Recommended
More Related Content
Similar to Copyright © 2017, 2007, 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. All Right
Similar to Copyright © 2017, 2007, 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. All Right (20)
More from AlleneMcclendon878
More from AlleneMcclendon878 (20)
Recently uploaded
Recently uploaded (20)
Copyright © 2017, 2007, 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. All Right
- 1. Copyright © 2017, 2007, 2003 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Criminological Theory: A Brief Introduction Fourth edition Chapter 5 The Social Ecology of Crime Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Social Disorganization Theory (1 of 2) • Contains several assumptions that distinguish it from other perspectives discussed in the text • Social disorganization attempts to explain why some communities have higher crime rates than others (not individually based) Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Social Disorganization Theory (2 of 2)
- 2. • This theory assumes that social organization, schools, churches, businesses, etc., when functioning normally enable a community to deal with crime • Crime is not due to defective people, but rather social organizations that have failed Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Intellectual Origins • During the early 1900s in Chicago, Park and Burgess began their work on social ecology • Social ecology holds that people struggle for survival in a community of mutual dependence Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Important Principles • Two principles are of particular importance to Social Disorganization Theory 1. People compete for resources 2. People exist in a world of mutual dependence Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All
- 3. Rights Reserved Location of Crime (1 of 2) • Shaw and McKay (1942), developed the connection between social disorganization and crime • Looked at how crime was spread across Chicago in the 1930s and 1940s • They found that crime was concentrated in slum areas, which tended to be located in the center of the city Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Location of Crime (2 of 2) • The pattern appeared to be consistent over time regardless of ethnic composition • Based on this information, the question then became, why does place matter? • The city of Chicago was divided into 5 zones that radiated out from the city’s center or core Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Zones • The Zones were as follows:
- 4. 1. Inner City (Central Business District) 2. Transitional Zone (Area of high crime) 3. Working Class Zone 4. Residential Zone 5. Commuter Zone (Suburbs) Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Zone II • The most important zone to the theory is the transitional zone • Homes in the area are older and of poorer condition • People living in this zone have little tangible incentive to make their communities better Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Social Disorganization and Causes • Shaw and McKay concluded that Social Disorganization is endemic to Zone II • The community in this area cannot function as its residents would desire • They expend personal effort to improve the living
- 5. conditions of this type of neighborhood that is against the common sense of individuals in this area Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Conditions for Social Disorganization (1 of 2) • According to Shaw and McKay, 3 factors create natural conditions for social disorganization 1. Residential Instability 2. Racial/Ethnic Heterogeneity 3. Poverty Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Conditions for Social Disorganization (2 of 2) • Each of the aforementioned signs of disorganization undermines the ability of residents to work in concert and prevent crime from occurring Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Residential Instability • Communities with a lot of residential turnover have high levels of crime
- 6. • Effective formal and informal community organizations require a relatively stable population • People do not tend to form close ties with people they will only know for a short while Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Racial/Ethnic Heterogeneity • Shaw and McKay found that communities where many different ethnic groups live in close proximity have higher crime rates • Communication was found to decrease under these conditions, which made the community less effective at being able to organize/control the neighborhood Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Poverty • Communities with high poverty tend to lack the resources needed for effective community organization • Concentrated poverty weakens the tax base, which supports community institutions (schools) • Residents are focused on personal survival and not other
- 7. activities Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Development of Social Disorganization Theory (1 of 4) • After Shaw and McKay the theory languished for many years • Other theories become more popular • Crime was seen as a byproduct of culture and not explicitly the domain of poor communities Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Development of Social Disorganization Theory (2 of 4) • Disorganization also fell out of favor due to limitations with data • Weakness of community networks (an important factor of disorganization) was hard to measure using typical community level data Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All
- 8. Rights Reserved Development of Social Disorganization Theory (3 of 4) • The primary data that disorganization theorists were able to show were maps with dots denoting where crime was taking place Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Development of Social Disorganization Theory (4 of 4) • In 1974, Kasorda and Janowitz talked of communities with informal ties, which helped the theory come back into fashion • Kornheiser (1978), attacked critiques and focused on informal social bonds Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Revived Social Disorganization Theory (1 of 2) • Work by Sampson et al. (1997), created the concept of Collective Efficacy • Collective efficacy is the idea that residents band together to protect the best interests of their communities
- 9. Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Revived Social Disorganization Theory (2 of 2) • Social Capital is related to collective efficacy and is based on the idea that informal networks within the community help prevent crime Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Policy Implications (1 of 3) • On one level, disorganization theory suggests straightforward policy • Community organizations with informal control mechanisms need to be promoted • HOAs and neighborhood watches are examples of these types of community organizations Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Policy Implications (2 of 3) • Shaw and McKay’s Chicago Area Project is an example of
- 10. an early social program based on Social Disorganization Theory • Project staff and social workers were used to help create and maintain community organizations Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Policy Implications (3 of 3) • An interesting finding from this study was that once financial support was cut back, these communities began to have more issues Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Policy Implementation • Why have these types of policies been so difficult to implement? • Issues such as residential mobility, incarceration (which hurts communities) and improvements that ‘price out’ poor residents are some of the key issues here Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved
- 11. Routine Activities Theory • Based on the work of Hawley (1950) suggesting that there was a natural rhythm of human life • Cohen and Felson (1979), three components were necessary for a crime to occur 1. Motivated Offender 2. Suitable Target 3. Lack of Proper Guardianship Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Role of Social Changes • Social Changes are often relevant for facilitating/impeding situations in which offenders are poorly defended/worthwhile targets • Changes such as more women working (leaving homes unguarded during the day) have affected crime rates Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Empirical Research/Criticisms • A criticism of Routine Activities Theory is that it is difficult to test
- 12. • Many look at routine activities as a victim blaming theory and are thus highly critical of it • Readers should be aware of the inherent ideology embedded within any type of theory Copyright © 2015, 2011, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved Copyright