1.  If there can be said to be a unified ‘classical’ perspective in criminology associated with theorists such as Beccaria and Bentham, what might be its core or central belief about crime?

2. What were the socio-economic, political and cultural factors underscoring the emergence of these classic ideas in criminology?

3. What are the main criticisms of classical theory?

4. Consider the relevance of classical theory in contemporary Britain:
a. Do we have a classical system of justice?
b. Do criminologists still utilise the ‘doctrine of free will’?

5. Finally (without using the internet) can you find out where Jeremy Bentham is today?

Biological positivism
1. How did the early theories of crime distinguish between criminals and non-criminals?

2. What other biological explanations of crime have been proposed?

3. What crimes do you think may be linked to biological factors; consider:
a. What behavioural traits are connected with crime?
b. What type of crime has biological theory tended to focus on?
c. What type of crime has been associated with biological factors in popular discourse?

4. What are the dangers of accepting biological explanations of crime when it comes to preventing crime?

Psychological explanations
Psychological explanations have a long history, ranging from crude psychological positivism to the more developed and influential ideas today.  But generally:

1. What have psychologists contributed to our understanding of offending behaviour?

2. Personality traits are persisting underlying tendencies to act in certain ways in particular situations. It has been suggested by psychologists that an individual’s personality traits may shape how people perceive their world.  What sort of traits might we suggest criminals may have?  How would you describe your personality?

3. Some branches of psychological criminology suggest crime is inherited genetically, others that it is learned behaviour.  Is the exposure to offending behaviour equal across society or are some groups more likely than others to acquire criminal behaviours?  Which groups of people may be particularly susceptible to learned or inherited criminality?

4. Does psychology provide adequate explanations for crime, or simply describe the facets of some criminals ex post facto?

Conflict theories
Conflict theories draw attention to power differentials, such as class conflict, and are rooted particularly to ideas of radical thinkers often associated with Marxist ideas; but:

1. Is it fair to claim that conflict theories explain crime by going beyond the mere fact of blocked opportunity to try to explain why that blockage exists?

2. How and where in contemporary society might conflict theories be relevant?

3. Is it fair to suggest that ‘crime’ in any specific society or historical period will reflect the political, economic and cultural interests of the dominant social elite?

Feminist perspectives
The feminist school of criminology is a school of criminology developed in the late 1960s and into the 1970s as a reaction to the perceived general disregard and discrimination of women in the traditional study of crime. Proponents assert that the patriarchal domination of the field of criminology has led to the field being inherently biased and androcentric. This, they argue, leads mainstream criminology to either generalise or ignore criminological inquiry relevant to women in an effort to support the male dominated status quo.

1. Is patriarchy still an issue in contemporary society, and is it an issue in the criminal justice system specifically?

2. Has women’s liberation caused an increase in crime?

3. Some feminist criminologists advocate prevention and treatment rather than punitive responses to crime for women, because they are more amenable to rehabilitative strategies. Should this ‘amenability’ be a factor in determining the criminal justice sanctions that women are given?

Social disorganization
Developed by the Chicago School, and related to ecological theories, social disorganization theory suggested a linking between neighbourhood ecological characteristics and crime. But consider: 

1. A core principle of social disorganization theory is that place matters – i.e., one's residential location – as much or more than one's individual characteristics (age, gender, race) in shaping the likelihood that a person will become involved in illegal activities, but can these factors be easily separated?

2. Is it true that inner city areas where poorer populations reside are communities characterised by weakened social stability?

Strain/status frustration
Strain and status frustration have long been regarded as having an explanatory power linking the social and psychological factors that might influence individuals towards particular criminal acts, but consider:

1. What is status frustration and where does it come from?

2. How is it different to ‘strain’

3. What is the importance of ‘goals’ in contemporary society?

4. Which do you think is the most successful of the strain/status frustration theories?     

Neutralization
The idea of neutralization emerged to counter the then prevailing criminological wisdom that offenders engage in crime because they adhere to an oppositional subcultural rule set that values law breaking and violence, but:

1. Is there evidence that offenders may hold different values to mainstream society?

2. Do offenders simply develop techniques to neutralise their qualms regarding offending after they actually commit the offence as ex post facto justifications?

3. Which technique/techniques of neutralization may be said to apply to the following statements:

1. ‘It wasn't my fault, what else could I do when put in that situation?’
2. ‘Insurance companies are the biggest thieves going, and everyone ups their claim a bit.’
3. ‘Only God can judge me, who are you to say what is right or wrong?’
4. ‘Where I come from, you stand by your friends, you look after them.’
5. ‘Are you telling me you have never taken drugs, you are just a hypocrite.’

Drift
Matza's concept of drift is based on the idea that individuals drift at will between law-abiding and criminal behaviour and are never committed entirely to one type of behaviour, but:

1. Can you think of any crimes or behaviours that might stand contrary to this position?

2. Matza suggests that the fact that offenders often express regret and remorse when confronted with their crimes and its consequences suggests that they are not opposed to society's values and norms; is this fair conclusion?

