Essay on Right Realism
Using material from Item A and elsewhere, assess the value of the right realist approach to crime and deviance.
Realist approaches to crime are alternatives to the Marxist and Interactionist approaches, which in realists eyes both seemed to be unable to generate ideas that could lead to reducing levels of crime. Marxists tended to see property crime as a justified attempt to redistribute wealth, whereas Interactionists saw criminals as different from non-criminals only in that they had acquired the label ‘criminal.’ Realists tried to counter these tendencies by focusing on the reality of crime, its consequences on the victims and the need to do something about it. Realist approaches to the study of crime emerged in the 1980s as a response to what Rock called a “theory bottleneck.” Two versions of realist theory have been developed, left and right realism. Both reflect different political perspectives, with right realism going together with Conservative views and particularly those of the New Right. It is important how realist theories and right realism emerged in the 1980s as this is when the ‘New Right’ really came to prominence with Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative Government. They believed in privatisation and weren’t fans of the welfare state, which is also one of the reasons right realists use as the cause of crime.
The Sociologist Charles Murray had the theory that there was an “underclass”, a significant group at the bottom of society who were too dependent on the welfare state. Murray blames the welfare state as being one of the causes of crime because it creates a dependency culture, and people prefer to ‘scrounge’ off the state rather than get a job. Therefore they have a lot more time to commit crime, as well as the idea that the “underclass” will develop certain values that may cause them to want to commit crime. Murray further argued that the underclass was comprised of “fatherless families”, with boys growing up without suitable male role models
Realist approaches to crime are alternatives to the Marxist and Interactionist approaches, which in realists eyes both seemed to be unable to generate ideas that could lead to reducing levels of crime. Marxists tended to see property crime as a justified attempt to redistribute wealth, whereas Interactionists saw criminals as different from non-criminals only in that they had acquired the label ‘criminal.’ Realists tried to counter these tendencies by focusing on the reality of crime, its consequences on the victims and the need to do something about it. Realist approaches to the study of crime emerged in the 1980s as a response to what Rock called a “theory bottleneck.” Two versions of realist theory have been developed, left and right realism. Both reflect different political perspectives, with right realism going together with Conservative views and particularly those of the New Right. It is important how realist theories and right realism emerged in the 1980s as this is when the ‘New Right’ really came to prominence with Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative Government. They believed in privatisation and weren’t fans of the welfare state, which is also one of the reasons right realists use as the cause of crime.
The Sociologist Charles Murray had the theory that there was an “underclass”, a significant group at the bottom of society who were too dependent on the welfare state. Murray blames the welfare state as being one of the causes of crime because it creates a dependency culture, and people prefer to ‘scrounge’ off the state rather than get a job. Therefore they have a lot more time to commit crime, as well as the idea that the “underclass” will develop certain values that may cause them to want to commit crime. Murray further argued that the underclass was comprised of “fatherless families”, with boys growing up without suitable male role models