Social control can be used to give reference to the sanctions given by the government to keep away chaos erupting in the society. Different scholars have put forward several perspectives to try understanding social control.
Classical Perspective
Among the theories of social control put forward by scholars is the classical perspective which postulates that it requires rational judgment to contain crime. Consequently, there is need to put up a justice and law system to help contain crime with scholars arguing that there is the need for the government to protect its population and their property. To achieve the protection status of the citizens, laws put in place need to be practical and effective (Zald, 2017 p.32). The works of the first classical theorists and other reasonable thinkers showed that the law is supposed to expend minimal possible danger to the individual and society at large. They postulated that the law should work in a way that it does not bring undue cruelty to the lawbreakers.
According to researchers, the classical perspective allows that the cost of indulging in given criminal activities are supposed to exceed potential benefits and hence provide a workable platform to implement decisional scales aimed at achieving law compliance. The theorists further argue that any punitive action given to offenders should not be way too heavy to seem unnecessary and cruel (Ritzer, and Stepnisky, 2017 p.20).
Unlike other theories, the classical theory paints individuals as having free will consequently having the ability to make choices and taking responsibility for their actions and behavior. The fact that human beings have the free will means that they can align with the concepts of guilt, responsibility, sin, and praise. Morally, actions that have been undertaken out of free will have been shown to deserve blame or credit and thus the presence of laws (Buechler, 2016 p.114).
Since human beings are generally viewed as hedonistic showing that pleasure and pain are integral in life, classical perspective proves that rational human beings will do anything within their means to achieve highest possible measures of pleasure (Zald, 2017 p.45). Coupled with free will, human hedonism indicates that individuals will conform to the most desirable character as a means of social control.
The concept of positivism in the classical perspective of criminology argues that the society works according to existing general rules. According to Buechler (2016 p.120), working along existing general rules supports the rational judgment in containing crime and the fact that offenders do not have to be overly punished.
Functionalist Perspectives
The works of Durkheim largely contribute to the functionalist perspective of social control supposing that the society comprises of intertwined parts that function harmoniously to keep in place a state of social balance and equilibrium (Tittle, 2018 p.79). Durkheim was highly interested in knowing what makes it possible for the social order to be in place and how the stability of the society is maintained. Studies have shown that the society is a sum total of its basic components and as such each component or part function to keep the society stable with no single component seen to work alone.
According to the functionalist perspective of social control, social institutions are the building blocks of a society with every institution being designated to satisfy various needs in the society (Turner, 2017 p.107). Each institution in addition to satisfying different societal needs possesses specific repercussions for the society form and shape. An institution is only deemed to serve important roles in the overall working of the society and if it does not serve the role then the institution is likely to die.
Research has shown a strong relationship between social institutions and the functionalism perspective in that whenever social institutions fail to offer adequate moral guidance to human beings there emerges a breakdown of community and individual social bonds popularly known as anomie (Aronowitz, 2016 p.77). Durkheim further suggests that institution’s failure to function appropriately leads to the disintegration of social identity and more so a rejection of the values that are self-regulatory. Further studies by Durkheim suggest that anomie which is described as the insatiable will is never fulfilled making it only more intense (Tittle, 2018 p.84). The increase in the intensity of anomie according to Durkheim which is a factor of reduced social ethics eventually results in moral deregulation coupled with lack of legitimate aspirations which is a cultivated condition.
In other studies, anomie is closely shown to relate with the influence of normlessness resultant of differential adaptation which would influence the development of norms to inherently transform because of social-regulation. This inherent transformation yields either to development of norms in case of their nonexistence or evolving the norms that have turned obsolete and rather rigid (Akers, 2017 p.30). Anomie is seen to relate deviance where a discontinuity between social structures and culture consequently bring deviance in a society provided that crime is functional.
Labeling Perspectives
The labeling theory of crime tries to show the relationship between self-identity and individual behavior with how they are determined by their description or classification. The theory holds that crime will only be a result of what the society describes as a criminal (Hirschi, 2017 p.115). The proponents of labeling theory argue that stereotyping and self-fulfilling concepts are the biggest contributors to crime (Staples, 2018 p.89). The theory further addresses the issue of crime being an inherent act by postulating that deviance or the reaction to social control is not an inherent behavior. More studies show that deviance results from the continued negative labeling of the minority by a majority of what is regarded as the accepted cultural norms. Stigmatization which is a potent negative label acts to change an individual's social identity and self-concept.
Early scholars who put forward the labeling perspective of crime found that crime is not as such a violation of the laws as it is seen as an act outraging the society. The scholars showed that the reaction from social norm or deviance labeling outrages, the society and that the society holds it wise to control deviance (Akers, 2017 p 53). More studies sought to prove that individuals would acquire labels from the views of others about individual behaviors or tendencies further proving that crime is a socially constructed given that individuals are social constructions and reconstructions of their interactions with the community.
According to the labeling theory, formation of laws, policies and their enforcement groups only facilitates the development of deviance from the formed laws and policies. For example, instituting laws against homosexuality or slavery bring to being the existence of slavery and homosexuality.
