Criminology - Theory Understanding Crime Essay

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Certainly, the reason that some individuals become criminals has to do with biological predisposition, particularly in the case of many crimes of violence. On the other hand, circumstances, greed, desperation, and opportunity also play an undeniable role in many crimes. Social class and exposure to deviant subcultures also contributes to criminal behavior (Henslin, 2002; Macionis, 2003), but even so, those risk factors do not affect everyone the same; therefore, those approaches also fail to explain crime in many cases (Henslin, 2002; Macionis, 2003).

In some ways, the recent occurrences involving Bernard Madoff and several other high profile white collar criminals do not seem to fit any of the traditional criminological theories other than rational choice and possibly psychological disorder.

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These perpetrators were already the recipients of the considerable benefits of social class and opportunity and were already wealthy even by contemporary American definitions of wealth before resorting to crime to accumulate even greater wealth. Likewise, the collapse of the U.S. housing market because of widespread fraud in the mortgage and loan industry also seems to defy traditional theories about crime other than the convergence of motive and opportunity. Ultimately, crime may simply be a function of the inherent selfishness and free will of man and a comprehensive theory of crime nothing more than a cataloging of all the common manifestations of that selfishness......

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