Unit Five Schools of Thought throughout History - PowerPoint Presentation

1. Unit FiveSchools of Thought throughout History

2. 4.1. Classical Criminology In the early nineteenth century great advances were made in the natural sciences and in medicine. Physicians in France, Germany, and England undertook systematic studies of crimes and criminals. Crime statistics became available in several European countries.

3. There were emerged an opposing school of criminology, which is the positivist school This school posits that human behaviour is determined by forces beyond individual control and that it is possible to measure those forces or factors. Unlike classical criminologists, who claim that people rationally chose to commit crime, positivist criminologists view criminal behaviour as stemming from biological psychological, and social factors.

4. Classical Criminology In the late eighteenth to the mid nineteenth centuries, during what is now called the neo classical period, the classical culture of the ancient Mediterranean was rediscovered. This was also a period of scientific discoveries and the founding of new scholarly disciplines. one of these was criminology, which developed as an attempt to apply rationality and the rule of law to brutal and arbitrary criminal justice processes. The work of criminology’s founders – scholars like Cesare Beccaria and Jeremy Bentahm – became known as classical criminology.

5. 4.1.1. Cesare Beccaria (1738 - 1794), presented a coherent, comprehensive design for an enlightened criminal justice system that was to serve the people rather than the monarchy. With this presentation, he became “the father of modern criminology .“

6. According to Beccaria, the crime problem could be traced not to bad people but to bad laws. A modern criminal justice should guarantee all people equal treatment before the law. Beccarias presentation (book) supplied the blue print. The blue print was based on the assumption that people freely chose what they do and are responsible for the consequences of their behaviour.

7. Lastly, Beccaria proposed the following principles: Law should be used to maintain the social contract Laws are the conditions under which men, naturally independent, united themselves in society. Weary of a continual state of war, and of enjoying liberty, which became of little value from the uncertainty of its duration, they sacrificed one part of it to enjoy the rest in peace and security.

8. Only legislators should create laws The authority of making penal laws can only reside with the legislator, who represents the whole society united by the social compact. Judges should impose punishment only in accordance with law No magistrates the, (as he is one of the society), can, with justice inflict on any other member of the same society punishment that is not ordained by the laws

9. Punishment should be based on the pleasure/pain principle Punishment should be based on the act, not on the actor Crimes are only to be measured by the injuries done to the society, The punishment should be determined by the crime If mathematical calculation could be applied to the obscure and infinite combinations of human actions, there might be a correspondence scale of punishments descending from the greatest to the least.

10. Punishment should be prompted and effective The more immediate after the commission of a crime a punishment is inflicted, the more just and useful it will be. An immediate punishment is more useful; because the smaller the interval of time between the punishment and the crime, the stronger and more lasting will be the association of the two ideas of crime and punishment

11. All people should be treated equally He asserts that the punishment of the nobleman should in no wise differ from that of the lowest member of society Capital punishment should be abolished The punishment of death is not authorised by any right; for...no such right exists...The terrors of death make so slight an impression, that it has not force enough to withstand the forgetfulness natural to mankind.

12. The use of torture to gain confessions should be abolished It is confounding all relations to expect ... That pain should be the test of truth, as if truth resided in the muscles and fibres of a wretch in torture. By this method the robust will be escaped, and the feeble be condemned. It is better to prevent crimes than to punish them “Would you prevent crimes? Let the laws be clear and simple, let the entire force of nation be united in their defence, let them be intended rather to favour every individual than any particular classes...Finally, the most certain method of preventing crime is to perfect the system of education.

13. 4.1.2. Jeremy Bentham’s Utilitarianism (1748 – 1832) his approach to rational crime control. Like Beccaria, he was concerned with achieving “the greatest happiness of the greatest number.” His work was governed by utilitarian principles. According to this principle, actions should be judged according to whether, on balance, they contribute to the happiness and benefit of humankind. Utilitarianism assumes that all human actions are calculated in accordance with their likelihood of bringing happiness (pleasure) or unhappiness (pain).

14. He advocated that punishment should not be guided by retribution, but rather by the aim of preventing crime. In agreement with Beccaria, he defined crime as an offense detrimental to the community.

15. A common feature of classical theorists was their focus on criminal law and their neglect of criminals. This can be understood in the context of the times, as the law was administered in an arbitrary and capricious manner.

16. 4.2. Positivist Criminology During the late eighteenth century significant advances in knowledge of both the physical and the social world influenced thinking about crime. Auguste Comte (1798 - 1857) A French sociologist, applied the modern methods of the physical sciences to the social sciences in his six volume. He argued that there could be no real knowledge of social phenomenon unless it was based on a positivist (scientific approach) approach.

17. The nineteenth – century forces of positivism and evolution moved the field of criminology from a philosophical to a scientific perspective. In general the common ground of positivistic theories can be seen more clearly in focusing on two aspects of the concept: empiricism and determinism. First positivism presumes that knowledge can be discovered only by means of observation and experience. It insists that criminologists employ the scientific method to seek answers to their questions.

18. Thus positivism is rooted in the collection of empirical data, thereby shifting the focus from crime to criminals. Classical criminologists, by contrasts, were philosophers. They only had to engage in armchair theorizing about crime because they assumed there were no individual differences between criminals and non criminals in need of explanation.