Marxist Perspectives
Marxist theory of crime seeks to unearth what brings continuity and stability in a society even though unlike functional theory, Marxist perspective inclines towards political philosophy. The basis of crime according to Marxist theorists the society is split along wealth, power, world perceptions and prestige (LaFree, 2018 p. 66). To support these Marxist scholars argue that the character and shape of the legal systems in societies are derivations of natural conflicts in the structural being of societies which are grouped politically and economically hence showing the relationship between crime and the society. Structural and immediate social environments give rise to such criminogenic situations and crime.
In an attempt to understand crime and the society, Marxists postulate that it is the law that the ruling class uses to maintain a disadvantaged position of all other classes in the society. Economic and political powers are interconnected with the economic power gradually giving rise to political power among the minority elite class while bringing disempowering of the many that are limited politically and economically. Consequently, the minority ruling class defines what is criminal and what is not and thus deviance in the society is a definition by the ruling class to protect their interests (Lyman, 2016 p 99).
Karl Marx in an attempt to explain the behavior of the ruling class and crime provided that the efficient functioning of any society requires social order which can only be achieved through a socialization process. The socialization process is referred to as law which the political class or the state uses to perpetuate its interests. Given the sovereignty of the state, the law which is made by the state can be employed for whatever purpose. In support of the sovereignty of the state and its ability to tailor laws to suit its interests, the Marxist theorists show how vagrancy laws are put in place to suit interests of ruling class. Practical examples can be further drawn from the application of British Colonial rule in its protectorates of East Africa to ensure the ruling elite benefits from coffee and tea plantations giving rise to resistance behavior.
Marxist theorists explain that to enforce social control, institutions are set up where none are existent. Such institutions include justice systems and police forces to enforce the laws made by the ruling class (Goffman, 2018 p.30). Other institutions such as religion seek to create challenges of alienation resultant of its structure that sets similar goals to its members without providing the equal wherewithal to accomplish them. Families, the media, and schools are seen to be other institutions put in place to make true the agendas of the ruling class.
The Disciplinary Society Perspective
The disciplinary society is a theory proposed for bringing normalcy and social control. The modern society is seen to make efforts to instill social control in the name of efficiency, progress, rationality and sufficiency (Sherman, 2018 p. 251). The main question surrounding a disciplinary society is how the rational society can maintain discipline given the societal propensity towards irrationally criminating dissent. In achieving discipline in the society and the disciplinary ideology, several concepts have to be considered that involve law and order, governmentality, regulatory authority, social control, rationality, punishment, discipline, and efficiency.
Disciplinary society is closely associated with the thoughts of a society making complete adjustment and surveillance. Social surveillance revolves around observations on persons of interest to survey their movements, behaviors, actions, and communications to gather intelligence by governments with an objective of protecting and investigating crime (Hirschi, 2017 p.111).
One proponent of a disciplinary society, Michel Foucault puts across a disciplinary society as an application of maintaining discipline among individuals but is not an actual social reality. In his arguments, Foucault proposes that the authoritarian police wanted to found a society built on military lines with the objective of yielding obedient individuals (Seidman, 2016 p. 67). Foucault differed from other social control theories arguing that the sovereignty of the state legitimized enforcement and implementation of the law.
Foucault describes disciplinary society along docile bodies where the body is subjected to control and discipline forces. According to Foucault docility is achievable through disciplinary actions which are different from the use of violence or force since discipline controls the positions and operations of the body (Seidman, 2016 p.73). In further discussions, Michel Foucault suggests that schools, prisons, and hospitals functioned similarly to machines in attempts to control and transform individuals consequently achieving social control. Exercises and timetables according to Foucault’s assessment of monasteries and armies acted to regulate the body.
Crime according to the disciplinary society becomes a transgression from the societal dominant norms. The dominant norms are argued to emanate from the transformations and control achieved on individuals over time by indulgence in activities that are repeatedly performed as in exercising and following timetables (Migdal, 2018 p.65).
Feminist Perspectives
Female criminality theories emerge within assumptions and cultural context those judge women who commit criminal offenses as being inherently or pathologically criminal since they deviate from the real biologically set characteristics of women deemed as law abiding. Nicole Rafter Hahn postulated that a woman who was promiscuous, indecisive and irresponsible was deemed as bad since the woman possessing such characteristics presented loosening of morals not just for herself but other women and their ancestry (Quinney and Shelden, 2018 p.121).
One female offender theorist, Cesare Lombroso, argued that the determining factors of female criminality are psychological and physiological as opposed to social-structural and socializing factors (Thibaut, 2017 p.8). In his arguments, Lombroso brought to light some common deviations linked to female offenders as excessively possessing a desire for revenge, greed, cruelty untruthfulness and an absence of religious feeling. W.I. Thomas in his argument on the feminist perspective of social control postulated that a feminine desire for response and new experience formed the foundation for criminal behavior.
The workplaces, media and public life are motivated by desires for response and new experience which according to Thomas formed the foundation for criminal behavior. As such, to bring social control according to the feminist theory, the law, religion, and education are brought forward as possible contributors to social control (Thibaut, 2017 p.15). The control measures in religion, education, and employment prove that the law is just but one agent of social control.
Conclusion
From the discussions above, it can be concluded that social control is a function of several components as proposed by various theorists on criminology and social control. The theories cannot work in isolation given that they borrow from each other. Presence of laws and regulations in a society can only be argued to be part of a larger system responsible for instilling social control as postulated by disciplinary society theorists. Rational individuals have the ability to self-install control in many instances.
References
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