1.2 What Is Criminology?
“Trying to understand the behavior of some people is like trying to smell the color 9.”
Janis Ian, activist and singer/songwriter
Criminology can be described as trying to understand people’s behavior as it relates to crime. Janis Ian’s quote humorously shows how challenging that can be. Still, it is this effort that sets criminology apart from criminal justice in terms of focus, approach, and perspective.
First, what is criminology exactly? Criminology is the study of crime and why it happens. It considers individual factors and societal factors to better understand what drives someone to commit a crime. Once we, as a society, understand the why, we can address that cause and stop it in its tracks. With this goal in mind, criminologists look at crime from many perspectives—psychological, sociological, economic, political, biological, and more.
We can see criminology in action when criminologists attempt to break down why there has been an increase in violent crime since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, specifically gun violence in Portland, Oregon, as described in the Chapter Overview. Criminologists are looking at what happened during the pandemic to figure out what caused the increase in crime, what the impacts of the crimes were, and what needs to change based on what they learn. Again, they do this with the belief that if they know why crime is happening, they can figure out how to prevent it.
1.2.1 Criminology and Criminal Justice Perspectives
Edwin Sutherland, one originator of this approach to understanding crime, explained criminology as the scientific study of breaking the law, making the law, and society’s reaction to those who break the law (1934). With a focus on crime and law, how is criminology different from criminal justice?
In the simplest terms, criminal justice is the what and criminology is the why. Criminal justice is the system that deals with crime and its consequences. It is made up of the three Cs—cops, courts, and corrections. Although the criminal justice system is essential for addressing crime, it is not set up for analyzing and addressing why the crime occurred in the first place. Rather, the criminal justice system is tasked with addressing the crime itself through law enforcement, the courts, and corrections.
Criminology, on the other hand, focuses on understanding crime. It is important for criminal justice and criminology to work hand in hand to have a positive impact on public safety, which is the goal of both areas and everyone involved in these fields. From the criminal justice perspective, when we talk about why, we are often talking about motive. However, from the criminology perspective, when we talk about why, we are talking about causes.
Let’s go back to the example in the Chapter Overview to see how the same phenomenon of an increase in gun violence in Portland is looked at differently through a criminal justice lens versus a criminology lens. In figure 1.2, the column on the left, Criminal Justice Perspective, lists several potential reasons those in law enforcement, the courts, and others focused on addressing crime may consider. The column on the right, Criminology Perspective, lists several potential reasons someone analyzing why this crime is happening in the first place may consider. As you can see, there is no simple answer on either side.
|
Explanations for the Increase in Gun Violence |
|
|---|---|
|
Criminal Justice Perspective |
Criminology Perspective |
|
Budget cuts to police department during pandemic |
Kids out of school which may have been their source of safety and guidance |
|
Dealing with protests downtown after the killing of George Floyd took full resources (no patrols in other areas) |
Unsafe homes made worse during pandemic (increased intimate partner violence and child abuse) |
|
High burnout and resignation rate of Portland Police Bureau officers following summer protests |
No escape from bad situations, so more kids went to the streets and did so in pain |
|
Defund the Police movement and negative press turned community against law enforcement |
Many kids in neighborhood were in the same tough situation (ideal conditions for street gangs to form or grow) |
|
Gun Violence Reduction Team was disbanded |
Economic distress, high unemployment, extreme strain on low-income communities |
|
Law enforcement could no longer adequately police neighborhoods and without this control, crime spread and escalated |
Lack of enough resources caused competing over those limited resources or anything that could be claimed as their own |
Figure 1.2. Criminal Justice and Criminology Perspectives on the Increase in Gun Violence in Portland, Oregon during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Consider how these different perspectives could lead to different attempts at solutions. What action might someone in a leadership position decide to take if they believe the cause of the increased gun violence in Portland is due to budget cuts in the police department? Compare this to the action they might take if they believe the cause is a lack of a safe place for teenagers to hang out in neighborhoods where gun violence is the highest.
Criminologists base their understanding of causes for crime on existing theories in psychology, sociology, economics, politics, and biology. Then they create new theories with the goal of painting an even clearer picture. We will discuss what it takes to create a theory and what that process looks like in the next section.