232   Part VI * Varieties af Control Theory \A\sj^f)\ t QsC^i
theories-are not empirically viable however, is mistaken (Akers, 2000; Krohn, 2000). A further limitation is that Birschis approach is largely astructural and aliistoricat Unlike Shaw and McKay (Chapter 8), he does not examine how macrosocial changes oc earring in the United States affect the strength of social bonds for people located in different sectors of American society (see also Sampson and Wilson, 1995 [Chapter 9 in this volume]; see also, Sampson and Laub, 1994).
References
Agnew, Robert. 1985. "Social Control Theory and Delinquency: A Longitudinal Test." Criminology 23:47-61.
Akers, Ronald L. 2000. Criminological Thearies: Introduction and Evaluation, 3rd edition. Los Angeles: Roxbury.
Costello, Barbara J. and Paul R. Vowell. 1999. "Testing Control Theory and Differential Association: A Reanalysis of the Richmond Youth Project Data." Criminology 37: 815-842.
Hirschi, Travis. 1969. Causes of Delinquency. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Kempf, Kimberly L. 1993. 'The Empirical Status of Hirschi's Control Theory." In Freda Adler and William S. Laufer (eds.), New Directions in Criminological Theory: Advances in Criminological Theory, Volume 4, pp. 143-185. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction.
Krohn, Marvin. 2000. "Control and Deterrence Theories of Criminality." In Joseph F, Sheiey (ed.), Criminology: A Contemporary Handbook, 3rd edition, pp. 372-399. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Sampson, Robert J. and John H. Laub. 1993. Crime in the Making: Pathways and Turning Points Through Life. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
-. 1994. "Urban Poverty and the Family Context of Delinquency: A New Look at Structure and Process in a Classic Study." Child Development 65: 523-540.
Sampson, Robert J. and William Julius Wilson. 1995. "Toward a Theory of Race, Crime, and Urban Inequality," In John Hagan and Ruth D. Peterson (eds.), Crime and Inequality, pp. 36-54. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Three fundamental perspectives on delini quency and deviant behavior dominate ths current scene. According to strain or moti. vational theories, legitimate desires thai-conformity cannot satisfy force a persor, into deviance. According to control or boni theories, a person is free to commit delini quent acts because his ties to the convem tional order have somehow been broken; According to cultural deviance theories, the deviant conforms to a set of standards noe accepted by a larger or more powerful socji ety. Although most current theories of crime and delinquency contain elements of af least two and occasionally all three of these perspectives, reconciliation of their as-; sumptions is very difficult. If, as the control theorist assumes, the ties of many persons to the conventional order may be weak or virtually nonexistent, the strain theorist, lit accounting for their deviance, builds into; his explanation pressure that is unnecessary. If, on the other hand, it is reasonable to assume with the strain theorist that everyone is at some point strongly tied to the conventional system, then it is unreasonable to. assume that many are not (control theories), or that many are tied to different "conventional" systems (cultural deviance theories). ...
Control theories assume that delinquent acts result when an individuals bond to society is weak orbroken. Since these theories: embrace two highly complex concepts, the: bond of the individual to society, it is not surprising that they have at one time or another formed the basis of explanations of; most forms of aberrant or unusual behavior. It is also not surprising that control theories have described the elements of the; bond to society in many ways, and that they > have focused on a variety of units as the point of control....
Elements of the Bond
Attachment
In explaining conforming behavior, sociologists justly emphasize sensitivity to the opinion of others. Unfortunately, as sug-
gested in the preceding chapter, they tend to suggest that man is sensitive to the opinion of others and thus exclude sensitivity from their explanations of deviant behavior. In explaining deviant behavior, psychologists, in contrast, emphasize insensitivity to the opinion of others. Unfortunately, they too tend to ignore variation, and, in addition, they tend to tie sensitivity inextricably to other variables, to make it part of a syndrome or "type," and thus seriously to reduce its value as an explanatory concept. The psychopath is characterized only in part by "deficient attachment to or affection for others, a failure to respond to the ordinary motivations founded in respect or regard for one's fellows"; he is also characterized by such things as "excessive aggressiveness," "lack of superego control," and "an infantile level of response." Unfortunately, too, the behavior that psychopathy is used to explain often becomes part of the definition of psychopathy. As a result, in Barbara Woottons words:
[The psychopath] is . .. par excellence, and without shame or qualification, the model of the circular process by which mental abnormality is inferred from anti-social behavior while anti-social behavior is explained by mental abnormality.
