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Crime And Cesare Beccaria's Rational Choice Theory

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Rational choice theory (RCT) assumes individuals choose to commit crime based on rational/logical thinking and calculations (maximizing profits and minimizing losses). An offender, such as a burglar, might plan to rob a home while the family is away (high profit from stealing and little chance of getting caught). To believe that this is the only reason why criminals offend is preposterous and myopic; it is only a small sliver of the basis of crime. Rational choices are implemented by offenders (sometimes), but other causes include but are not limited to: economic disparity, substance abuse, family factors, biological factors/genetic influences, mental illnesses, opportunity (easy target to hit), perceptions of the punishment (is the offender …show more content…

The theory was founded during the Age of Reason, or Enlightenment (18th century), an era in history “characterized by a critical approach to religious, social, and philosophical matters that seeks to repudiate beliefs or systems not based on or justifiable by reason” (“Age of Reason”). Some individuals no longer believed God was the answer for everything and sought to uncover the facts of the universe through logic and reasoning (hence, rational choices drive crime). RCT was a rejection of minimally traditional theist God (before the Enlightenment- a perfectly, morally, omnipotent, omniscient being who had control over his creatures unless corrupted) by stating humans have free will and can do as they please/rationally deem correct. Though this theory seems to explain some amount of crime, RCT is …show more content…

Though he was influenced by Darwin, Lombroso misunderstood his work and considered criminals evolutionary throwbacks of primitive forms (Mazzarello, 2011). Trait theory has evolved over time from Garofalo’s sociological tilt (crime is an immoral act that is injurious to society) to Enrico Ferri (focused on social and economic factors that motivate criminals) to a modern, biosocial trait theory, which theorizes each person is mentally and physically unique, does not possess equipotentiality (equal potential to learn and achieve), and has developed traits at birth or soon after that affect social functioning and affect criminal behavior. Physical, environmental, and social conditions work in concert to produce behavior. The last part of the theory states, instincts affect learning (rape or desire of males to control

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While a few theories are not as regular, others have developed and are utilized as a part of numerous criminal reviews today. Cutting edge criminologists consolidate the most important aspects of sociology, psychology, anthropology, and biological theories to advance their comprehension of criminal behavior. Rational choice theory, psychological, biological, and strain theory are used to analyze the

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Introduction Jennifer Ebarhardt who, through her collaboration with different experts in various fields such as law, criminology, novel studies that further law enforcements and judges as well as criminology discover in her studies found out that there is racial bias in today’s policing and sentencing of criminals such that black color is stereotype as group of people who are associated with violence and therefore they mostly received death sentence especially when their victims are whites and therefore they are blacks who are arrested. These behaviors can be best explains using the following theories: General Strain Theory According to this theory, people are involved in crimes because they are not in a position to achieve their goals making them to be frustrated and has the following sources: A person aspiring to become wealth and famous but these aspirations are impossible making them to engage in vandalism or physical attacks which are antisocial forms of behaviors, a person may experience strains due to removal of highly valued stimuli such as migration to new residence will make him/her to get involved in criminal activities in efforts to revenge the loss of highly valued stimuli. Black American youths are unable to meet making them to develop frustration and delinquency.

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This theory clearly rules out the effect of inherited or innate factors, and the last is the cognitive theory, which is based on how the perception of an individual is manifested into affecting his or her potential and capability to commit a crime. (Psychological theories of crime) Relating these theories to the case under study, it’s clear that the behaviour can be traced most times to faulty relationships in the family during the first years of

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520 Words | 3 Pages

RCT's basic premises are that human beings base their behavior on rational calculations, they act with rationality when making choices, their choices are aimed at optimization of their pleasure or profit. An example of Rational choice theory applying to criminal behavior would be a criminal who sells drugs for the goal of money but also weigh out the risk of getting caught. The scene from Goodfellas that applied to rational choice theory was where Henry blew up cars in the parking lot with the goal of making money and didn’t care about the risk of his dad finding out.

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CHOICES “White collar crime” refers to those offenses that are anticipated to generate fiscal gain using some form of dishonesty. This type of crime is usually committed by people in the commercial world who, as a result of their employment position, are able to get a hold of large amounts of other people’s money. “White collar crime” does not involve forceful, drug-related, or blatantly illicit activities. In fact, perpetrators are typically involved in otherwise lawful industries and may hold respectable positions in the community prior to the discovery of their fraudulent schemes. The slogan “white collar crime” was made up in 1939 by Edwin Sutherland during a dialog which he gave to the American Sociological Society.

