Classical School, Deterrence, and Rational Choice Theories of Crime

1
Classical School, Deterrence, andRational Choice
Theories of Crime

• And discussion of The Enlightenment.
• Chapter 5

2
Preclassical Notions of Crime and Criminals

• Prior to the 18th C explanations for many things
  including behavior and crime tended to be based
  on religious or spiritual understandings
  supernatural forces
• Crime was the result of demonic possession or the
  evil abuse of freewill interestingly, because
  of the legacy of original sin in that all
  people were considered born sinners it made no
  sense to ask the question what causes crime?
  The gift of the grace of God kept people
  obeying the law and if they deviated it was
  because God was no longer their guide.
• This demonological explanation began to wane with
  the advent of a period of time historians refer
  to as the Enlightenment (18th C). - paradigm
  shift led people question the role of religion,
  demonic possession shift to new ideas of
  rationalism, humanism, and the belief in law over
  the supernatural.

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Pre-Classical Views of Crime contd

• Rationale for punishment has often been
  retribution payback and revenge
• Blood Feuding kinship groups would fight back
  and forth widening and escalating the situation.
• To gain control Lords began capitalizing on
  superstition and declaring people possessed and
  imposing punishments in the name of religion
  punishment was seen as appeasing God and victims
• The Holy Inquisition diminishing authority of
  the Catholic Church punish heretics through
  brutal means church wasnt allowed to spill
  blood so the state handled it pre separation
  of church and state many crimes resulted in
  D.P.
• Brutal punishment and torture burning alive,
  drowning, burying alive, beheading, stoning, and
  breaking on the wheel.

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• Thousand of innocent people were labeled witches
  and the state only became more brutal when the
  church wasnt involved eventually death was the
  punishment for ALL felonies in England in the
  17th C.
• Death penalty was not used humanely but rather
  was brutal burning alive was the most common
  form for heresy (opinion contrary to the church
  and or state)
• Pg. 174 has a terrible tale of a victim and the
  torture and death he experienced brutal

5
The Classical School of Criminology

• The arbitrary administration of justice and the
  cruel punishments in medieval Europe provided
  fertile ground for the emergence of the Classical
  school of criminology.
• The Classical school must be interpreted in the
  context of the Enlightenment. began in FP
• Charles Montesquieus - Espirit deslois (The
  Spirit of the Laws) 1748 expressed hatred of
  despotism
• Jean-Jacques Rousseau Thomas Hobbes - The
  Social Contract
• Demonological explanations of crime began to wane
  leading into the Enlightenment

6
The Enlightenment

• 18th C. is known as the Age of Enlightenment
• Both an end and a new beginning (emerging
  revolutions) characterized by reason and logic.
• Enlightened intellectuals would lead people out
  of the skeptical Dark Ages which was
  characterized by superstition, magic, demonic
  possession
• Autonomy of reason, confidence in the discovery
  of causality, assault on authority, solidarity of
  intellectuals philosophes

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Age of Enlightenment contd

• Main figures of Enlightenment included some
  recognizable folks Descartes, Pascal,
  Montesquieu, Voltaire, Rousseau
• Largely a French movement because French culture
  dominated Europe
• Feudal ideals were crumbling and by 1750 the
  reading public came into existance due to
  increased literacy. Philosophes never knew if
  their ideas would be embraced or rejected and
  they imprisoned.
• Despite, they assumed the air of an army on the
  march (hippies?)
• Many of the Philosophes rebuffed religion and
  tried to show its importance and relevance but
  without the supernatural powers of the Middle
  Ages embraced rationality to explain behavior
  including crime.

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The Classical School of Criminology, cont.

• Cesare Beccaria - Father of Classical Criminology
• Wrote On Crimes and Punishments (1764) academy
  of fists Verri brothers contribution to the
  Enlightenment
• Advocated the principle of no crime without law
  and specified the criteria for the enactment and
  administration of criminal codes.
• Staunchly supported the separation of powers in
  criminal law.
• Asserted that the essence of crime was harm done
  to society.
• At the heart of Classical thought was the notion
  that it is better to prevent crimes than to
  punish them (Beccaria, 1764/196393). Out of
  this idea arises Deterrence. Also, better to let
  a guilty man go free than to punish an innocent
  man very contrary position to the old ways of
  torture of the innocent to extract confessions

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Beccaria and Deterrence Theory

• The deterrence doctrine and its assumptions
  regarding human nature permeate social relations
  and institutions.
• Deterrence employs threats of punishment to
  influence behavior. It assumes that
• people are rational
• peoples behavior is a product of free will
• people are hedonistic, i.e., that their goal is
  to increase pleasure and/or to reduce pain
• Three principles of punishment that became the
  hallmark of classical deterrence doctrine
• gtgt Swift, Certain, Severe, (Public) NYT
  hangings
• Punishment must also be proportionate to the harm
  caused.
• Punishment used to keep order not avenge crime.

