SOCI 250 Lecture Notes - Lecture 18: Physical Attractiveness, Cesare Lombroso, Criminology
8 Jun 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
Lecture 18 (November 14th, 2017)
Crime (cont.)
! Offender vs. victim
•!1) Black (offender) vs. white (victim)
o!Most likely
•!2) White (offender) vs. white (victim)
•!3) Black (offender) vs. black (victim)
o!Only a bit lenient because it’s black versus black
•!4) White (offender) vs. black (victim)
o!Least likely
! Problems with Beccaria’s model
•!Ignored differences in the circumstances of particular situations.
o!The code treated everyone exactly alike, since only the act, not the intent, was
considered in determining the punishment. Thus, first offenders were treated the
same as repeaters, minors/adults, insane/others, etc.
•!Everyone is punished equally for a given act they committed
•!Neoclassicists recognized that the free will approach had a number of shortcomings.
Suggested that judges need some discretion to allow for the consideration of factors such as
age, mental condition, priors etc.
o!The neoclassicists lightly revise Beccaria’s work
o!The law says that at age 18 (sometimes 16) is when we are “responsible” and
susceptive for the juvenile system – neoclassicists are trying to take this stuff into
account: how much discretion to give to judges, and so on
•!The first annual national crime statistics were published in France in 1827 (about sixty years
after Beccaria’s book).
o!Crime was going up not down
o!They were on the wrong path
"!For 60 years, there were efforts to model criminal justice around Beccaria’s
ideas
"!In a way, the first major reaction should have been “maybe we’re off to the
wrong start” – despite warning signs from the beginning that maybe
Beccaria’s main assumptions about minimizing pain, free choice, maximizing
pleasure, rational actors… were all flawed
o!These findings revealed that Beccaria had been wrong to argue that changes in
punishment policies alone could reduce crime.
•!NOTE: Despite the fact that many of the ideas of the classical school were discredited over
150 years ago, modern versions of this theory are still quite popular.
! Modern forms of classicism
•!Deterrence Theory – the way this thing is described now, people don’t refer to Beccaria, they
call it the deterrence theory, and there are 2 kinds of it:
o!1) Specific Deterrence
"!Empirical evidence suggests that the severity of punishment is no more
effective than less severe punishment. Certainty?
"!Where I am deterred from committed a particular act
"!I am calculating that the punishment for a certain act is too much, and it will
deter me from actually acting in that way
"!This is all about me
o!2) General Deterrence
"!Empirical evidence does not support
"!You see I actually take her laptop, you see that I am punished and you don’t
want that to happen to me, so you don’t steal the laptop
o!One more obvious problem:
"!Let’s say I’m a firm believer in the deterrence theory, but do we actually
know what the actual consequence is this for crime? Am I really supposed to
calculate all of the pros and cons (i.e.: 27 months in prison)? How should I
know – broadly speaking, we’re not aware of sanctions for almost anything.
It’s difficult if not impossible to believe that we’re calculating these things
"!We can have a broad sense of this will make me end up in jail, and this
doesn’t – but even then, we’re not always certain
"!One of the logics is that we have to get more and more punitive – but the
evidence doesn’t support that at all
"!The people who go to prison are more likely to steal a car when they get out –
and this is not what Beccaria expected. The only part of his model that yes,
will change our behavior: certainty – we are increasingly gaining the technical
capacity to increase certainty. for example: when you know that on the
Boulevard you will get caught if you go over 30km/hour, no matter what, you
will slow down on that road because you just know – this is us changing our
behavior relative to the sanction we are going to get
•!THUS, research does not support policy. Ideology does.
•!Regained popularity in 1970s through present.
•!The criminal justice system has largely abandoned rehabilitation as its main crime-control
strategy in favor of the severity of punishment.
•!The US has the highest crime rates in the world – the only country in the developed world to
have the death penalty, yet where’s the deterrence?
! Deterrence theory
•!Why does punishment fail to deter crime?
o!Many offenders may not be that rational
"!Crimes of passion
"!Emotion and rationality do not go hand in hand very well
•!Not a rational calculation
"!Or maybe there’s limits to our rationality
"!Some might say “what’s rational for me is not necessarily rational for you”
•!It might be very rational for me to steal a car, but for you it isn’t
"!Rationality varies from person to person
o!The justice system does not punish in an effective way.
o!The likelihood of punishment is very low. If it were more certain it may be a more
effective deterrent.
"!It’s difficult to know
Document Summary
Ignored differences in the circumstances of particular situations. o the code treated everyone exactly alike, since only the act, not the intent, was considered in determining the punishment. Thus, first offenders were treated the same as repeaters, minors/adults, insane/others, etc: everyone is punished equally for a given act they committed, neoclassicists recognized that the free will approach had a number of shortcomings. For 60 years, there were efforts to model criminal justice around beccaria"s ideas. In a way, the first major reaction should have been maybe we"re off to the wrong start despite warning signs from the beginning that maybe. 150 years ago, modern versions of this theory are still quite popular. Modern forms of classicism: deterrence theory the way this thing is described now, people don"t refer to beccaria, they call it the deterrence theory, and there are 2 kinds of it: o 1) specific deterrence.
