Scly4 Functionalist Approach to Crime and Deviance

This essay will detail the functionalist perspective of crime and deviance. Functionalist theories began to emerge after the industrial revolution in the 18th century. This period was called the enlightenment, and brought about scientific belief as opposed to the feudalist beliefs of religion. Religion no longer had such a powerful impact on peoples’ lives. The aim of sociological theories such as functionalism is to cure social ills, such as poverty and disease, and possibly even create the perfect society.

Furthermore Durkheim doesn’t specify how much crime is good for society before we fall into anomie. New Right sociologists such as Murray would be critical of this as they believe that subcultures which carry out criminal and deviant acts form an underclass which threatens society on the whole rather than strengthening ‘boundary maintenence.However Durkheim doesn’t state why people commit crimes, another functionalist who did was Merton.

Moreover, Societies are held together by both consensus with values and coercion. The functionalist view is that the balance of harmony among the society is held up by societal institutions. For example, schools, church and family are seen as the most significant foundation for an adequately functional society.

In American society money is seen as the purpose of life, overemphasized. In attaining that money, for some individuals is not always great but the money in the end, the goal, is greater. Success is attainable for everyone which leaves failure to be the fault of the individual. Merton described five modes of adaptation, depending on the individual's attitudes toward cultural goals and institutional means to attain them. The first approach to the adaptation of strain in society is Conformity, the most common. Individuals accept both the goals as well as the advised means for attaining those goals. The last four adaptations Merton described were seen as deviant; Innovation, Ritualism, Retreatism, and Rebellion. Individuals

Functionalists believe that society is based on a value consensus into which society socialises its members, which enables to cooperate harmoniously and meet society’s needs and goals.

Durkheim states that crime and deviance is inevitable and a certain level is necessary for society to exist. He also claims that it is a positive aspect of society as it shows examples of rights and wrongs within society and by punishing offenders, through ways such as public humiliation and portraying crime as wrong, raises awareness of crime and therefore deters others from committing crime along with creating a collective conscience. He also argues that crime and deviance allows social change to occur which is needed in order for society to remain stable. Durkheim’s

In his first chapter, Erikson gives regard to a foremost leader in sociology; Emile Durkheim. As he notes, crime is really a natural kind of social activity. If crime is a natural part of

Deviance and crime are wide-ranging terms used by sociologists to refer to behavior that varies, in some way, from a social norm. Cultural Norms are society's propensity towards certain ideals; their aversion from others; and their standard, ritualistic practices. Essentially the 'norm' is a summation of typical activities and beliefs of group of people. This essay will evaluate the sociological theories associated with crime and deviance and to compare and contrast these main theories. And find links between these theories to today’s society. There are various Sociological deviance theories, including Structuralist: why do some people break the rules? ,

Crime can not be removed completely from society because it will always be the necessary unacceptable norm that can be located in all forms of societies around the world. Crime is regarded, by many people such as politicians and other people of everyday society, as horrid and unnecessary. Emile Durkheim believes that crime is normal and it isn't possible for it to not exist. If crime is everywhere and in no area has crime ever been successfully eradicated then we should assume it is there for a reason. According to many books written by Emile Durkheim, such as Suicide, and The Division of Labor, society plays a large role in our actions and Durkheim explains that reasons to which why crime is executable. Experts in the Department of

This shared culture provides a framework allowing individuals to co operate by doing things such as defining their goals they should pursue and laying down rules about how they should behave. One functionalist, Parsons, calls this agreement value consensus- the glue that holds society together. Value consensus makes social order possible, with Parsons indentifying that the system has two mechanisms for ensuring individuals conform to the shared norms, thus meeting the systems needs; Socialisation and Social control. The system can assure its needs are met by teaching individuals to want to do what is required of them, with positive sanctions rewarding conformity and negative ones punishing defiance. As individuals are integrated, the behaviour of each person will be quite predictable and stable, allowing cooperation. However this view can be seen as a weakness, as it is somewhat ‘naïve’ to assume that there is consensus; it is unlikely within society we all essentially believe in and work for the same thing. From an action perspective, Wrong criticizes the idea of a value consensus as he criticizes the functionalists over socialized, deterministic view of the individual. Wrong says that individuals have no free will or choice; they are mere puppets whose string are pulled by society. Due to this, the functionalists approach somewhat contradicts itself as functionalism sees humans as being shaped by society, but their approach actually takes

For some, conformity is an unthinkable evil in American society. All individuals living within a community conform in some way to social norms, yet to label someone a conformist is akin to labeling them ignorant and unoriginal. However, conformity - and its associated impacts - are as integral to the functioning of society as the principles of nonconformity. Conformity is often positively utilised to induce positive social change nationally and internationally. It prompts dissemination of workload, provides protection (‘strength in numbers’), and encourages strict rule enforcement. Although less appreciated than non conformists, conformists and their resulting principles play a vital role in the smooth conduction of society.

Crime and deviance are acts that will elicit dissent from society. They take various forms and involve various concepts and theories. It will be the aim of this paper to explore those that are considered to be functional for society.

To come to understand why people act with deviant behavior, we must comprehend how society brings about the

To begin with, Durkheim saw that crime was a necessary means in achieving a state of equilibrium. He states that crime and deviance could not be vanished due to the fact that a society can never establish a state where everyone

The functionalist theory interprets all parts of society: the functional and dysfunctional. Although crime and deviance may seem to be dysfunctional to society, they are important aspects of society because they help to create social norms and social order. Crime and