19. 4.3. Biological Determinism Throughout history a variety of physical characteristics and disfigurements have been said to characterise individuals of “evil” disposition. In the earliest pursuit of the relationship between biological traits and behaviour, a Greek scientist who examined Socrates found his skull and facial features to be those of a person inclined toward alcoholism and brutality.

20. Through the ages cripples, hunch backs, people with long hair, and a multitude of others were viewed with suspicion. Indeed, in the Middle Ages laws indicated that if two people were suspected of a crime, the uglier was the more likely to be guilty.

21. By the nineteenth century, the sciences of physiognomy and phrenology had introduced specific biological factors into the study of crime causation Physiognomy is the study of facial features and their relation to human behaviour Phrenology is the nineteenth century theory based on the hypothesis that human behaviour is localized in certain specific brain and skull areas. According to this theory, criminal behaviour can be determined by the bumps on the head.

22. Cesare Lombroso (1835 - 1909) Lombroso's work replaced the concept of free will, which had reigned for over a century as the principle that explained criminal behaviour with that of determinism. Besides of his theory of the born criminals, he argued that criminals frequently have huge jaws and string canine teeth, characteristics common to carnivores who tear and devour meat raw.

23. To the born criminal Lombroso added two other categories, insane criminals and criminoloids. Insane criminals are not criminal from birth; they become criminal as a result of some change in their brains which interferes with their ability to distinguish between right and wrong. Criminoloids make up an ambiguous groups that includes habitual criminals, criminals by passion, and other diverse types.

24. Most scientists who followed Lombroso, did not share his enthusiasm or his view point. A Return to Biological Determinism The Somato Type School in the search for the source of criminality, other scientists too looked for the elusive link between physical characteristics and crime The somato type school of criminology, which related body build to behaviour, became popular during the first half of the twentieth century.

25. It originated with the work of a Germen psychiatrist, Ernst Kretshmer (1888 - 1964), who distinguished three principal types of physiques: The asthenic – lane , slightly built, narrow shouldersThe Athletic – medium to tall, strong, muscular, coarse bones; and The pyknic – medium height, rounded figure, massive neck, broad face.

26. He then related these physical types to various psychic disorders: Pykincks to manic depression, asthenics and athletics to schizophrenia, and so on. William Sheldon formulated his own group of somato types: The EndomorphThe MesomorphThe Ectomorph

27. In his description, people with predominantly mesomorph traits (physically powerful, aggressive, athletic physiques), he argued, tend more than others to be involved in illegal behaviours.

28. 4.4 Psychological Determinism Psychologists have considered a variety of possibilities for individual differences - defective conscience, emotional immaturity, inadequate childhood socialization, maternal deprivation, poor oral development. The study on psychological determinism show:Aggression is learnedWhich situations promote violent or delinquent reactionsHow crime is related to personality reactions andHow various mental disorders are associated with criminality

29. Pioneers in criminal psychology Issac Ray (1802 - 1881), was interested throughout his life in the application of psychiatric principles. He defined moral insanity as a term used to describe persons who were normal at all respects except that something was wrong with the part of the brain that regulates affective responses.

30. Ray questioned whether we could hold people legally responsible for their acts if they had such an impairment, because such people committed their crimes without an intent to do so. Henry Maudsley (1835 - 1918), a brilliant English medical professor, shared Ray’s concerns about criminal responsibility. According to Maudsley, some people may be considered either “insane or criminal according to the standpoint from which they are looked at.

31. He believed that for many persons crime is an “outlet in which their unsound tendencies are discharged; they would go mad if they were not criminals.” Most of Maudsley’s focused on the border line between insane and crime.

32. 4.5. Sociological Determinism During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, some of scholars begun to search for the social determinants of criminal behaviour. Pioneers in the perspectives of sociological determinism The Belgian mathematician Adolphe Quetelet (1796 - 1874) French Lawyer Andre Michel Guerry (1802 - 1866) Working independently on the relation of crime statistics to such factors as poverty, age, sex, race, and climate, both scholars concluded that society, not the decisions of individual offenders, was responsible from criminal behaviour.

33. Gabriel Tarde (1843 - 1904) Formulated one of the earliest sociological theories of criminal behaviour Tarde rejected the Lombrosian theory of biological abnormality, which was popular in his time, arguing that criminals were normal people who learned crime just as others legitimate trades. He formulated his theory in terms of Laws of imitation – principles that governed the process by which people became criminals.

34. According to Tarde’s thesis, individuals emulate behaviour patterns in much of the same way as that they copy styles of dress. Moreover, there is a pattern to the way such emulation takes place:Individuals imitate others in proportion to the intensity and frequency of their contacts;Inferiors imitate superiors – that is, trends flow from upper to lower classes;When two behaviour patterns clash, one may take the place of the other, as when guns largely replaced knives as murder weapons .

35. Emile Durkheim (1858 - 1917) Durkheim’s division of social labour became a land mark on the organization of society. According to Durkheim, crime is as normal a part of society as birth and death. Durkheim further pointed out that all societies have not only crime but sanctions. The rationale for the sanctions varies in accordance with the structure of the society

36. In a strongly cohesive society, punishment of members who deviate is used to reinforce the value system – to remind people of what is right and what is wrong – thereby preserving the pool of common belief and the solidarity of the society. Punishment should be harsh to serve these ends.

37. The most important of Durkheim’s many contributions to contemporary sociology is his concept of anomie, a break down of social order as a result of a loss of standards and values.