The problems of diagnosis, tautology, and name-calling are avoided if the dimensions of psychopathy are treated as causally and therefore problematically interrelated, rather than as logically and therefore necessarily bound to each other. In fact, it can be argued that all of the characteristics attributed to the psychopath follow from, are effects of, his lack of attachment to others. To say that to lack attachment to others is to be free from moral restraints is to use lack of attachment to explain the guiltlessness of the psychopath, the fact that he apparently has no conscience or superego. In this view, lack of attachment to outers is not merely a symptom of psychopathy, it is psychopathy; lack of conscience is just another way of saying the same thing; and the violation of norms is (or may be) a consequence.
Chapter 22 + Social Band Theory 233
For that matter, given that man is an animal, "irnpulsivity" and "aggressiveness" can also be seen as natural consequences of freedom from moral restraints. However, since the view of man as endowed with natural propensities and capacities like other animals is peculiarly unpalatable to sociologists, we need not fall back on such a view to explain the amoral man s aggressiveness. The process of becoming alienated from others often involves or is based on active interpersonal conflict. Such conflict could easily supply a reservoir of socially derived hostility sufficient to account for the aggressiveness of those whose attachments to others have been weakened.
Dürkheim said it many years ago: "We are moral beings to the extent that we are social beings." This may be interpreted to mean that we are moral beings to the extent that we have "internalized the norms" of society. But what does it mean to say that a person has internalized the norms of society? The norms of society are by definition shared by the members of society. To violate a norm is, therefore, to act contrary to the wishes and expectations of other people. If a person does not care about the wishes and expectations of other people—that is, if he is insensitive to the opinion of others—then he is to that extent not bound by the norms. He is free to deviate.
The essence of internalization of norms, conscience, or super-ego thus lies in the attachment of the individual to others. This view has several advantages over the concept of internalization. For one, explanations of deviant behavior based on attachment do not beg the question, since the extent to which a person is attached to others can be measured independently of his deviant behavior. Furthermore, change or variation in behavior is explainable in a way that it is not when notion of internalization or superego are used. For example, the divorced man is more likely after divorce to commit a number of deviant acts, such'as suicide or forgery. IE we explain these acts by reference to the superego '(or internal
control), we are forced to say that the man
"lost his conscience" when he got a divorce;
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ana, or course, u fie remarries, we nave 10 conclude that he gets his conscience back.
This dimension of the bond to conventional society is encountered in most social control-oriented, research and theory, F, Ivan Nye's "internal control" and "indirect control" refer to the same element, although we avoid the problem of explaining changes over time by locating the "conscience" in the bond to others rather than making it part of the personality. Attachment to others is just one aspect of Albert J. Reiss's "personal controls"; we avoid his problems of tautological empirical observations by making the relationship between attachment and delinquency problematic ratherthan definitional. Finally, Scott Briar and Irving Piliavin's "commitment" or "stake in conformity" subsumes attachment, as their discussion illustrates, although the terms they use are more closely associated with the next element to be discussed.
Commitment
"Of all passions, that which inclineth men least to break the laws, is fear. Nay, excepting some generous natures, it is the only thing, when there is the appearance of profit or pleasure by breaking the laws, that makes men keep them." Few would deny that men on occasion obey the rules simply from fear of the consequences. This rational component in conformity we label commitment. What does it mean to say that a person is committed to conformity? In Howard S. Becker's formulation it means the fol lowing:
First, the individual is in a position in which his decision with regard to some particular line of action has consequences for other interests and activities not necessarily [directly] related to it Second, he has placed himself in that position by his own prior actions. A third element is present though so obvious as not to be apparent: the committed person must be aware [of other interests] and must recognize that his decision in this case will have ramifications beyond it.
ine lqea, men, !S tnat ine person mvests time, energy, himself, in.a certain line of activity—say, getting an education, building up a business, acquiring a reputation for virtue. When or whenever he considers deviant behavior, he must consider the costs of this deviant behavior, the risk he runs of losing the investment he has made in conventional labor.
If attachment to others is the sociological counterpart of the superego or conscience, commitment is the counterpart of the ego or common sense. To the person committed to conventional lines of action, risking one to ten years in prison for a ten-dollar holdup is stupidity, because to the committed person the costs and risks obviously exceed ten dollars in value. (To the psychoanalyst, such an act exhibits failure to be governed by the "reality-principle.") In the sociological control theory, it can be and is generally assumed that the decision to commit a criminal act may well be rationally determined— that the actor's decision was not irrational given the risks and costs he faces. Of course, as Becker points out, if the actor is capable of in some sense calculating the costs of a line of action, he is also capable of calcula-tional errors: ignorance and error return, in the control theory, as possible explanations of deviant behavior.
