Youth and Crime – Task sheet 8

  • The official statistics show that juvenile crime has declined in recent years after having reached a peak in 198485.
  • Ricky Taylor's (1998) analysis of official statistics between 1957 and 1997 shows that in 1958, 56% of all offenders found guilty or cautioned were aged 20 or under compared with 38% in 1997.
  • However, only one in ten crimes result in arrest and conviction so it is likely that youth involvement in crime is higher than the official statistics indicate.]

Patterns and Trends of Delinquency

1. Gender

  • Of those offenders who are identified by the courts or the police, four out of five (80%) are male, and almost half (47% ) of the offences are committed by those under the age Of 21. As for as the police and the courts are concerned, therefore, crime is predominantly an issue to do with young men.
  • This would suggest that when we talk of youth delinquency we are more properly talking of male youth delinquency. Youth is clearly a gendered category. Moore (1988) points out that the peak age for female crime is 1315 while for males it is 1418. He goes on to provide the following ratios of male to female offenders in relation to various criminal acts.
  • Frances Heidensohn (1985) has suggested that the lack of female involvement may reflect the lack of opportunity to commit crime and the greater surveillance juvenile females have to face. As a result, one effect of the lessening of controls on young females may be an increase in involvement in crime and juvenile delinquency.
  • It is also the case that although there remains much less likelihood of women being prosecuted and convicted for crime, the rates of imprisonment are increasing and the periods for which women are being imprisoned are increasing. This may be due to increased number of female police officers more willing to arrest women and the rise of the ladette culture in young women.

2. Ethnicity

  • Black and Asian youths are much more likely to get stopped and arrested by the police than white youths. For many people this has led to the allegation that the police are in some way racism and deliberately target ethnic minorities. This view gained considerable support after the MacPherson report (1999) labelled the Metropolitan Police as 'institutionally racist' in relation to its failure to arrest and prosecute the murderers of the black teenager Stephen Lawrence.
  • In relation to offending and ethnicity, Tarling (1993) reports on a study by Ouston in the mid1980s relating to young people attending schools in inner London. He found that by the age of 17, 28 per cent of boys with parents born in the UK and Eire had been either cautioned or convicted, while 39 per cent of boys born in the West Indies or of West Indian parents had been cautioned or convicted. Equivalent statistics for other ethnic groups include 24 per cent for those of Indian or Pakistani descent and 21 per cent for those of Cypriot descent.
  • However, Tarling (1993) goes on to point out that once factors such as social class and educational achievement are taken into account, the ethnic differences virtually disappear.
  • It is clearly the case that the overrepresentation of ethnic minorities in certain statistics relating to delinquency has led to something of a debate about the possible reasons for this. Racism on the part of the police and the criminalization of the black community have both been suggested as reasons for this in the work of Hall et al. (1979), Paul Gilroy (1982) and more recently John Solomos (1993).

3. Class

  • There have been a number of studies considering the class background of offenders. Coles (1995) summarizes the findings of some of these, arguing that they point to a clear link between material and social deprivation and levels of offending.
  • Serious offending is seen to be more prevalent among sons of manual workers and among those who live in big families. Unemployment and illhealth are also seen as factors likely to be associated with higher levels of offending and these factors are also known to be more prevalent in lower income areas than in higher income ones.
  • One interesting question, asked by Tuck (1993), was why young workingclass males do not undertake crime in rich areas where the pickings would be much better. The research gives no clear answers as to why they do not do this, but does suggest that notions of class justice (taking from the rich) do not seem to play a part in such proceedings.
  • Such findings lay open to question the usefulness of statistical correlation in explaining juvenile delinquency and Coles argues we need to focus much more on the process of decision-making concerned with becoming a delinquent, rather than simply looking at the social background of offenders.

Sociological Explanations of Youth Deviance

Labelling theory

  • Labelling theory argues that powerful groups shape societal reaction by making the rules for powerless groups, such as the young and labelling young people via policing or media moral panics.
  • Studies of policing in both Britain (Smith and Grey, Holdaway) and USA (Cicourel) suggest young people, especially young blacks, are negatively labelled as either suspicious or criminal in everyday policing which results in over~ proportionate stops and arrests.
  • Labelling theory suggests that once labelled the deviant status becomes a master status that may have negative consequences in terms of prejudice and discrimination and selffulfilling prophecies for young people.
  • Youth subcultures confer normality and status on those labelled by society, and membership may compensate for negative societal reaction.

Moral panics and youth cultures

There is a strong relationship between youth cultures and the mass media. This relationship is complex and unusual. Most members of youth cultures are interested in the music played and learn about the culture and the group from teen magazines. They buy the music, watch the movies and read the books.

