Theoretical Criminology

Left realism criminology is the realistic in its entire appraisal to the crime itself and its causes. It is radical since in a crime, it is often viewed as an endemic product. Crime is not considered to be an abnormality product but is considered to be a normal working of a social disorder. In left realism, the central tenet is the reflection of the crime reality which is based on its origin, the nature and also its potential impacts. Realism is believed to involve the practice of the notion in being able to answer what is answerable and also what can be able to be done about all the crime problems and the social control.

The origin of left realism was in Britain where it emerged in the early 1980s as a law and order politics reaction and it was perceived to having being a vacuum in the radical left thinking on the real crime and the control of the crime. The theory of the left realism was originally generated by Jock Young in 1988 where the main aim of the left realism was to be able to avoid what was usually seen as being the worst excesses of both the left idealist and the right idealist approaches to the crime problem which is commonly found in the modern society of today.

The right realism was often accused of both the distortion and the dramatization of the problem nature with a sick society talk, crime rates which are out of control and an increase in the moral decay. The left realism on the other hand, was accused of neglecting the crime by not taking the crime seriously by reducing the crime into an ideological distortion on the behalf of the state, where the crime which is committed by the people who are in the working class against other people of the same class is viewed as being a first order problem because of its growing impact on the working class communities and the society as a whole.

Explain the left realist position on:- a) increase in crime, and b) relative deprivation as a cause of crime.

The position of the left realism on the increase in crime is that they see that crime is usually understood in the terms of its relationship between the four common known elements which are the society or the public, the state and its agencies, the victim, and the offender. They believe that crime is socially constructed and the social factors are responsible for what is considered to be criminal which explains the increase in crime.

In relative deprivation, the left realism, it is believed that the Caribbean men who are young are have been at a greater risk of criminalization between the 1980s and the 1990s which proved that this explanation was more of a relative deprivation because there was lacking a fit in what they felt should have been expected in the terms of material awards and jobs. This led to high levels of unemployment to the Caribbean men and if they got employed, they were paid very poorly because of the opportunities which were blocked from them and the existing racial discrimination. This relative deprivation could be a cause to the increase in the street crime and also the increase in the public disorder in the working class of the young Caribbean men in the inner city.

Explain left realism's links with subcultural theory.

Subcultures are often seen as being adaptations which are creative due to the changing of the historical circumstances and also the changing of materials. The left realism therefore characterizes this criminal adaptation as being a part of the adaptation series of the individuals which help in the promotion of the hard individual notion. Subcultures is seen as a source of a collective solution which could help in the solving of a group’s problems and therefore could come in hand to help out a group of individuals who shared a relative deprivation because it would motivate and encourage them to join the lifestyles which could help them to be able to cope up with the problem that they are facing.

What is the left realist position on race and crime? What explanation is given for the disproportionate number of black offenders in custody? Do you agree with this explanation?

The left realistic approach on race and crime is that due to the relative deprivation, crime has been associated with the poverty stricken areas where like for example in the United States of America, the people who live in the poverty stricken areas are mainly the blacks and in most cases the rates of unemployment is very high in these areas which makes the residents to involve themselves in crime. This has been very evident in the United States prisons where the number of the black offenders who are in custody is very high as compared to the white offenders in custody. These numbers of the black offenders has been seen to be increasing at a very high rate and most of the offenders come from very poor backgrounds.

To some extent I agree with this explanation because the black people who live in the slums find life to be very difficult and they have to survive in one way or the other and they don’t have jobs since they are not given jobs because of their race, so they end up in a criminal life and not because they wanted to be criminals but they have no way out because they have to find a living.

Are marginality and relative deprivation class or race issues, or both?

The marginal groups are the groups which do not have any organization which can represent them when it comes to political issues and the political life and these groups also do not have goals which are well defined. These marginal groups are more prone to riots and violence as a result of political actions. Both the marginality and deprivation are both class and racial issues. The main reason as to why they are both racial and class issues is that they bring about the division of the society which could lead to an increase in the criminology since some people in the society are favored while others are not favored.

What are seen as the problems of military style policing? What impact, is it claimed, would police accountability to local authorities have on crime control?

The police should try as much as possible so as to be able to fight the crime which is prevailing in the community by improving the relationships within the community so as to be able to trigger the free flow of information by the use of minimal policing since there and areas which are over-policed while others are under-policed. The problems that the military policing is experiencing is that they are losing the fight against the rising crime since they lack the information which is needed and essential in solving the crime.

The police should try to come up with new methods which could assist them to fight the crime like the adaption of new policing methods. The police without the support from the community, they would be forced to using tactics like the searching of very large numbers of people in a small area so as to be able to find the suspects which can be very tiring and time consuming. This searching of the people could lead to the mobilization of the bystanders which could cause unrest.

Explain the left realist multi-agency approach to crime reduction.

The left realistic multi agency approach to crime reduction has been done through the use of the multi-agency partnerships so as to be able to come up with strategies which could help in the cutting of the criminology in many states. This strategy involves the local governance agencies like the education, health, telephones, communication, and many others, these partnerships were created under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 so as to be able to meet all the training needs of all the officials who were to be involved in these crime reduction partnerships which had been established in the New York City.

In the crime prevention there was scheduled to be the identification of the targets for crime and proper action was to be taken so as to be able to deter the potential offenders, there was the general disruption of the crimes as they happened, there was the prevention of further crime, and the harm was limited like the stopping the further use of a credit card which was stolen. This multi-agency crime prevention was coordinated by the local authorities

What has been the contribution of left realism to criminological theory and to empirical enquiry about crime? What criticisms have been made of the left realist approach?

The contribution to of the left realism to criminological theory and to the empirical enquiry about crime is that of the square of crime by the expansion of the of all the basic relation triangles which is one of the subject matters in criminology are the offender, the state, and the victim. Where it stated that if there was any change in the four factors would end up affecting the crime rate and the crime could not be explained in the terms of the crime control agencies and that the agencies who were involved in the crime control were wider that the whole of the entire criminal justice system.

Criminal offenses are the main challenge in the social well-being of any population. Coming up with effective sentencing goes a long way in ensuring that crime offenders are given an appropriate sentence and that the harm caused by the crime is well recognized, to both the offended and the society as a whole. Most important, the sentences should be aimed at correcting and empowering the offenders so as to make them important and productive members of the society.

The criticisms that have been made about the left realistic approach is that it led to a divided society through the marginalization and racial discrimination since there is no explanation to the fighting of a crime with another crime at hand like the victimization of a victim where the police and the agency’s stigmatize the victims and the willingness of the community at large to report a crime to the police becomes affected which could lead to an increase in the crime rate. The key criticism leveled against the left realistic approach is its focus on the economic deprivation which only gives an explanation to the economic crime but fails to give an explanation for all the other manifestations of the prevalent behaviors in the society.