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Jeremy Bentham - Utilitarianism and Classical
Thought

• A contemporary and admirer of Beccaria
• He was a child prodigy and wrote extensively
  throughout his lifetime with most works not
  published during his lifetime.
• Body was preserved at University College London
  still on display.

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Bentham contd

• At the heart of Benthams punishment philosophy
  was Utilitarianism all action must serve a
  purpose (the greatest happiness principle) (all
  action should be judged by its effect on the
  happiness of the community)(greatest happiness
  for the greatest number).
• People serve two masters pleasure and pain
• Hedonism (?)
• The weighing of pleasure versus pain is known as
  hedonistic (felicific) calculus.
• Freewill allows people to make calculated and
  deliberate decisions

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Bentham contd

• Principle of morals and legislation(1789) this
  is a philosophical piece on the social control of
  individuals based on the principle of utility
  (the creation of happiness in the party
  concerned) the association by Bentham is the
  greatest happiness for the greatest number.
• Human action should be judged based upon its
  effect on the happiness of the community as a
  whole. Punishment falls under this philosophy.
• W/ regard to each action it is imp. to consider
  1) the act itself, 2) the circumstances of the
  act, 3) the intentionality, 4) the consciousness
  of the act, 5) the motive, 6) the general outcome
  of the act.
• W/ regard to punishment the punitive action must
  be considered in terms of intensity, duration,
  certainty, proximity, productiveness, purity, and
  extent.
• The act of legislation is vital to maintaining a
  balance between personal pleasure and a minimum
  degree of pain for the greatest number of people.

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Impact of Classicism on Criminal Law and
Procedure

• Classical school emergence of modern
  criminological thinking.
• Criminal law and procedure, penology, policing -
  were profoundly affected by Classical School
  reform movement were made more civilized with a
  deterrent purpose in mind.
• Many contributions were in the reform of criminal
  codes and procedures.
• Legal reforms and protections for the accused by
  classical theorists spread throughout the Western
  World.
• John Adams, Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson
  Constitution

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The Impact on Penology and Policing

• Penology
• Brutal Incarceration to imprisonment under
  relatively humane conditions.
• Segregation by sex, age, or reason for
  incarceration.
• Bentham and Panopticon.
• Policing
• Reforms took longer in policing than in penology
• Sir Robert Peel - the London Metropolitan Police
  Act of 1829
• Bobbies or Peelers
• Deterrence via police patrol.
• Boston Police Dept. in 1838 adopted the ideas of
  the LMPA

15
Contemporary Deterrence Theory and the
Conceptualization of Deterrence

• Research on deterrence has focused on certainty
  of punishment - a dimension emphasized by early
  classicists.
• How swift must punishment be to deter crime?
• Crime should decrease as punishment severity
  increases. However, Beccaria and Bentham were
  cautious about declaring that deterrent effects
  are contingent upon the severity of punishment.
• For punishment to have the desired effect, the
  individual must be cognizant of the punishment.

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General and Specific Deterrence

• General Deterrence - involves punitive sanctions
  (real of perceived) designed to influence the
  behavior of individuals other than those
  punished.

• Specific Deterrence - (also called special or
  individual deterrence) seeks to discourage the
  sanctioned individual from engaging in future
  misconduct again.

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Deterrence

• Deterrence
• Wide range of potential impacts of punishment
• Threat of sanctions can completely deter
  individual action.
• Reductions in rule violations can occur
• Crime Displacement
• Differences by Crimes
• Instrumental crime and Expressive crime (which is
  more deterrable?)
• Differences by Persons (impulsive, low
  self-control, optimistic, young, lower class,
  male, little to lose w/ much to gain)
• Extralegal Sanctions Shaming both verbal and
  nonverbal cues by family and friends can have
  deterrent value

18
Group Exercise

• Decide an appropriate punishment for the
  following crimes
• Adultery
• Theft of personal property of 10,000
• Vandalism
• Drug dealing
• Attack on ones honor

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A Rational Choice Perspective

• Punishment does not deter under all circumstances
  though it does some (rape w/o getting caught?)
• The rational choice perspective incorporates many
  more variables and expands on conventional
  deterrence by considering the choices of both the
  offenders and the victims
• Offense and offender specific choices,
• The rational choice perspective has paved the way
  for additional practical crime prevention focus
• studies of victimization
• defensible space designs
• crime displacement
• hot spots
• routine activities

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Routine Activities

• Introduced by Cohen and Felson to explain
  escalating official crime rates during the 1970s
• Three premises are at the heart of Routine
  Activities
• Assumed there is an abundance of motivated
  offenders
• There is a suitable target
• An absence of capable guardians
• The focus is on the lifestyle choices of
  potential victims - focuses on victimization.
• Target hardening examples
• deterrence