What Is Radical About Radical Criminology - Essay Example

What is radical about radical criminology? By: + In the late 1960’s the people began being more aware of the political grip and the consequences the rule had over the society hence the development of radical criminology which places the blame of deviant behavior and criminology on officially sanctioned economic and cultural arrangements. In other words, radical criminology holds that the distribution of wealth and power in any society is to be held as the primary reason for the emergence and development of criminal behavior. This perspective looked at poverty and discrimination as the main causes of frustration and pent-up hostilities, which people expresses through acts of crime such as rape, murder, theft, etc. Hence, radical criminology holds that the struggle to control resources is centrally based on the society while the law (public rule /government rule) acts as a tool for the powerful and prominent to rule over the rest of the society (Brown, Esbensen and Geis, 2010). The main ideas behind radical criminology are based on the ideas and writings of Karl Marx that focus on capitalism and its advantages and disadvantages. Based on Karl Marx’s ideas, the lower class laborers are continuously being exploited by the powerful members of the society. Hence the powerful developed capitalism and taught the poor that it was in their best interest while the working class lived under a false class consciousness thus a rebellion was imminent when the lower class and middle class society discovered the exploitations. Based on this it is clear that under radical criminology, the poor commit crimes due to frustration, anger and economic needs while on the other hand the wealthy and powerful engage in illegal acts as they create a competitive advantage over their rivals hence an increase in their influence and position in the society. Therefore, social and economic forces are the main causes of radical criminology. They focuses on the need for the society to function as a whole as opposed to the interests of the ruling class, the powerful and prominent in the society hence any society that experiences radical criminology should be perceived as a desperate attempt by the society to neutralize the power of the ruling class (Brown, Esbensen and Geis, 2010). The aspect of being radical in identified in this perspective as the need for the society to meet the social standards they grave and have power over others. The ruling power/law does hence a continuous rebellion against the law is experienced as the society strives to meet its needs and get over the oppression and exploitations they feel they are exposed to under the law. This is the one of the causes of crimes such as drug abuse as the individuals get high to escape the reality and live in a fantasy world where they feel the law cannot oppress /exploit them in any way. As these delusional individuals continue to participate in drug abuse they, form gangs who eventually turn to other forms of crime such as burglary, theft, gang rape, etc. to keep up their habits. This essay is aimed at answering what aspect is radical when it comes to radical criminology through the analysis if major crimes committed such as prostitution, human and sex trafficking, drug abuse, rape and pornography through theoretical perspectives and examples. By so doing, a clear understanding of the definition and implications of radical criminology in the society. Drug abuse has been and continues to be a problem in today’s society. The issue of drug trade is perceived as radical and part of radical criminology. This is due to its capabilities to Para-militarize certain areas in a society. There is consistency and number of people abusing the drugs in a certain locale leading to an area that is known to be a drug hotspot to the local society where the society can indulge in substance abuse without the fear of being apprehended by law enforcement agencies. The ingestion and voluntary use of drugs can be perceived as a critical need for the society to escape reality. They feel exploited and oppressed according to Karl Marx and hence they form a rebellion against the law by engaging in crime to feel that they are in control of their own lives as opposed to what the law in reality dictates (Cited in Brown, Esbensen and Geis, 2010). This issue is further escalated by the emergence of drug lords and drug cartels that “corrupt the system” and hence contribute to the emergence and growth of drug hotspots in the society. A good scenario is Mexico where the government is unable to control certain areas that are under the protection of drug lords leading to the area over-flocking with desperate drug addicts who eventually turn to violent or economic crimes to raise money to keep their constant supply of drugs coming. Due to the corruption of the law by powerful cartels, such as society experienced an increased crime rate in other areas and at times leading to drug wars between cartels who fight to remain the most powerful and influential individual to increase his business in the society (Jones, 2006). The United Kingdom is ranked as a “Tier 1” country when it comes to human trafficking due to its high economic growth and development and its compliance to the International Prevention of Human Trafficking. It is known destination for human trafficked individual from Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe for the purposes of sexual slavery and forced labor. Human trafficking is majorly for the purpose of sexual slavery according to the National Vigilance Association (NVA) thus it can be deemed as sexual trafficking. Human / sex trafficking can be perceived as an aspect of radical criminology since the traffickers are prominent and powerful individuals who have a way of manipulating the law and obtaining high quality falsified documents with ease to facilitate the trafficking of their victims. The traffickers use the victims as prostitutes who receive little or no pay hence creating a hotspot for prostitution brothels in the society where drug abuse is also prominent hence creating a rebellious group in the society that has no respect