Criminal Justice Paper

October 10, 2017

Social structure theories explain crime by referencing to the social and economic arrangements in the society. Social structure theories focus on the relationships among institutions and groups and envisage crime as an outcome of a given social process and as the result of or class and economical struggle (Schmalleger, 2011). The social structure theories can inform the implementation of policies to combat crime and solve societal struggles. The theories are used to understand how the social situations lead to crimes and how they social process can be used to deter crimes. For instance, these theories have been used to inform the implementation of policies to lower class society with programs such as Aid to Dependent Children, welfare, Head Start programs, food stamps, extra help with education, neighborhood self-help legal services, and job opportunities, and recreational programs to children with no access to federal help.

Criminal gang is a serious problem in the United States. However, this problem can be eliminated with proper policy implementation. For instance, most the people join gangs because unemployment. The government needs to come up with measure to increase employment to the youths, who are the majority of people likely to be lured in criminal lives. The government should establish measures to fight poverty such as educating people to embrace self-employments (Schmalleger, 2011). The three sociological explanation of crime include social disorganization, strain theory, and culture conflict theory. Social disorganization claims that social pathology leads to crime. Strain theory attributes crime as lack of fit between success goals that are socially approved and the convenience of socially approved methods to achieve those objectives. Culture conflict theory relates crime with criminality found in a rattle of values between inversely socialized groups over proper behavior or what acceptable (Schmalleger, 2011) is.

References

Schmalleger, F. (2011). Criminology today: An integrative introduction. Prentice Hall.