Critique of Marxist Criminology (From Crime and Justice - An Annual Review of Research - Volume 2, P 159-210, Norval Morris and Michael Tonry, ed. - See NCJ-74239)

• NCJ Number: 74240
• Author(s): R F Sparks
• Date Published: 1980
• Length: 52 pages
• Sale Source: University of Chicago Press
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This article critically examines the Marxist theory of criminology as it applies to problems about the origins, nature, and enforcement of criminal law; the intellectual origins, central tenets, and some work of Marxist scholars are described.

Abstract

Within the past few years, a Marxist school of criminology has developed in England and the U.S. In both countries, this school arose in part because of a dissatisfaction with 'mainstream' criminology; especially in the U.S., political radicalism provoked by the turmoil of the sixties also played a part. The theoretical antecedents of Marxist criminology include 'labeling' and 'conflict' theories of crime and the origins of the criminal law. Although its writings to date have been marred by vacuous rhetoric and polemic, the Marxist school has usefully called attention to a number of important questions, in particular questions concerning the relations between social structures and economic systems and the criminalization of certain forms of behavior. To date, relatively little empirical research has been done by Marxist criminologists; much of the important scholarly writing on crime from a Marxist perspective has been done by social historians. Marxist criminologists tend to be committed to practical applications and a desire for radical social reform; but this commitment is not imposed by the scientific claims which Marxists make, and it has sometimes led to those claims being impropeerly suspect. Marxists claim both that the criminal law is affected by the social relations of production in capitalist societies, and that the criminal law is an instrument by which capitalist social order is maintained. Although there is some truth in each of these propositions, each needs to be qualified. There are signs that Marxist criminology may be moving toward something nearer to what Marx himself wrote. Marx himself did not assert that the legal and political superstructure of society is determined by its economic base as some have recently argued. It remains to be seen what effect this trend will have on Marxist theories of crime and crime control. Over 35 footnotes and 113 references are provided. (Author abstract modified).