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The classical theory of crime says that people make rational choices when they commit crimes. “Individuals have the will and rationality to act according to their own will and desires. Individuals will calculate the rationality of the crime based on the benefits of the crime versus the consequences of the crime” (Robinson, 2014). This theory discuses that how people think about the negative and positive outcomes before they commit crime. Even though they realize it is not right, they still continue to commit illegal offence because they believe that what they are doing is for the greater

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In criminology, differential association is a theory developed by Edwin Sutherland proposing that through interaction with others, individuals learn the values, attitudes, techniques, and motives for criminal behavior. The differential association theory is the most talked about of the learning theories of deviance. (DAT). (Sutherland) (Sociological Theories of Crime and Their Explanation on Crime , 2007) Theories of criminality are most commonly derived from human behavior.

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Most was derived from the assumption that behaviors such as; criminal and otherwise, are inherited. Which means that criminals are biologically different than non-criminals. One of the earliest explanations was known as Phrenology which was in the mid-1700’s to mid-1800’s, which viewed the shape and size of the brain and skull as determinants of criminal tendencies. The next early positivist explanation for deviance was in 1876, Cesare Lombroso’s theory of “Atavism” and “The Born Criminal” This was the 1st Major Application of this new science to the study of criminals and deviance.

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Third, I will explore Farrell 's critique of Hayward 's article and consider his arguments made in response to Hayward 's conclusions. Fourth, this paper will engage in its own critique of both Hayward 's and Farrell 's work and conclude with which article makes the most compelling argument. Tenets of Rational Choice Theory and Situational Crime Prevention Rational choice theory originated in the Classical School of thinking as it is based on the ideas of utilitarianism, which states that individuals make decisions that provide the greatest pleasure, as well as the ideas of free will and rational thought (Farrell and Hodgkinson, 2015). According to Farrell and

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Why do people commit crimes? What goes through their minds before they actually commit a crime? These are questions asked from society to criminologist every time one decides they want to commit a crime. Criminologists has given us different crime causations, theories, to explain the answer to these questions. A theory is a speculation about how phenomena, behavior, or process are caused and what takes place after the cause is determined (Anderson, 2015).

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Today, there are proven facts that people who have parents that are criminals have a high chance of becoming criminals themselves. Not only can people become criminals because of their family but they can also become criminals because of the environment that they surround themselves in. This is where nature versus nurture comes into play. A person’s nature is their genetic makeup, basically meaning that a person’s nature is the genes they get from their parents. Also, a person’s genotype, one’s genetic makeup based on the sequencing of the nucleotides we term, provides them with physical traits that set the stage for certain behaviors (56).

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Criminal behaviour has always been an interest for psychologists, for they could never quite come to a conclusion between nature and nurture. Research concerning this topic has been organized for many years and due to the never ending debate, is still being conducted. I have decided to read and write about this myself, for I was genuinely curious about the matter and wanted to be a part of the research, as I felt responsible to do so. I believe that in order to stop something, it must be discussed and scrutinized. What effects do genes have on criminal behaviour, why do peer pressure and habitat influence a person to commit crimes and are men really more violent than women?

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Social process theory depends on the interaction between individuals and society as an explanation and is also known as interactionist perspective. This theory assumes that everyone has the potential to violate the law and that criminality is not an innate human characteristic but is instead a belief that criminal behavior is learned by interaction with others (Schmalleger, 2012). Social process feels the socialization process that occurs because of group membership is the main way through which learning occurs (Schmalleger, 2012). Social process theory views criminality as people’s interactions with various organizations, institutions, and processes in society (Siegel, 2000). This theory feels that people from all areas have the potential

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Where external and internal factors play a part and they are fated to be a criminal. The scientific grounds are offenders and people who have not yet offended can be given help, and they can be diagnosed by experts and receive treatment needed to not offend (Cavadino, 2007

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Researchers have invested decades worth of time and data, attempting to answer the question of what causes crime. The study of criminological theory contains a great number of explanations, focused on discovering why exactly, crime occurs. Whether causations are biological, psychological, or sociological in nature, theory has lead us closer to answering the question of why crime happens. Perhaps causations are best explained using hybrid explanations that include a little bit of everything.

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