What is social control in crime and deviance?
Social control refers to the methods which persuade or force individuals to conform to the main social norms and values which are leared through early socialisation. This in turn prevents deviance. They can be formal, through institutions like school and law enforcement or they can be informal, through peers and family. Sanctions are a way of enfocring social control and can be good or bad, ranging all the way from good sanctions being pocket money or a knight hood to bad sanctions being sitting in the corner or life imprisonment. Agencies of social control: Formal social control;
Informal social control;
The social construction of crime: Crime is whatever is against the law, as in, if it is against the law is to wake up at 7:59, then you are a criminal if you wake up at that exact time. What is regarded as a crime is more often then not regarded as devient. Newburn (2007) says that crime is a label attached to certain forms of behaviour which are prohibited by the state and have som elegal penulty agianst them. No act in itself is criminal, it is only criminal when it is labled as a crime. Killing in itself is not criminal, it is dependant on the circumstance; for instance if you kill someone by hit and run then it is criminal, but if you kill an enemy at war then it is not. As what is criminal changes over both time and country it strengthens the idea that no act alone is criminal. The social construction of deviance: Deviance is essentialy deviation from rules/norms/beliefs/conformity and values of something. It could be deviation from law, deviation from family, or even deviating around a pot hole when driving. It is very difficult to define exactly what is deviant because many people disagree. Downes and Rock (2007) suggest that ambiguity is a key feature as people don’t really know what is deviant and what isn’t. A persons judgement on what is deviant will depend on loads of stuff about them personally, and deviance in a speific setting will depend on the social norms and how others react to it. For instance, wearing a t-shirt that has a swear word might be cool and accepted around friends, but not in the work place or in front of the queen. Plummer (1979) Societal and situational deviance: Societal deviance:
Situational deviance:
These both show that deviance can be agreed on across whole societies, but differ with other societies, or even differ between groups in society. The following show how deviance and crime can change over time, further proving that no act in itself is either deviant or criminal.
What is meant by social control?Social control is the study of the mechanisms, in the form of patterns of pressure, through which society maintains social order and cohesion.
What is social control and why is it important to social control?Social control regulates behavior in accordance with established norms which brings uniformity of behavior and leads to unity among the individuals. The family maintains its unity because its members behave in a simi-lar manner in accordance with family norms.
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