Definition Of Crime Sociology

A crime is defined as any act that is contrary to legal code or laws.

Definition of crime sociology. The study of crime and deviance is a large subfield within sociology with much attention paid to who commits which types of crimes and why. Some deviant behaviors are considered so harmful by a society that they are considered a crime. Sociology also studies social status or stratification social movements and social change as well as societal disorder in the form of crime deviance and revolution. Criminalization is a procedure deployed by society as a pre emptive harm reduction device using the threat of punishment as a deterrent to anyone proposing to engage in the behavior causing harm.

Crime is deviant behavior that breaks a law and is punishable using legally codified sanctions. Crime is a particular kind of deviant behavior that entails breaking laws. Historically the nazi genocide is the most obvious example. Social life overwhelmingly regulates the behaviour of humans largely because humans lack the instincts that guide most animal behaviour.

There are many different types of crimes from crimes against persons to victimless crimes and violent crimes to white collar crimes. The sociology of crime criminology is the study of the making breaking and enforcing of criminal laws. In 2017 for example it was found that the murder rate increased by 26 and knife crime increased by 20 meaning more of these crimes were present in society. A simple explanation is that state crimes are crimes committed by governments which are in breach of human rights.

In sociology a normative definition views crime as deviant behavior that violates prevailing norms or cultural standards prescribing how humans ought to behave normally. An individual who commits a crime is called a noun criminal and when something is declared illegal it is verb criminalized also called illegalized and when the law changes making something no longer a crime it is verb decriminalized also called legalized. Deviance and social norms vary among societies communities and times and often sociologists are interested in why these differences exist and how these differences impact the individuals and groups in those areas. The crime rate is data taken from official police statistics revealing the number of crimes committed per 1 000 individuals in the population crime rates tend to be broken down into rates for each category of crime e g.

Sociologists who study deviance and crime examine cultural norms how they change over time how they are enforced and what happens to individuals and societies when norms are broken.