Difference Between Deviance And Crime

In Belize today, our Society is being plagued by crime daily and very often as you listen to the daily news someone is dead either my being shot, hit and run, suicide or some other form of death. Other times minor incidences are reported and often times we wonder why did this even make the news? It is nothing unusual it is just petty (deviance). Therefore, we need to define the difference between crime and deviance in a simple way; crime is the breaking of legal norms, while deviance is the breaking of social norms. Sometimes these can be the same ‘norm’ which is broken, although in some cases certain acts of deviance are not seen as criminal and some criminal acts are not socially viewed as deviant. Crime and deviance can be categorised by

Structural strain theory, a type of functionalist theory, predicts that societal inequalities actually force and compel the individual into deviant and criminal behaviour. Conflict theory explains deviance and crime as a consequence of unequal power relationships and inequality in society. Symbolic interaction theory explains deviance and crime as the result of meanings people give to various behaviours. Differential association theory, a type of symbolic interaction theory, interprets deviance as behaviour learned through social interaction with other deviants. Another type of symbolic interaction theory, argues that societal reactions to behaviour produce deviance, with some groups having more power than others to assign deviant labels to

To put it simply, crime is constructed by the use of social laws and the decisions of those with power to make some of these social laws and the decisions of those with power to make some of these social laws into criminal laws. Crime can be seen as a social construction as what is legal or illegal in one society or culture may not be in another, the same can be said of deviance. Crime is repeatedly viewed as a ‘physical fact’ by the government or media. However it can be argued that when one thinks of acts which are criminal in one place yet are not in another that crime is a social construction. To refer back to the point of these with power deciphering which acts are criminal, it can also be argued that those with power (e.g. government) define these acts as criminal, whether socially deviant or not, to suit their own purpose and to control certain parts of society. This argument may help to explain why different societies create different laws in different places, the answer being that other governments may have different agendas which suit the social order of their society. This argument about social power supports the view that crime is socially constructed.

While discussing crime as a social construction it is also important to differentiate between crime and deviance. Not all violation of social norms is criminal. It