Criminal Justice

Answer two questions:

1.  Durkheim treats deviance and crime as objective, measurable social facts. Deviance is both normal (ALL societies have patterns of deviance/crime) and pathological (patterns of deviance/crime are statistically infrequent compared to conforming behavior patterns).  Explain how recreational marijuana use may be both normal and pathological social behavior.  If most people have used marijuana ("normal"), how can it be defined as deviant ("pathological")?

2. Erikson argues that deviance is NOT an objective quality of behavior; rather, social audiences label deviance based on directly or indirectly witnessing such behavior. In short, deviance is less about statistical evidence and more a quality of social reaction.  Using drunk driving as an example, how does audience reaction establish boundaries between recreational drinking and drunk driving, especially the legal response to the latter?  In your answer pay particular attention to age of offenders as an important boundary.