The concept of commitment assumes that the organization of society is such that the interests of most persons would be endangered if they were to engage in criminal acts. Most people, simply by the process of living in an organized society, acquire goods, reputations, prospects that they do not want to risk losing. These accumulations are society's insurance that they will abide by the rules. Many hypotheses about the antecedents of delinquent behavior are based on this premise. For example, Arthur L. Stinchcombe's hypothesis that "high school rebellion... occurs when future status is not clearly related to present performance" suggests that one is committed to conformity not only by what one has but also by what one hopes to obtain. Thus "ambition" and/or "aspiration" play an important rale in producing conformity. The person becomes committed to a conventional
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ted to conformity.
. Most lines of action in a society are of course conventional. The clearest examples are educational and occupational careers. Actions thought to jeopardize one's chances in these areas are presumably avoided. Interestingly enough, even nonconventional commitments may operate to produce conventional conformity. We are told, at least, that boys aspiring to careers in the rackets or professional thievery are judged by their "honesty" and "reliability"—traits traditionally in demand among seekers of office boys.
Involvement
Many persons undoubtedly owe a life of virtue to a lack of opportunity to do otherwise. Time and energy are inherently limited: "Not that I would not, if I could, be both handsome and fat and well dressed, and a great athlete, and make a million a year, be a wit, a bon vivant, and a lady killer, as well as a philosopher, a philanthropist, a statesman, warrior, and African explorer, as well as a 'tone-poet' and saint. But the thing is simply impossible," The things that William James here says he would like to be or do are all, I suppose, within the realm of conventionality, but if he were to include illicit actions he would still have to eliminate some of them as simply impossible.
Involvement or engrossment in conventional activities is thus often part of a control theory. The assumption, widely shared, is that a person may be simply too busy doing conventional tilings to find time to engage in deviant behavior. The person involved in conventional activities is tied to appointments, deadlines, working hours, plans, and the like, so the opportunity to commit deviant acts rarely arises. To the extent that he is engrossed in conventional activities, he cannot even think about deviant acts, let alone act out his inclinations.
This line of reasoning is responsible for the stress placed on recreational facilities in many programs to reduce delinquency, for much of the concern with the high school dropout, and for the. idea that boys should be drafted into the Army to keep them out of
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idea that involvement in conventional activities is a major deterrent to delinquency that it was accepted even by Sutherland:
In the general area of juvenile delinquency it is probable that the most significant difference between juveniles who engage in delinquency and those who do not is that the latter are provided abundant opportunities of a conventional type for satisfying their recreational interests, while the former lack those opportunities or facilities.
The view that "idle hands are the devil's. workshop" has received more sophisticated treatment in recent sociological writings on delinquency. David Matza and Gresham M. Sykes, for example, suggest that delinquents have the values of a leisure class, the same values ascribed by Veblen to the leisure class: a search for kicks, disdain of work, a desire for the big score, and acceptance of aggressive toughness as proof of masculinity. Matza and Sykes explain delinquency by reference to this system of values, but they note that adolescents at all class levels are "to some extent" members of a leisure class, that they "move in a limbo between earlier parental domination and future integration with the social structure through the bonds of work and marriage." In the end, then, the leisure of the adolescent produces a set of values, which, in turn, leads to delinquency.
Belief
Unlike the cultural deviance theory, the control theory assumes the existence of a common value system within the society or group whose norms are being violated. If the deviant is committed to a value system different from that of conventional society, there is, within the context of the theory, nothing to explain. The question is, "Why does a man violate the rules in which he believes?" It is not, "Why do men differ in their beliefs about what constitutes good and desirable conduct?" The person is assumed to have been socialized (perhaps imperfectly) into the group whose rules he is violating; deviance is not a question of one group im-
236   Part VI ♦ Varietia of Control Tfcorj
Chapter 22 + Social Band Theory 237
posing its rules on the members of another group. In other words, we not only assume the deviant Iws believed the rules, we assume he believes the rules even as he violates them.
How can a person believe it is wrong to steal at the same time he is stealing? In the strain theory, this is not a difficult problem. (In fact, as suggested in the previous chapter, the strain theory was devised specifically to deal with this question.) The motivation to deviance adduced by the strain theorist is so strong that we can well understand the deviant act even assuming the de-viator believes strongly that it is wrong. However, given the control theory's assumptions about motivation, if both the deviant and the nondeviant believe the deviant act is wrong, how do we account for the fact that one commits it and the other does not?
