Andrea,+Jordi

Important Definitions:
__**Deviant:**__ This term refers to **UNACCEPTABLE ** behavour that doesn't conform to society's norms and values (which may or may not be criminal.) __**Crime:**__ Envolves all actions that break those rules that have been made into laws. **__Dark figure (of crime):__** Crimes which are not recorded or reported and so do not appear in statistics. This dark figure of crime is discovered when studies or surveys such as the self-report study or the victim survey show that there is a difference between the number of self-reported crimes and officially reported crimes. **__Self report study:__** When people are asked what offences they have commited. **__Victim survey:__** A method of research in which people are asked what crimed they have been victims of. **__Delinquency:__** Deviant behavour, which may or may not be crime, commited by people under 18.


 * //Who is guilty? //
 * //Who decides? //
 * //What does 'guilty' mean? //
 * //What happens? -police, politicians, judges //
 * //Is the system fair? -no, why? //

What does 'guilty' mean?

 Guilty has various meanings: <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">**__1.__** Having committed an offense, crime, violation, or wrong, esp. against moral or penal law; justly subject to a certain accusation or penalty; culpable: Ex: The jury found her guilty of murder. - Can be guilty of DEVIANT behavour or CRIME. <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">**__2.__** Characterized by, connected with, or involving guilt: guilty intent. <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">**__3.__** Having or showing a sense of guilt, whether real or imagined: a guilty conscience.

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">SO 'GUILT' IS SOCIALLY DEFINED : FORMALLY THROUGH LAWS AND LEGAL PROCEEDINGS, BUT ALSO AT A PERSONAL LEVEL AS A RESULT OF SOCIALISATION; ESPECIALLY PRIMARY SOCIALISATION.

Who is guilty?
<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> variables of guilty:

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">**__-Sex :__** More than 4 out of 10 males and 1 in 10 females are likley to be found guilty or cautioned at some point during their lives.
====<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">**__-Age:__** Self-report studies show that individuals more often break the law when they are young ("peak" ages at which they are most likely to be found guilty : between 15 and 19).Young people who become involved in crime in the earliest ages (before 14) tend to become the most persistent offenders ==== <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">//Graph showing criminals per age in spain.// <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">

__**<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">-Nationality: **__
<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">//Graph showing criminals per nationality in Spain//

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">[[file:sociology criminals NATIONALITY.docx]]
====<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">//statistic (pie chart form) of crime per country.// http://www.nationmaster.com/red/pie/cri_tot_cri-crime-total-crimes. however, this is not reliable because the countries that are more developed will have a more efficient record of crime, whether as other countries like Brazil or India may have more crime but it is not included on the statistics, because it doesn't reach them. This is also an example of mass media manipulating. ====

====<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">__**-Location**__: in the inner city there is more crime. This is due to the big concentration of people living in a small space. crime then becomes more anonymous. ====

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> • Does crime tend to occur in particular geographical locations? Is it for example, predominantly an urban or a <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> rural phenomenon? <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Shaw and McKay <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> Shaw and McKay argued that the central area was a ‘zone of transition’. This meant that it contained a large number of immigrants, of low-income families, and a constantly shifting population, they described this zone as being ‘socially disorganised’. By this they mean that it is an area where there are many ‘broken’ families, violence, and lots of other social problems. They also claim that these sorts of areas have high and increasing crime rates because the population is constantly changing, and in a large and anonymous urban setting there is less social control. They also argued that it offers more opportunities for crime. <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Morris – Croydon study 1957 <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> If any areas could be described as socially disorganised, it would be the more middle class residential areas. In these areas people did not interact a great deal and they might have to live in them for a long time before they made significant social contacts and relationships. <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Baldwin and Bottoms – Sheffield study 1976 <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> The degree of social disorganisation was a factor but it was not found to be significant on council estates. Baldwin and Bottoms thus concluded that there was no evidence for Shaw and McKay’s arguments regarding social disorganisation, and they found no correlation between a high population turnover and crime rates.

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> However, both Shaw, McKay and Morris agreed that where people didn't know each other and therefore were anonymous, crime increased (whether it is in inner city areas or middle-class residential areas). Plus, this offers a greater oportunity for crime.

<span style="color: #008080; font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Who decides? <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">-**Marxist** would argue that it is a conspiracy of people in power, with power, that cover up white - collar crime and base the system on working-class crime.

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">The institution which decides what is crime and what isn’t is the <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">parliament <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">. Here is where the laws are decided, but they are interpreted and executed by the <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> government <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> and the consequences are dictated by the <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">courts <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">. <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> The laws, and with them the decision of what is crime and what isn’t are very much <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">influated by the mass media and the politicians <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">. When these two institutions criticise some kind of law it can affect the way the law is interpreted or dictated. <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> Other people who can decide if something is considered a crime or not is the <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">police <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">. Although hypothetically they shouldn’t decide, they can decide if they consider a crime important enough to record it or not. The proof of the existence of this data is the “Dark figure" //(*view definition above)//

<span style="color: #008080; font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">What happens? <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> -How does society make most people <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;"> conform most of the time? Informal and formal social control. <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">Formal social control means the creation of laws and rules and using them to control people's behaviour. The **agencies of social contro**l inclue:
 * <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">__The Legislature__: This term refers to the branch of government that is responsible for legislating, that is, for making laws. (Eg: in Britain = Houses of Parliament)


 * <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">__The police__ - the role of the police forces is to prevent crime, to protect life and property and to arrest and mantain public order. However, to marxists the police are servents of the capitalist ruling class. Problems identified in the British police in the recent years include: the shortage of women and ethnic minorities, racism, sexism and corruption.
 * <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">__The judiciary__: refers to courts, which try those accused of crimes and convict and sentence those who are found guilty. Courts can impose a range of sanctions on those found guilty, including probation orders, community service orders, fines and imprisionment, according to how serious the offence is.
 * <span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">__The penal system__: this refers to the people and organisations that deal with offenders (prisions and probation service).

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">//[ Summary//: Therefore, the parliament creates laws and the police, judiciary and the penal system are the agents of social control responsable of deciding who broke the rules and are therefore criminals and guilty, based on their interpretations of the laws. This interpretation will also be influenced by society's values and stereotypes, and the individual's (being judged) social context. Social context such as: deprivation, poverty, education and ethnicity.//]//

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=au_YglkLFmQ media type="youtube" key="au_YglkLFmQ?fs=1" height="385" width="640" This video refers to the American Legal System and, apart from the American enphasis on 'plea-bargaining', there is also a slight difference in terminology. In the UK we talk about a judge setting or posting 'bail' rather than establishing a bond (so a suspect is 'released on bail' rather than 'bonded out' as they say in the video).

Is the system fair?

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