number plate recognition
• Store cards
• Digital footprint
• Digital footprint is used to infringe your civil liberties other than protecting you.
• Everything is being recorded.

Surveillance Societies

Lyon:

With the evolution of technology, modern society has reached a pinnacle point where our lives are transparent and there is a lack of privacy.

• Every move is monitored (eg. selling of data: Amazon Alexa, Facebook → Metaverse, etc.)
• We are so used to it, that it has become routine:
• We no longer notice it or consider it as much consciously

Post Panoptical Society

Bauman and Lyon:

An evolution of Foucault’s model of panopticon surveillance:

• Surveillance has now gone past the prison model that Bentham originally constructed, surveillance is everywhere
• ‘“Everything moves from enforcement to temptation and seduction”, a surveillance society that no longer chases its victims but finds its volunteers’
• It is no longer the thought of being watched that regulates our social behaviour, rather the fact that we are now constantly being monitored.
• Development from liquid surveillance: we are always being watched from where we drive and go, to what we buy online and in-person.
• Furthermore, an additional form of post-panoptical surveillance is known as ‘omnioptic’ where the many watch the many - argued to be the most ‘liquid’ type of surveillance.

Actuarial Justice

Feely and Simon (1994)

Argue that a new technology of power is emerging through the justice system.

• Also known as ‘categorical surveillance’
• This is different to Foucault's disciplinary power in three ways

1. It focuses on groups rather than individuals
2. It's not interested in rehabilitation of offenders, rather in preventing them from offending.
3. It uses actuarial analytics or calculations of risk (statistical rates of how likely an event is to occur.

• They argue that this actuarial approach is becoming increasingly common in crime.
• Example: airports screen passengers before they come into the airports. Passengers gain points based on their gender, ethnicity, age, and criminal convictions. The more points a passenger gains the more likely they will be stopped at customs.

Kilburn Experiment

Newburn and Heyman:

The Kilburn Experiment - investigated the effect of CCTV in a police custody station and determined the perception of camera presence. Added 15 cameras in prison cell areas, two monitoring screens, three video recorders to allow for 24 hour surveillance (prisoners & officers).

• Officers were positive, as it could provide evidence against false accusations as well as ensure they do not miss out on any deviancy even if they are too occupied.
• However, they also argued it did not fully ensure their safety and it invaded prisoners' privacy - such as the argument that toilets should not be monitored.
• Certain prisoners believed that CCTV provided valuable evidence and protected both the offiders and detainees.

Evaluation of Surveillance:

Yes

No

-        Helps reduce the fear of crime -        People feel less of a fear of being a victim of crime when they are aware of CCTV and other surveillance systems, perpetrator less likely to commit crime due to fear of being prosecuted -        Helps to fight against terrorism -        Using data mining and social media monitoring, links are able to be made between disparate terrorist groups -        Provides evidence -        Both for the prosecution and the defence.

-        Oppressive form of social control -        Few watching the many allows for the ruling-class to shape the behaviour of the working-class. -        Limited evidence that it changes behaviour -        Norris - found that although CCTV reduced crime in car parks, it did little to reduce other sorts of crime. -        Loveday and Gill - Burglars, shoplifters and fraudsters were not put off by CCTV. -        Erosion of civil liberties -        Every action we take is monitored, there is no such thing as privacy and our actions can be used against us at any time.

Punishment

Newburn: Purpose of Punishment

• Rehabilitation - Discourage reoffending
• Deterrence - To prevent other people from offending in the future.
• Restorative justice - To force criminals to make amends to the victims they have harmed.
• Protection of society - Incapacitation takes the offenders out of society so they are unable to harm others.
• Boundary maintenance - To reinforce the social norms and values and remind people of what is acceptable.
• Retribution - The criminals deserve to be punished for their crime  - ‘just desserts’

Rehabilitation

The punishment is used to change and/reform offenders in order to reduce the risk of them reoffending.

An example of this is anger management and education.

Deterrence

Punishing the individual discourages them from future offending – and others through making an example of them. This relates to Durkheim’s Functionalist Theory that crime and punishment reinforce social regulation, where prison sentence for a crime committed reaffirms the boundaries of acceptable behaviour.