for the law. Traffickers occasionally sell their victim as sex slaves degrading their human rights causing a revolt among the victim who despise the law for not being able to safeguard their security while in the country. The victims end up committing crimes against the law to satisfy their need for security hence they can even resolve to riot against enforcement agencies as an act of rebellion against the law. Traffickers on the other hand commit these acts of human trafficking for the economic gain it can be perceived as a radical move according to Karl Marx whereby the powerful and prominent people in the society in this case the traffickers engage in illegal activities to maintain their position in the society as the powerful members of the society. Rape, sex trafficking and prostitution are, according to Karl Marx, orthodox Marxist in that they are acts of demoralization. Karl Marx argued that in a capitalist society, the society largely depends on the chronically unemployed and underemployed individuals who were offering their services. Due to poor employment or the lack of employment, where demoralized and thus high subjected to vices and crimes thus acts such as a prostitution and rape where motivated by the lack of employment. The decision of an individual to commit an act of rape in largely based on the individual’s lack of employment in that they have no money to support a family or afford to date thus resolve to crime. This act can be perceived on a radical criminology perspective as an act of the society revolting against the law by performing acts of crime to feel as powerful and to have the benefits that the powerful individuals in the society have access to. Marx describes offenders as a parasitic group of individuals in the society since they fend off the hard work and success of the working class society through crimes such as prostitution, theft, extortion etc. This can be observed in the modern society as certain groups of individual with no education of employability skills form gangs that make a living by performing crimes against the working class society so that they may achieve what they have achieved. This gangs participate in all manner of crime ranging from drug abuse to murder hence have no regard for the law as they perceive the law as oppressive and only meant to safeguard the benefits of the ruling society of powerful and prominent individuals. Globalization is increasingly increasing in the modern world and crime is forming part of globalization hence as globalization increases the so does the rate of crime in any given society. This is true since new technologies are increasingly making crime easy to commit as opposed to the previous generations thus the radical aspect of radical criminology is also changing and adopting to the new emerging techniques adopted by criminals (An Insurgent journal, 2013). According to Findlay (1999), the most prominent threat facing the law is cybercrime under activities such as hacktivism and disarmament virus attacks. Hacktivism is the regarded as an aspect of radical criminology based in its perspective. It focuses on active civil disobedience. Hackivism has been identified as an active defiance of the law and is used by mostly criminals who want their activities legalized or who want to divert attention from their criminal activities so that they are not interfered with by the law enforcement agencies in the society. Hackivism has been used in countries such as Egypt and the UK to divert attention to the act of cybercrime while illegal activities were carried out un-noticed. The use of computers to commit crime has been perceived from a radical perspective as a major cause for revolt against the law as acts of identity theft and online data theft have increased leaving the public to question the capability of the law in safeguarding their security. In conclusion, the radical aspect in radical criminology is entirely based on the capitalism and its perception by each group of people in the society, that is, the unemployed, the poorly paid and the powerful and prominent individuals. In accordance to radical criminology, the unemployed individuals perceive the law as oppressive and as a way for the powerful and prominent individual to exploit and use them. They perceive their roles in the society as demoralizing hence have no regard for the law, as they believe it does not benefit them in any way (An Insurgent journal, 2013). The second group of individual, the poorly paid, commit crimes as they perceive the law as unfair as the prominent group is perceived to have more benefits over them thus turn to crime in an attempt to gain power and receive the benefits that are available to the prominent and rich. The other group, the prominent and powerful group, performs criminal acts since they are able to get away with them and to ensure that their position in the society is maintained hence have no regard for what befalls the rest of the society in their attempt to maintain their power and influence (An Insurgent journal, 2013). Consequently, as each group finds a way to justify their reasons for participating in crime, the law should be upheld and maintained to ensure that the society remains intact. Radical criminology should be studied in order to aid the abolition of certain crimes in each group as globalization increasingly increases resulting to more loss of employment and the emergence of new people in the powerful and prominent class. Reference List An Insurgent journal, R. (2013). Radical Criminology. [online] Journal.radicalcriminology.org. Available at: http://journal.radicalcriminology.org/ [Accessed 28 Apr. 2015]. Brown, S., Esbensen, F. and Geis, G. (2010). Criminology. New Providence, NJ: LexisNexis/Anderson Pub. Findlay, M. (1999). The globalisation of crime. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Jones, S. (2006). Criminology. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Lynch, M. (2013). Political economy and crime: an overview. Journal of Crime and Justice, 36(2), pp.137-147. Wozniak, J. (2008). Poverty and Peacemaking Criminology: Beyond Mainstream Criminology. Critical Criminology, 16(3), pp.209-223. Read More