Crime and economics: a critical review of the economic explanations of crime
Luis David Ramírez de Garay *
* Doctor of Sociology with a specialty in Crime, Violence and Comparative Studies from Bielefeld University in Germany. He has a master's degree in political sociology at the Mora Institute and a degree in sociology from the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences of the UNAM. As of January 2013, he is a professor-researcher at the Center for Sociological Studies at the Colegio de México. Previously, he worked as a consultant for the United Nations and for the private sector in Mexico.
Resume
The link between crime and the economy is wide, full of edges and with interesting theoretical and empirical problems. For this reason, this article seeks to offer an overview of the scope and limits of this traditional nexus. For this, the explanations from sociology, economics and criminology were organized into three groups: criminal rationality, political economy of crime and economic deprivation. Each group was reviewed in the light of its origins, its basic arguments, its theoretical limits and its most relevant empirical problems; with special attention to the results that the investigation has had in the comparative study of crime. In conclusion, the text provides a clearer perspective on the status of economic explanations of crime;on the lines to follow to study the economic characteristics of crime; and an extensive Bibliography that will serve to guide future research.
Keywords : crime, economics, criminology, sociology of crime, political economy of crime, economic deprivation.
Abstract
The link between crime and the economy is wide and with appealing theoretical and empirical problems. In view of this the present paper offers a review of the advantages and the limits of this almost traditional link. For this purpose, different approaches from the sociology, the economy and the criminology were selected and classified into three groups: rationality, political economy and economic deprivation. The review of each group included its origins and its basic arguments so as its more important theoretical limits and empirical problems. To gain a better insight, the applicability of each approach to the comparative study of crime was also considered.As a result this text presents a wider and critical view of the actual status of the economic explanations of crime and an accurate map of the most important research puzzles related with the economic characteristics of crime. It also offers an extensive bibliography to guide students' interests and future research.
Key words : crime, economy, criminology, crime sociology, crime political economy, economic deprivation.
Introduction
A review of the relationship between the economy and crime
The interest in explaining crime based on economic conditions has been present for a long time in the history of social thought. In the 19th century, before the appearance of the social sciences, a proto-meaning of the relationship between economic phenomena with the emergence of the concept of deviant behavior can already be found. Deviance or abnormal behavior appeared as social problems alongside the industrialization processes of western Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries. The abrupt changes in the social structure and economic production were accompanied by the rapid growth of urban centers, the emergence of urban crime, and the growth of the so-called new “dangerous classes”.These suboptimal products of industrialization quickly became the object of study of the social thought of the time, thus becoming the first link between economic processes and criminality.
Towards the end of the 19th century, this link was already occupying an important place on the agenda of an incipient but modern social science. In