Protection of Society

Punishment ensures people in society are protected from criminals. Prisons and other forms of punishment mean possibly dangerous people are kept away from society. Putting offenders in prison takes away their ability to offend as they do not have the opportunities.

Durkheim: Boundary Maintenance

Refers to when crime produces a reaction from society, uniting its members in condemnation of the wrongdoer and reinforcing their commitment to the shared norms and values.

Retribution

• A punishment by which society makes the offender suffer as much as the suffering caused by the crime.
• Hegelian Retribution: Punishment annuls the wrong done.
• Liability: The offender had knowledge that he would be punished if he committed the acts, and he, therefore, deserves punishment if he does it.

Perspectives on Punishment

Functionalism:

Society can only exist if there is a shared system of values that ties a society together morally. Laws are representative of this collective consciousness.

Durkheim believed that punishment is a way of reasserting the shared values and norms of society, as well as breeding social solidarity from the moral outrage people feel collectively about the offence.

Furthermore, Durkheim argued that punishment of crime has a salutary effect on society by reaffirming the collective consciousness; he assumes that criminal punishment is done on behalf of society.

Marxism

The laws enforced reflect ruling class ideology. Althusser would describe the CJS as a Repressive State Apparatus, because it keeps people in line. Protects the ruling class from the working class, upholds social class hierarchy.

Weberianism

Only the state has the power to punish offenders, not the church or landowners like in the past. Legal Rational Authority meaning punishment is based on impersonal rules and regulations set out by a vast bureaucracy and set out checks and balances.

Post and Late Modernism

• Punishment has changed from being very direct, immediate and physical. (Involving torture and sometimes death to being more focused on incarceration and rehabilitation.
• Although punishment today isn’t as severe as it was in the past, control has expanded over people’s lives much more than it ever used to.
• Foucault calls “technologies of surveillance” - they are kept under surveillance programmes and are expected to reform their behaviour.
• Foucault also sees the growth of prison as a means of punishment in reflecting the move from sovereign power to disciplinary power.
• Sovereign power involves direct physical coercion to get people to obey the laws.

Changing Forms of Punishment

Sovereign Power - public forms of punishment and physical punishment were forms of showing power by monarchs rather than deterring criminal behaviour.

to:

Disciplinary Power - decline in sovereign power and new forms of state power moved punishment to disciplinary power which includes surveillance and monitoring.

Garland:

Garland argues that in the 1950’s the state practised ‘penal welfarism’. This is the theory that the study of criminal justice which holds the prisoners should have the rights and positive motivation to gain opportunities for advancement within the criminal justice system. This means the CJS is not only catching the criminals but rehabilitating them and reintroducing them into society.  However, Garland believes that we have moved into a new era that is in a ‘punitive state’ that enforces a ‘culture of control’.  There are three main ways in which the state now seeks to control crime and punish offenders:

• Actualism
• ‘Mass incarceration’ and ‘transcarceration’
• Politicians increasingly use the issue of crime control, and being ‘tough on crime’ as a means to win elections.

Rusche and Kirchheimer

• Marxist approach that sees punishment as a form of social control and class domination.
• Rusche and Kircheimer stated that the dominant form of punishment has changed over time based on the needs of the economy; their claim was that prisons had emerged to serve the needs of industrial capitalist economies, and their elaboration on the functions of prisons in modern societies.
• They see the change in punishment from the physical punishments, to transportation and now with cheap prison labour. This reflects the changing economic needs of the dominant class. Brutality rose when population was plentiful and land declined as labour forces declined.

Prisons

The main reason for prisons is for them to be the ‘ultimate deterrent’ by controlling crime and punishing offenders.

Are they effective?

Yes

No

-        They keep society safe from any dangerous criminals. They re-socialise offenders into norms and values and educate them to prevent recidivism. Alongside, the offenders may have bad experiences in prison which will also prevent reoffending.

-        Prisons are often called ‘schools of crime’ which means that offenders may just learn new ways of offending or techniques. Therefore it can be argued that prisons reproduce crime. Becker would argue that prisons breed labelling which can lead to reoffending. The recidivism rate has been around 30% since 2008 which shows that the system is not changing and rates of reoffending are not decreasing.