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The Consensus Perspective

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Criminologists have long tried to fight crime and they have developed many theories along the way as tools to help them understand criminals. In the process of doing so, criminologist have realized that in order to really understand why criminals are criminals, they had to first understand the interrelationship between the law and society. A clear and thorough understanding of how they relatively connect with criminal behavior is necessary. Therefore, they then created three analytical perspectives which would help them tie the dots between social order and law, the consensus, the pluralist and the conflict perspectives. Each provides a significantly different view of society as relative to the law. However, while they all aim to the same …show more content…

Durkheim even argued that the penal law expresses a society’s “collective conscience” (Luckenbill, 1992). Therefore, it is seen as just and fair to all members. According to Michalowski, the law serves all people equally (Schmalleger, 2012). It is not biased and works with the people to protect them from what they feel endangered of.
Finally, the consensus perspective takes responsibility for those who violate those values. Many believe that criminal behaviors result from a failure to control oneself, a lack of self-control. The consensus perspective advocates believe that crime exists because there are members of society “who fail to participate in the social consensus” (Agnew, 2011), arguing that these people are “low is self-control and lack the abilities to resist the temptations and provocations for crime” (Agnew, 2011). In other words, those do not have the base norms necessary to fight the temptations of crime. Almost as if they have no conscience and they tend to be those with no strong connections with family, school or any major institutions, therefore cannot quite control themselves. Many argued that “crime is a result of low self-control” (Agnew, 2011).
Overall, in the process of understanding the relation between social order and the law, the consensus provides a clearer and more radical view. It shows society as what it really is. It presents society as a united force respecting and following the norms as to

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