Control theories have taken two approaches to this problem. In one approach, beliefs are treated as mere words that mean little or nothing if the other forms of control are missing. "Semantic dementia," the dissociation between rational faculties and emotional control which is said to be characteristic of the psychopath, illustrates this way of handling the problem. In short, beliefs, atleast insofar as they are expressed in words, drop out of the picture; since they do not differentiate between deviants and non-deviants, they are in the same class as "language" or any other characteristic common to all members of the group. Since they represent no real obstacle to the commission of delinquent acts, nothing need be said about how they are handled by those committing such acts. The control theories that do not mention beliefs (or values), and many do not, may be assumed to take this approach to the problem.
The second approach argues that the deviant rationalizes his behavior so that he can at once violate the rule and maintain his belief in it. Donald R. Cressey has advanced this argument with respect to embezzlement, and Sykes and Matza have advanced it with respect to delinquency. In both Cressey s and Sykes and Matza's treatments, these rationalizations (Cressey calls them "verbalizations," Sykes and Matza term
them "techniques of neutralization") occur i prior to the- commission of the deviant act. If the neutralization is successful, the person is free to commit the act(s) in question. B oth in Cressey and in Sykes and Matza, the strain that prompts the effort at neutralization also provides the motive force that results in the subsequent deviant act. Then-theories are thus, in this sense, strain theories. Neutralization is difficult to handle i within the context of a theory that adheres closely to control theory assumptions, because in the control theory there is no special motivational force to account for the neutralization. This difficulty is especially noticeable in Matza's later treatment of this 1 topic, where the motivational component, the "will to delinquency" appears after the moral vacuum has been created by the techniques of the neutralization. The question i thus becomes: Why neutralize? j
In attempting to solve a strain theory ;
problem with control theory tools, the con- ;
trol theorist is thus led into a trap. He can- ; not answer the crucial question. The
concept of neutralization assumes the exis- i
fence of moral obstacles to the commission )
of deviant acts. In order plausibly to ac- '■
count for a deviant act, it is necessary to ;
generate motivation to deviance that is at i
least equivalent in force to the resistance I
provided by these moral obstacles. How- I
ever, if the moral obstacles are removed, !
neutralization and special motivation are j
no longer required. We therefore follow the |
implicit logic of control theory and remove }
these moral obstacles by hypothesis. Many \
persons do not have an attitude of respect [
toward the rules of society; many persons j
feel no moral obligation to conform regard- j
less of personal advantage. Insofar as the j
values and beliefs of these persons are con- i
sistent with their feelings, and there should |
be a tendency toward consistency, neutral- \
ization is unnecessary; it has already oc- j
curred. j
Does this merely push the question back \
a step and at the same time produce conflict i
with the assumption of a common value j
system? I think no t. In the first place, we do I
not assume, as does Cressey, that neutral- !
ization occurs in order to make a specific j
criminal act possible. We do not assume, as do Sykes and Matza, that neutralization occurs to make many delinquent acts possible. We do not assume, in other words, that the person constructs a system of rationalizations in order to justify commission of acts he wants to commit. We assume, in contrast, that the beliefs that free a man to commit deviant acts are unmotivated in the sense that he does not construct or adopt them in order to facilitate the attainment of illicit ends. In the second place, we do not assume, as does Matza, that "delinquents concur in the conventional assessment of delinquency." We assume, in contrast, that there is variation in the extent to which people believe they should obey the rules of society, and, furthermore, that the less a person believes he should obey the rules, the more likely he is to violate them.
In chronological order, then, a persons beliefs in the moral validity oE norms are, for no teleoiogical reason, weakened. The probability that he will commit delinquent acts is therefore increased. When and if he commits a delinquent act, we may justifiably use the weakness of his beliefs in explaining it, but no special motivation is required to explain either the weakness of his beliefs or, perhaps, his delinquent act.
The keystone of this argument is of course the assumption that there is variation in belief in the moral validity of social rules. This assumption is amenable to direct empirical test and can thus survive at least until its first confrontation with data. For the present, we must return to the idea of a common value system with which this section was 'begun.
The idea of a common (or, perhaps better, a single) value system is consistent with the fact, or presumption, of variation in the strength of moral beliefs. We have not suggested that delinquency is based on beliefs counter to conventional morality; we have not suggested that delinquents do not believe delinquent acts are wrong. They may well believe these acts are wrong, but the meaning and efficacy of such beliefs are contingent upon other beliefs and, indeed, on the strength of other ties to the conventional order.
Where Is the Motivation?