There is also an argument first made by Stan Cohen to suggest that the media in part create youth cultures and promote or demonise them. The mods and rockers subcultures of the 1960s were only made up of groups of youth with different clothing styles before the exaggerated claims of the press began the process of their formation into the subcultures we know about today. This process began after a few scuffles broke out on Easter Sunday 1964.

Press editorials and comment exaggerated and distorted events, using words like “riot’, “battle” and “siege” to describe what were, in reality, minor events and scuffles typical of drinkers and young people.

There were no gangs as such; the mods and rockers did not exist. Only a minority had motorbikes or scooters and they were not affluent, as the press claimed. Newspapers predicted that similar riots would happen again and, of course, this led to the classic “self-fulfilling prophecy”.

Youths went down to the east and south coast resorts of Clacton, Brighton, Margate or Hastings to join in the fun. The press increasingly criticised their clothes, their hairstyles, their scooters and motorbikes until the ‘look’ adopted by the young people was associated with these “folk devils”, the object of unanimous criticism and bad reporting.

Cohen states that there are two reasons for the exaggeration of events by the press:

  • The need to create news: Newspapers with little news to report are boring and do not sell, therefore when there is little or no ‘news it is necessary to create it. The mods and rockers did not become news because they were new; they were presented as news to justify their creation as news. The ‘riots’ were reported on Bank Holidays when nothing happened in politics.
  • The existence of the structures of the news making process: journalists naturally take the side of the police, the magistrates and the local residents because they share the same worldview. This consensual definition of the situation is reported, rather than either objective events (if such exist) or the definitions of events held by mods and rockers themselves. Mods and rockers, like all youth subcultures, act as scapegoats for society to blame its troubles on. They also strengthen the boundaries of the acceptable, by bringing them into focus.

Gareth McLean on the meaning of the hoodie

Friday May 13, 2005 …The Guardian

Really, it's only a sweatshirt with an extra bit. And sometimes a zip. And possibly pockets. It is not made of chain mail, of Batman's offcuts, or of the very fabric of evil itself. Indeed, nowadays, you're lucky to get one that's 100% cotton. And yet, the hooded top can strike fear into the heart of even the most courageous among us. A lone figure behind us on the walk home - hood up, head down - and we quicken our steps. Someone solitary and hooded at the back of the bus, and we opt for a seat near the front. A group of hooded teenagers on the street, and we're tensing our shoulders, clenching our fists (round handbag strap or house keys-cum- weapon), training our ears for verbal abuse in order to emphatically ignore it. Just as leather trench coats are associated with Goths, Matrix fans and ageing Lotharios, so the hoodie has become a signifier of disgruntled, malevolent youth, scowling and indolent. The hoodie is the uniform of the troublemaker: its wearer may as well be emblazoned with a scarlet letter.

For this reason, the managers of Bluewater shopping centre in Kent have drawn up a code of conduct for the centre - a dress code, if you will. Wearing clothing that obscures the face - hooded tops, baseball caps - will not be allowed. Those persevering with such anti-social, CCTV-foiling fashion choices will be asked to leave the mall. While there's a bigger argument to be had about the privatisation of public spaces and Bluewater's ability to enforce a dress code on its customers, it would not seem to be one John Prescott fancies engaging in. He told the BBC he welcomed Bluewater's decision, following an incident in a motorway cafe when he was surrounded by 10 youths wearing hooded tops. The hoods were almost like a "uniform", he said. "I found that very alarming. I think the fact that you go around with these hats and these covers ... is intimidating."

Rachel Harrington, vice-chair of the British Youth Council, says Bluewater's decision demonstrates a growing demonisation of young people. "It's yet another example of a trend - tarring all young people with the same brush and overreacting to any behaviour by young people. You can understand shopping centres' desire to please their customers, but it doesn't seem to me to be the best response. It's very easy to create the stereotype of the young thug as emblematic of society's problems, rather than seek out the root of the problems."

Marxist theory

  • Taylor, Walton and Young suggest that workingclass youth choose to commit crime because of their experience of the injustices of capitalism in terms of inequalities in wealth and power.
  • Gilroy argues that black streetcrime reflects young black people's anger at the way that white society has historically treated black people via slavery and colonialism and is a rational political response to everyday prejudice and discrimination, especially police harassment.