3. What is the empirical evidence that people do simply drift in and out of criminality?

Control theory
Control theorists generally argue that there is no problem explaining why people commit crime since all human beings suffer from innate human weaknesses which make them unable to resist temptation.

1. Is this true?

2. Is control theory also somewhat tautological, in that the only way to determine if people have low self-control is to see if they engage in criminal behaviour?

Labelling/interactionist/new deviancy theories
Labelling theories suggest that labels applied to deviant and criminal behaviour are socially damaging, but:

1. Where do labels come from?

2. Labelling theorists question the nature of deviance by asking if there really is a difference between deviants and the supposedly normal. However, if normality is questioned, and if we cannot describe normality, then how can we define deviance?

Administrative criminology
Administrative criminology was a term coined by Jock Young to describe a body of criminological works, but:

1. What constitutes administrative criminology and what can be said to be the central features of this perspective?

2. Is it truly fair to suggest that administrative criminologists have no concern with what causes criminal behaviour?

Routine activity theory
At the heart of routine activity theory is the idea that in the absence of effective controls, offenders will prey upon attractive targets. 

1. Can you think of examples of crime that may seem to confound this notion?

2. Rational choice and routine activities theory both hold that crime rates are a product of criminal opportunity. It is arguable that there is now a greater abundance of opportunity to commit crime than ever before, yet the crime rate does not seem to be rising. Does this suggest a problem with the theory?

3. If offenders are rational and calculating as routine activity theorists suggest, why have deterrent sentencing strategies’ seemingly not yielded successful results in terms of lowering crime? 

Experimental criminology
Experimental is an important new and emergent strand of criminology, which again brings to the fore questions about the links between academic knowledge and criminal justice policy and praxis, but:

1. To what extent do experimental criminologists believe in and pursue a working relationship with policymakers where there is a clear division of labour?

2. What are the moral and ethical dangers inherent in believing that it is not the criminologist’s job to advocate for particular policies but only to advise policymakers about which of their programmes are effective?

Peacemaking criminology
Peacemaking criminology is a non-violent movement against oppression, social injustice and violence in criminology, but:

1. Do we need to fight a ‘war on crime’?

2. Does the criminal justice system simply successfully vindicate socially harmful and damaging retorts to ‘criminal behaviour’?

Cultural criminology
Cultural criminology is a perspective that seeks to understand crime and study it in the context of its culture. It views both crime and criminal justice and control agencies as cultural products, but:

1. What do we understand by the term ‘culture’?

2. Is it fair to suggest that the ‘seductions’ of crime were for too long misunderstood or ill-considered?

3. Is cultural criminology a useful explanation of criminal behaviour in contemporary society?

Green and environmental criminology
Green criminology is the analysis of environmental harms from a criminological perspective, or the application of criminological thought to environmental issues.

1.  Is the environment really a criminological issue?

2. Can other perspectives explain environmental crime?

3. Do we need a new green perspective?

4. How harmful is environmental crime?

Convict criminology
The ‘New School of Convict Criminology’ is a relatively new and controversial perspective in the field of corrections and the academic field of criminology. It challenges the way crime and correctional problems are traditionally represented and discussed, but:

1. How useful is inside knowledge when it comes to understanding criminal justice issues?

2. Is the term ‘convict criminology’ in itself potentially stigmatizing and problematic?

3. How successful will this perspective be in challenging the way crime and correctional problems are traditionally represented; what are the problems it will likely encounter?

Postmodern and late-modern criminology
In criminology there is not so much a postmodernist or late modernist  School, but rather a broad range of works that set to understand crime in view of postmodernism or ideas about late modernity, but:

1. What are the differences between the terms postmodernity and late modernity?

2. Which term do you think is the better descriptor?

3. To what extent are the conditions of society today unique or different to those of different epochs?

4. Is it important that the study of crime and criminals takes account of these ideas?

Comparative criminology
Comparative criminology is the study of the social phenomenon of crime across cultures, which serves to identify both differences and similarities in crime, crime patterns and crime control practices, but:

1. Is comparative criminology just a new buzz term?

2. What useful knowledge and ideas have been borne out of comparative criminology?

3. Are there places that western criminology does not adequately understand when it comes to conceptions and understandings of crime?

Psychosocial criminology
A psychosocial strand of criminology has emerged in recent years, which explores crime empirically and theoretically through analysis and Freudian perspectives fused with sociological understanding, but:

1. Should the psycho in psychosocial criminology draw from Freudian perspectives rather than other psychological ideas?

2. These essential psychosocial processes contextualise criminality within the lived experience of the offender, but what are the problems with making judgments on other peoples lived experiences?

3. Does the psychosocial approach provide a stable theoretical foundation on which to build effective treatment or intervention strategies’ in criminal justice?

Crime science
Crime science claims to be simply the study of crime in order to find ways to prevent it, but:

1. Can it be argued that crime science not only offers a superficial and irrelevant response to crime, it also makes society worse by diverting government resources away from addressing the social inequality at the centre of the crime problem?

2. Is crime ‘science’ scientific at all, or just a way for criminologists to make statements of the obvious?

3. What do you think to the idea that crime can be designed out?