Ch 1: Crime Control in
America - Nothings Succeeds Like Failure
Regardless of fluctuations in the
crime rate, the Rich Get Richer's thesis has been validated through
nine editions of
the book and more than 30 year in print: the rich continue to get richer
and there is an expanding number of poor people in prison. Chapter 1
starts the investigation by 1) discussing America’s high crime rate, 2)
reviewing the ‘excuses’ we make for the crime rate 3) introducing sources
of crime, and 4) outlining the pyrrhic defeat theory to explain the
continued failure of policies to reduce crime.
Summary
Internet Resources
1. America’s high
crime rate
Although crime has declined in
recent years, the US still has a substantially higher rate of crime than
other Western industrial democracies. More specifically, the U.S. has a
much higher rate of lethal violence
in the form of homicide compared to European countries (some of which have
high levels of theft and property crime). Rich Get Richer' argues that even though
violent crime has declined, little of it has to do with government
policies such as ‘tough on crime’ laws that incarcerate more people
for longer or because of community policing. The evidence is that many
states or cities that did not implement these changes also experienced
declines in crime. Indeed, Canada has also experienced decreases in crime
without adopting similar policies, which suggests the decline has to do
with the economy, changing markets for crack cocaine and demographics (the
number of young people).
The ‘imprisonment binge’ in
the United States might have accounted for some small changes in crime,
but there are also fears from criminologists that the ‘war on crime’
has eroded the rights of citizens (especially minorities – see the
discussion of driving while black in Chapter 3). It has also spawned a
criminal justice – industrial complex that makes policy more on the
basis of profit than public safety (this is also discussed more in Chapter
3’s Narrative and Exercises). [See
recommended readings at bottom of page for more sources of information]
Reiman next reviews what he calls
‘excuses’ for the high rate of crime and violence in the U.S. He
explains the excuse, but he
ultimately argues against the validity of these excuses; in other
words, he thinks they are false
reasons for our high crime rate.
A.
We’re too soft. The
U.S. has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world. Even when
our higher crime rate is figured in, we are at least as likely as other
countries to impose a prison sentence, and it is not likely to be more
lenient than other countries. The last 30 years has seen increased use
of mandatory sentence and increasingly harsher sentences.
B. Modern life. Other highly industrialized countries in the
world have lower crime rates. There are also striking differences within
the U.S. with respect to the amount of crime and violence. This
variation does not depend on the size of the city or the population
density (population per square mile)
C. Youth. Young people are more likely to commit crimes,
especially violent ones, and a well know phenomenon in criminology is
the maturation effect (people ‘age out’ of crime). But changes in
the amount of crime are not only
dependent on the size of the youth population.
D. We don’t know. Criminologists know that that the criminal
justice system can do little to impact crime rates. It responds
to crime after it occurs, and most criminals do not believe they will be
caught, so harsher sentences have little impact. Research points to a
wide variety of factors that produce crime (including the sources of
crime discussed below) and a number of important interventions (but few
concern the police, courts or prisons – read the quote from FBI
Director Freeh).
For further information why declining crime rates are
not related to ‘get tough,’ see
Stop
Violence Project has links to ideas for reducing many types
of violence, including youth and teen violence.
For a more systematic assessment of the failures in
criminal justice, see Justice Blind
3. 'Sources' of Crime
The Rich
Get Richer discusses ‘sources’ rather than ‘causes.’
The ‘source’ is less specific than a more immediate ‘cause,’ but
we feel that the following ‘sources’ are important in producing
crime, even if the exact mechanisms are not known:
A. Inequality (including
unemployment and poverty).
The concept underlying of many ideas
in this section is relative
deprivation, which is the difference between the rich and the poor.
Books on theories of crime contain a section on strain
theory, which hypothesizes that crime is the result of an
overemphasis on material success and too few legitimate opportunities to
achieve it. The idea of Crime and
the American Dream is that the ideas of success depicted in the
mass media encourage ever greater levels of consumption (there’s
always something bigger, better or newer), which can be a source of
crime for both poor and the wealthy.
B. The conditions of prison
and our overuse of it.
Putting people in overcrowded warehouse-style
prisons do not encourage pro-social behavior. Prisons have few programs
to help inmates be better people when they get out and give them skills
or opportunities to avoid returning to a life of crime. The overuse of
prison hurts communities and families from which minor offenders come.
C. Guns (especially handguns).
The current stock of 200 million guns and the relative ease of obtaining
one adds to the high level of lethal violence.
D. Current drug policy.
The effects of drugs on crime can be broken down into several
categories. (i) the pharmacological effect
is the effect of the drug that reduces inhibitions or stimulates other
activity, (ii) economic crime: is stimulated by the need for
money to buy drugs, so the higher the price of the drug, the greater the
incentive to commit the crime or engage in exchanges like prostitution,
(iii) systemic crime is violence caused by the lack of access to
the civil system for dispute resolution and corruption of police because
of the big money in drugs.
The idea of a pyrrhic victory
comes from a military campaign that achieves its objective (say, taking a
certain bit of land), but does so at such a high cost (lives and supplies)
that the campaign should be considered a failure. The Rich Get Richer
turns this around
and uses the notion of a pyrrhic defeat to describe a situation where vast
resources are spent to secure an objective (reducing crime), but this
failure is really a success. The failure results in a persistent high
level of street crime, which is a ‘victory’ for the wealthy and for
corporate America who are not seen as being part of the ‘crime
problem’; they remain free to keep perpetrating a variety of harms on
people. (The nature and extent of these crimes are discussed in Chapter
2;
the explanation of why this is not a conspiracy theory is in Chapter
4).
The pyrrhic defeat theory is built
upon the work of several theorists: (A) Durkheim noted that all
communities have deviance, and that deviants were functional in promoting
social solidarity by providing an ‘out’ group that helped form an
‘in’ group. (B) Erickson built on Durkheim by suggesting that if
deviance is functional, then perhaps communities encourage, promote and
recruit deviance. The Rich Get Richer
acknowledges a debt to their insight that
society can promote behavior it also desires to eliminate. We go
further, however, by questioning their consensus assumptions about what
constitutes ‘normal,’ ‘deviant,’ and ‘criminal’ behavior.
Chapter Two argues that our notions of ‘crime’ are socially
constructed and explores Quinney’s theories about the social reality of
crime. The argument is that what we think of as ‘crime’ does not
include the worst harms that might befall us (and wrongdoing by the
wealthy is generally excluded from definitions of crime). The Rich
Get Richer also
borrows insights from Marx about ideology to examine further the belief
that what we call crime is a direct reflection of the worst threats to our
well-being.
Two Empty Bottles with Different Labels:
Politicians on Criminal justice: One reason for close national and statewide races for federal offices is the lack of any discernable differences among the candidates. For people who are concerned about criminal justice issues the lack of any substantial policy differences among national candidates is most easily seen by the fact that today no national political figure is publicly opposed to the death penalty. For prisoners or families who have loved ones in prison, people who do not support a police state, the death penalty and the evisceration of human and civil rights the electoral choices between John Kerry and George Bush amount to choosing to be beat to death with a stick or a two by four.
(Counterpunch.org)