Functionalist Theory

Status frustration

  • Albert Cohen used the term status frustration to explain why so many young people who committed offences were from working class backgrounds. Cohen argued that the reason for this was their feeling of low self-esteem and low status gained at school.
  • According to Cohen, working class boys are more likely to fail at school and consequently feel humiliated. In an attempt to deal with this and gain some status amongst their peers, they develop sub-cultures which invert traditional middle class values such as obedience, politeness and obeying the law. Instead, they behave badly and engage in a variety of antisocial behaviour. Within the norms and values of the sub-culture, this behaviour provides them status.

Postmodernism: subcultures and emotion

•Recent postmodernist approaches reject the idea that youth offending can be explained in terms of some rational reason why subcultures develop. Instead they argue that emotions are important.

•Katz argues that crime is seductive – young males are attracted to it because it is thrilling. This could explain why so much young offending is not for financial gain, but for ‘kicks’. There is a simple pleasure in destroying a bus shelter or ‘tagging’ a police car.

•Similarly, Lyng argues that young males like to engage in ‘edgework’, which he explains as deliberately flirting with danger. This could explain the ‘buzz’ of stealing cars and driving at speed.

Crisis of masculinity and laddism

Writers such as Susan Faludi and Robert Bly suggest male underachievement is linked to a 'crisis of masculinity'. Male pupils, it is argued, are sensing wider changes in society, and the growing opportunities and confidence of females generally. Even before leaving school some males are picking up the message that women do not need men. Such ideas can be very discouraging and it seems to alienate them further into acceptance of failure or brutal 'laddism'. Recent research by Carolyn Jackson suggests that girls are now engaged in similar behaviour which she calls ‘Ladette’ due to the extreme pressure of testing that occurs in modern British schools.
Aggleton (1987) studied young men from the new professional middle classes and found that some boys distanced themselves from aggressive working class male masculinity. However, they also reject the idea of hard-work and seriousness. Instead, they aim for a male identity of effortless achievement. Clearly, success without effort is very difficult to achieve indeed and many of these boys underperform.
Salisbury and Jackson (1995) say that there is more than one possible form of masculinity for boys to identify with. Archer says that not all of these are aggressive. Notions of maleness are fluid, so boys will behave differently in differing situations. Male identities are, however, concerned with the creation of hierarchies of power and dominance. Some male identities are seen as having more status than others. As early as the 1970s Willis pointed out that hard working academic achievement among boys was seen, even by some teachers, as being effeminate, low status and undesirable.

Some males, especially from the working-class, see academic school work as feminine and resist it as undermining their culture of masculinity (Willis, 1979). It simply is not 'cool' to be academically able and can result in being labelled as a 'boffin' or 'geek'. As a consequence they seek alternative anti-school values and adopt 'laddish' attitudes and behaviour (Mac an Ghaill, 1994).

Gangs

The characteristics of gangs in the UK

  • Research on UK gangs began to mushroom in the 1990s. Shropshire and McFarquhar (2002) point to evidence from the police of the growth of street gangs who are prepared to use extreme violence, including shooting. Their findings coincided with a number of other British studies which suggested that there really is the beginning of a form of gang culture in the UK.
  • Bullock and Tilley (2002) used a database of the Manchester police to obtain information on 23 young males who were reputed to be gang members and interviewed them. They found that there were four major South Manchester gangs, with membership ranging from 26-67. Gang members were heavily involved in crime, committing a wide variety of offences including property crime and serious violence.
  • Mares (2001) observational study of two of the four South Manchester gangs found that the large majority of members were African-Caribbean in origin. They were loosely organised and there were no formal leaders. Other gangs in the Manchester area, however, had different structures and ethnic bases. Gangs in Salford tended to be all white and longer-standing, whereas in Wythenshawe they tended to be smaller, ethnically mixed, with about a quarter of the membership being female.

Campbell and Nicoll: the rise of girl gangs

  • There is some concern that violent crimes committed by young workingclass women are rising.
  • Studies of girl gangs in the USA by Campbell and Nicoll note that violence, drug dealing, robbery and possession of dangerous weapons are common activities carried out by young women. Young women joined gangs to compensate for low status in their families and communities and as an alternative to taking on lowskilled, tedious, lowpaid jobs.
  • Campbell found that many of the girls had a difficult task in balancing a number of competing demands and cultural desires. She suggests that they were torn between attempting to have a ‘cool’ streetwise image and retaining their Puerto-Rican values.
  • Moreover, such gangs contain elements of traditional patriarchal culture because members of female gangs were girlfriends of male gang members and when they became pregnant they moved uncomplainingly into traditional mother roles.
  • Nicoll suggests girl gangs are increasing in the UK, although she says they seem less organised and violent than those in the USA.

Questions: