Social Class and Crime Routledge Advances in Criminology

Social Class and Crime Routledge Advances in Criminology 1. Family Life and Youth Offending Home Is Where the Hurt Is Raymond Arthur 2. China’s Death Penalty History, Law, and Contemporary Practices Hong Lu and Terance D. Miethe 3. The Politics of Antisocial Behaviour Amoral Panics Stuart Waiton 4. Hooked Drug War Films in Britain, Canada, and the United States Susan C. Boyd 5. The Violence of Incarceration Edited by Phil Scraton and Jude McCulloch 6. Violence, Prejudice and Sexuality Stephen Tomsen 7. Biology and Criminology The Biosocial Synthesis Anthony Walsh 8. Global Gambling Cultural Perspectives on Gambling Organizations Edited by Sytze F. Kingma 9. Social Class and Crime A Biosocial Approach Anthony Walsh Social Class and Crime A Biosocial Approach Anthony Walsh New York London First published 2011 by Routledge 270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 Simultaneously published in the UK by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2010. To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk. © 2011 Taylor & Francis The right of Anthony Walsh to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereaf- ter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Walsh, Anthony, 1941– Social class and crime : a biosocial approach / by Anthony Walsh. — 1st ed. p. cm.—(Routledge advances in criminology ; 9) Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Criminology. 2. Criminal behavior—Social aspects. 3. Criminal behavior— Genetic aspects. 4. Sociobiology. 5. Social classes. I. Title. HV6025.W3657 2010 364.2'5—dc22 2010008524 ISBN 0-203-84424-6 Master e-book ISBN ISBN13: 978-0-415-88347-4 (hbk) ISBN13: 978-0-203-84424-3 (ebk) This book is dedicated to my wife, Grace, my parents Lawrence and Winifred, my sons Robert and Michael, stepdaughters Heidi and Kasey, and my grandchildren, Robbie, Ryan, Mikey, Randy, Christopher, Stevie, Ashlyn, and Morgan, and my great-granddaughter Kaelyn. Contents Preface ix Acknowledgments xiii 1 The Biosocial Approach 1 2 Genes, Environments and Behavior 13 3 Evolutionary Psychology, Crime and Status 26 4 The Neurosciences, Conscience and the Soft-Wired Brain 39 5 Social Class and Criminal Behavior: Myth or Reality? 52 6 The Class-Crime Relationship in Criminological Theories 65 7 Social Class and Socialization 77 8 Poverty, Crime and Developmental Neurobiology 90 9 Social Stratifi cation, the Genome, and Social Structure 103 10 The Nature and Nurture of Intelligence 116 11 Class Mobility: Ascription or Achievement? 128 Epilogue 140 References 143 Index 163 Preface Social class has been at the forefront of sociological theories of crime and criminal behavior from their inception. Indeed, one would be hard pressed to think of a theory in which class is not explicitly central to the theory (anomie/strain theory) or nipping aggressively at its periphery (social con- trol theory). However, none of these theories engage in a systematic explo- ration of what social class is and how individuals come to be on one rung of the class ladder rather than another. If these questions were to be explored in depth perhaps the class-crime relationship would become clear. That is, rather than simply adding class as a covariate to our causal models as if class itself required no explanation, perhaps the same factors that help to determine a person’s class level also help to determine that person’s risk for committing criminal acts. This book is about the “causal” factors shared by class attainment and criminal activities. Of course, this requires reducing sociology’s “master variable” to a lower level analysis, which is stoutly resisted by many traditional sociolo- gists, and by extension, criminologists, since the vast majority of them are sociologically trained (Cooper, Walsh, and Ellis 2010). While most criminologists would probably agree in the abstract that criminology is inher- ently interdisciplinary, in practice they tend to ignore any perspective other than the one they were trained in, and with which they have become com- fortable. They are particularly likely to ignore biology because they see it as deep, mysterious, and even racist, sexist, and other infuriating names one person calls another person’s position to silence him or her. There is a growing cadre of criminologists today, however, who argue that the causes of criminal behavior should be sought at many levels as long as each level is part of a coherent and mutually reinforcing whole. Chapter 1 introduces the reader to the biosocial approach, an approach that integrates insights from multiple biological and socio-cultural disci- plines. It is not a biological approach to human behavior because such an approach is not possible. It is called a biosocial approach because of the realization that all human behavior is the result of the complex interaction of nature and nurture over the life course. The biosocial approach is x Preface an extremely robust approach. As eminent Canadian philosopher of sci- ence Ian Hacking has characterized it: “‘Biosocial’ is a new word, but its pedigree, although brief, is the best” (2006: 81). The chapter looks at the major assumptions of biosocial theory (there is a human nature, it is both reductionist and holistic, it is developmental, and it eschews ideology), and briefl y introduces the three major divisions of biosocial criminology (genetics, evolutionary psychology, and the neurohormonal sciences). Chapter 2 takes a brief look at concepts and methods of behavior genetics, molecular genetics, and epigenetics. Few scientists today ask whether genes affect behavior; they ask how they do. Twin and adoption study designs that allow geneticists to separate genetic from environmental affects are explored, and then the genetic infl uences on criminality are examined using the concepts of gene x environment interaction and gene/environment correlation. The changing affects of genes in different environments and on personality and behavior over the lifespan are also explored. I then explore how molecular genetics is having an impact in criminology through studies of various genetic polymorphisms. I end the chapter with a look at epigenetics, a branch of genetics that studies how environmental experiences may be captured by the genome without altering the DNA sequence. The more we know about genetic effects on behavior, the more we know about environmental effects. Chapter 3 examines what evolutionary psychology has to say about status seeking and criminal behavior. Evolutionary approaches are fundamen- tally environmental in that they describe how environments have shaped the behavior of organisms by natural selection as they strategically adapt to their environments. Altruism and empathy are addressed as polar opposites of criminality, as is parenting effort versus mating effort. Traits (aggression, deception, low empathy, etc.) that lead to behaviors we now call criminal evolved to aid mating effort, not to aid criminality, but once in place they are useful in that regard. Similarly, traits that evolved to foster parenting effort such as empathy and altruism, also foster prosocial behavior. The relationship between violence, status, and reproductive success is also discussed. Finally, the importance of the family as the nursery of human nature is examined as a species-expected adaptation. Chapter 4 looks at the contributions to the neurosciences to understand- ing criminal behavior. It is emphasized that although the brain has many assumptions built into it over eons of evolutionary time (it is no tabula rasa), it physically “captures” the environment as it wires itself in response to it. This experience-dependent wiring is explored in terms of early expo- sure to violence. Conscience is a concept rarely addressed by sociological criminologists, but it has obvious importance in terms of the probability of committing or not committing crimes. Thus I examine the neurobiology of conscience as emotions interact with lessons learned to form it. I conclude the chapter with an examination of the concept of the “craving brain” and a brief look at prefrontal dysfunction theory. Preface xi Chapter 5 looks at whether the class-crime relationship is real or a myth, as some criminologists have maintained (Tittle, Villemez, and Smith 1978). I consider this issue by looking at the strengths and weaknesses of self- report data, at ecological data, and at offi cial police and victimization data and conclude that an inverse class-crime relationship is very real. I then address the issue of white-collar crime and how it coheres with the class- crime relationship. How different white-collar criminals are from street criminals and how biosocial criminologists explain occupational and corporate white-collar crimes conclude the chapter. Chapter 6 examines Charles Tittle’s (1983) contention that criminological theories that posit a negative class-crime relationship do not provide adequate theoretical rationales for doing so, and that they only do so by assuming that lower-class individuals have negative characteristics that lead them to crime. I look at this criticism with respect to the theories Tittle himself examined—anomie strain theory and its extensions, Walter Mill- er’s focal concerns, the Chicago school of ecology, differential association, Marxist/confl ict theories, utilitarian/deterrence theories, and social con- trol.

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