Criminology Final

By Author: Henry Ford
Total Articles: 189
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Question 1 – Methods of measuring crime
Measurement of crime entails different ways in which the rate and prevalence of crime is assessed. In the United States, there are different ways in which crime is measured. There are three ways of measuring crime including Uniform Crime Report (UCR), National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), and self-reported data (David, 2006).
1. The Uniform Crime Reports
Uniform crime reports mainly entails computed data through adding together the major crimes reported to the police. Crimes that are reported to the police further reported to the FBI and then published in crime report findings. This is the primary source of official crime statistics in the country and is usually released as annual Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) that are compiled by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (Abert, 2008).
UCR reports crimes that are known to the nation’s police and sheriff’s departments including the number of arrests that are made by these agencies. This is one of the strengths of the data because all crimes happening on the ground are likely to be captured in the report. In ...
... addition, UCR reports are also likely to be appreciated because they are devoid of bias. The long process involved in vetting the data from police to the FBI means that the accuracy of the report is ascertained and incidences of biasness are reduced. This means that the federal crimes are not included in the reports. In most cases, participation in the UCR reporting program is voluntary, which means all agencies do not participate (Reiner, 2007). This may erode the accuracy of the reports. The other limitation of UCR is that the process involved is long and the accuracy of the data may be compromised in the process. UCR also exclude drug offenses and federal crimes.
2. Crime Victimization Survey
National Crime Victimization Surveys were started with an aim of capturing majority of crimes that were not reported to the policies. This means that this method of measuring crime was meant to increase accuracy in counting (Reiner, 2007). This method mainly entails conducting scientific surveys of the population and asking people whether they have been victims of crime. Unlike UCR, NCVS are meant to report crime more details and using more comprehensive crime statistics.
Some of the strengths of NCVS include the fact that they provide information about the circumstances of the offense and about the victim including the characteristics of the offenders. Therefore, they are report crime more comprehensively providing more accurate data. In addition, NCVS are also likely to generate dark figure of crimes which means they are likely to report crime committed that many never come to official attention. However, they have weaknesses. First, NCVS do not have to meet the stringent legal and evidentiary standards for them to be reported as offenses. In addition, they do not report crimes committed in commercial establishment. Also, memory lapses and problems of over-reporting are likely to occur in process of data collection.
3. Self-reported Data
Self –reported surveys including the way criminologist are in a position to collect data for themselves without relying on government sources. They mainly include asking people to disclose their involvement in delinquent behaviors and crimes using anonymous questionnaires or through face to face interviews. One of their greatest strengths is that researchers are in a position to correlate different characteristics of respondents with admitted offenses going beyond demographics of age, race, and gender. They also report accurate data on some antisocial offending (Reiner, 2007). One of their weaknesses is that they are likely to study convenience samples like students. They also uncover only fairly trivial antisocial acts like fighting, stealing, smoking, and others.
Question 2 - Classical school of criminology
Classical school of criminology has its roots in the 18th century work. The classical school of criminology gained roots during the enlightenment period and was mainly developed by utilitarian and social contract philosophers including Jeremy Bentham and Cesare Beccaria. The interest of the classical school of criminology was on the system of criminal justice and penology. The bases of classical school of criminology were on the sense that man is a calculating anima and therefore has control in cause of criminal behavior. This theory was based on the belief that people usually have free will while making their decision whether to engage in crime or not (Langbein, 1977). The school of thought also believed that punishment was an effective method of deterring individual engagement in crime as longs as the punishment is proportional and fits the crime and is implemented swiftly.
Classical school of criminology can be considered to have been influential in making of the modern criminal justice system. Throughout the history of human civilization, it is evident that there have been different ways in which individuals were made to pay for the crime they committed. Some of the ways adopted as a compensation for crime were severe and including stoning to lenient ones like fines (Tonry, 2000). It was evident that classical school of criminology was developed with this notion in mind. Though this was based on scientific studies, there were elements of traditional ways of handling criminals. The criminal justice system of the eighteenth system can be considered to have been archaic compared to the modern criminal justice system but both were greatly influenced by classical school of criminology. Judges were not well trained and decisions were reached on personal reasoning rather than law. There was widespread use of torture to extract confessions and cruel punishments were also imposed including whipping, mutilation, public prosecution, and others.
The tenets of classical school of criminology have historically and currently influenced criminal justice police in different ways. The modern criminal justice system is based on the classical school of criminology. Punishment is still used not only as a means of deterrence but also as a reward for crime committed (Edward, 1996). Classical school of criminology stressed that the form of punishment used must be in accordance of the crime committed. Modern criminal justice system policy handles different forms of punishments depending on the crime committed. Modern form of punishment ranges from simple probation for less serious crimes to capital punishment for capital crimes. This modern form of criminal justice policy therefore shows that individuals are held responsible for their crimes and this means that they are considered to be calculating human beings who makes decision to commit a crime or not (Casare, 1995). Comparatively, there is a convergence between the classical school of criminology and the modern criminology policies. Although classical school of criminology has been overtaken by other emerging theories, it is evident that it still retains a lot of influences on modern criminal justice policies.
Question 3 – Individual and society as locus for cause of criminal behavior
Criminology is centered on individuals and the society. This is because crimes do not happen in the space but it takes place among individuals and the society. In one way or another, individuals and the society become perpetrators and victims at the same time. In a nutshell, a crime can be perpetrated by the individual where another individual is a victim or where the whole society becomes the victim. In either way, a crime can be committed by the society where a single individual is a victim. This means our understanding of crimes cannot be completed without understanding how crimes happen at individual and societal level (Hindelang, Gottfredson, & Garofalo, 1978).
Individuals and society are the locus of explanations in our understanding of criminal behavior. This has been brought out by major criminology theories that show how either the individual or the society commits crime. Major theories of crime explain the way in which either individuals or the society leads to crime. For example classical theories of crime that were developed under the classical school crime tends to focus on the role of individual in crime. Classical theories explain the way in which individuals make decision whether to commit crime or not. It posits that individuals have free will to engage in crime or not. This means that individuals are the focus our understanding of crimes because crimes are committed by individuals in their own personal capacity or together with others (Michael, 1979). Theories focusing on individuals looks into the extent to which individuals make decision to engage in crime or not. These theories look into individual capacity to commit crimes and also look into the power of deterrence imposed on individuals. Essentially, theories that focus on individuals as locus for crimes have a lot of influence on criminal justice system.

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