The most disconcerting question the control theorist faces goes something like this: "Yes, but why do they do it?" In the good old days, the control theorist could simply strip away the "veneer oE civilization" and expose mans "animal impulses" for all to see. These impulses appeared to him (and apparently to his audience) to provide a plausible account of the motivation to crime and delinquency. His argument was not that delinquents and criminals alone are animals, but that we are all animals, and thus all naturally capable of committing criminal acts. It took no great study to reveal that children, chickens, and dogs occasionally assault and steal from their fellow creatures; that children, chickens, and dogs also behave for relatively long periods in a perfectly moral manner. OE course the acts of chickens and dogs are not "assault" ^ or "theft," and such behavior is not "moral"; it is simply the behavior of a chicken or a dog. The chicken stealing corn from his neighbor knows nothing of the moral law; he does not want to violate rules; he wants merely to eat corn. The dog maliciously destroying a pillow or feloniously assaulting another dog is the moral equal of the chicken. No motivation to deviance is required to explain his acts. So, too, no special motivation to crime within the human animal was required to explain his criminal acts.
Times changed. It was no longer fashionable (within sociology, at least) to refer to animal impulses. The control theorist tended more and more to deemphasize the motivational component of his theory. He might refer in the beginning to "universal human needs," or some such, but the driving force behind crime and delinquency was rarely alluded to. At the same time, his explanations of crime and delinquency left the reader uneasy. What, the reader asked, is the control theorist assuming? Albert K. Cohen and James F. Short answer the question this way:
... it is important to point out one important limitation of both types of theory. They [culture conflict and social dis-
organization theories] are both control theories in the sense that they explain delinquency in terms of the absence of effective controls. They appear, therefore', to imply a model of motivation that assumes that the impulse to delinquency is an inherent characteristic of young people and does not itself need to be explained; it is something that erupts •when the lid—i.e., internalized cultural restraints or external audiority—is off.
There are several possible and I think reasonable reactions to this criticism. One reaction is simply to acknowledge the assumption, to grant that one is assuming what control theorists have always assumed about the motivation to crime—that it is constant across persons (at least within the system in question):
There is no reason to assume that only those who finally commit a deviant act ' usually have the impulse to do so. It is much more likely that most people experience deviant impulses frequendy. At least in fantasy, people are much more deviant than they appear.
There is certainly nothing wrong with making such an assumption. We are free to assume anything we wish to assume; the truth of our theory is presumably subject to empirical test.
A second reaction, involving perhaps something of a quibble, is to defend the logic of control theory and to deny the alleged assumption. We can say the fact that control theory suggests the absence of something causes delinquency is not a proper criticism, since negative relations have as much claim to scientific acceptability as do positive relations. We can also say that the present theory does not impute an inherent impulse to delinquency to anyone. That, on the contrary, it denies the necessity {of such an imputation:
The desires, and other passions of man, are in themselves no sin. No more are the actions, that proceed from those passions, till they know a law that forbids them.
A third reaction is to accept the criticism as valid, to grant that a complete explana-
tion of delinquency would provide the nec- [
essary impetus, and proceed to construct an j
explanation of motivation consistent with {
control theory. Briar and Piliavin provide (
situational motivation: j
We assume these acts are prompted by |
short-term situationally induced desires i
experienced by all hoys to obtain valued [:
goods, to portray courage in the pres- \
ence of, or be loyal to peers, to strike out [
at someone who is disliked, or simply to \
"get kicks." |
... There are several additional accounts f of "why they do it" that are to my mind persuasive and at the same time generally compatible with control theory. But while all of these accounts may be compatible with control theory, they are by no means deduc-ible from it. Furthermore, they rarely impute built-in, unusual motivation to the delinquent: he is attempting to satisfy the same desires, he is reacting to the same pressures as other boys (as is clear, for example, in the previous quotation from Briar and Piliavin). In other words, if included, these accounts of motivation would serve the same function in the theory that "animal impulses" traditionally served: they might add to its persuasiveness and plausibility, but they would add little else, since they do not differentiate delinquents from nondelinquents.
In the end, then, control theory remains what it has always been: a theory in which deviation is not problematic. The question "Why do they do it?" is simply not the question the theory is designed to answer. The question is, "Why don't we do it?" There is much evidence that we would if we dared.
Reprinted by permission of Transaction Publishers. Travis Hirschi, "Social Bond Theory" from Causes of Delinquency. Copyright © 1969 by Transaction Publishers.
Discussion Questions
1. Why does Hirschi say that the key question for criminologists to answer is "Why don't they do it?" as opposed to "Why do they do it?"
2% How does control theory differ from strain theory and cultural deviance (i.e., differential association) theory?
3. What are the four elements of the social bond? How does each one help to con-
trol a youth from engaging in delinquency?
4, What factors in American society might cause social bonds to be weaker in inner-city neighborhoods?