Discuss the below:
Q: Generate a chart or table that lists a variety of crime types. Your chart should include at least four types of crimes and should include violent crimes and economic crimes as two of the types. For each type of crime you list, provide a description of the cause of that type of crime. A third column on your chart should list the sociological theory that best fits what you have described as the cause of that type of crime.
Discussions of sociological theories about crime
Working from the information presented in the chart, write a synopsis (250-500 words) in which you take the next step and propose a social solution for each type of crime you identified in the chart. If, for example, one type of crime is property crime in which someone's property is taken or destroyed, you might think that the root cause is poverty and that social process theory explains this cause. Then in your synopsis, you would describe an antipoverty program that would minimize poverty in this country and thus reduce this type of crime.
Social Problems
Introduction
Social problems are nothing new to cultures of the world. They have existed since the advent of complex, stratified societies shortly after the agricultural or Neolithic revolution. For the most part, the sheer massiveness of the modern system in population numbers and technological complexity has greatly amplified social problems. Where they were small in the past, they are enormous in their proportions today, not only in America, but all around the world. This course will take a look into some of those problems that are facing the contemporary world. Emphasis will be placed upon how these problems arise and are perpetuated by the modern social structure. Some of the issues that will be addressed include crime, drug abuse, sexual variance, poverty, overpopulation, and family relations.
Defining Social Problems
As American society, and indeed the world, has experienced increasing population densities, massive industrialization, and great amounts of social and economic stratification, the quantity of social problems has become monumental. Social problems must be defined as phenomena that greatly reduce the quality of life for either the individual or a particular group of people. For the most part, social problems are inherent in modern society, and are only likely to get worse as the system grows larger and more competitive. However, sociologists endeavor to both describe and offer solutions for social problems. Also, those suffering from the effects of social problems are inclined to struggle to alleviate the deleterious effects of social problems, and this struggle, when it involves larger numbers of people, may be definable as social movement.
The text (Macionis, 2008) defines a social movement as an organized effort made by various groups and aimed toward shaping the way people think about an issue in order to encourage or discourage social change. Social movements consist of four stages: emergence, coalescence, formalization, and decline.
• Emergence normally occurs when a group of people with similar social views comes together with concern about a particular topic. The particular social issue emerges when this group raises its voice in concert.
• Coalescence is the process whereby some actual organization or structure is applied to the movement. For example, coalescence occurred in the anti-Vietnam war movement when Mark Rudd formally organized the Students for Democratic Society (SDS) at Columbia University during the early days of the Vietnam War.
• Formalization occurs when movements that have coalesced form formal structures, often with official philosophies and paid staff. The environmental movement became formalized when the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was implemented in 1970.
Social Stratification
American society, indeed the vast majority of the world, is today socially, economically, and politically stratified. That means that the societies exist in layers, or strata. Social stratification means that the society is organized into a social hierarchy or ranking system with the individuals who rank the highest having the greatest social prestige, and those who are in the bottom strata have the least social prestige.
Economic stratification also refers to a hierarchical system in which the top strata have the greatest quantity of the wealth, and the bottom strata have the least. In America today, about 5% of the population owns about half of the private property (Macionis, 2008). This means that, by far, the greatest component of American's wealth is concentrated in a small minority of the population. Political stratification means that a small number of Americans have political control over the vast number of the population. America is theoretically a democracy with government by the people, but in reality the government is in the hands of the higher ranking members of the political hierarchy. The fact that great quantities of wealth are required to run political campaigns and to win an election means that those who are outside the wealthy strata or who are not openly supportive of the wealthy strata are excluded from the political arena. As a result, individuals in the middle-income and working-class strata have very little political power, and the poor have even less. These factors have produced a trend that is characteristic of postmodern society: The majority of wealth is in the hands of progressively smaller percentages of the population.
Poverty in the Inner City
The extent to which the economic and social underclass has increased in the last few decades is enormous. New depths of urban poverty and disease, especially in the most densely populated areas of America's inner cities, have increased dramatically in the last century. Struggling for day-to-day survival, people have little access to adequate medical care, and very little articulation with mainstream American life. Poor nutrition, overcrowded housing, and the near demise of traditional culture, has created ideal conditions for the spread of disease and social anarchy. The arrival of acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) has only exacerbated the problem. Also, the incursion of crack and other forms of drugs has pushed chronic hardship into crisis, shattering families and monopolizing scarce health and subsistence resources.
In the past decade or so, inner cities have experienced skyrocketing rates of tuberculosis, syphilis, gonorrhea, hepatitis A, whooping cough, measles, mumps, severe ear infections leading to both vision and hearing loss, as well as AIDS. Many of these diseases were considered on the verge of eradication at short time ago, having declined since the 1950s, and they are still practically nonexistent in the more affluent suburban neighborhoods. Many treatable conditions go unrecognized or neglected. Also, poor nutrition and poor sanitary conditions have enormous effects on pregnant mothers, leading to low birth weights and poor health for babies. Babies whose birth weight is less than about 4 pounds are much more likely to have seizures, mental retardation, heart problems, asthma, blindness, deafness, and learning disabilities. The presence of large quantities of drugs in these inner city neighborhoods greatly increases the likelihood of birth defects in children.
Conclusion
Social problems and conflicts are indigenous to human culture. However, all of these factors operate to dramatically reduce the likelihood of inner-city Americans being able to move out of these neighborhoods and adapt to mainstream American life. Therefore, social problems of this magnitude must be considered the responsibility of all Americans.
References
Macionis, J. (2008). Social problems (3rd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.© 2010. Grand Canyon University. All Rights Reserved.