‘Marxism Is No Longer Relevant to Our Understanding of...

In order to answer the question, the terms Crime Deviance must firstly be defined. Crime is an act against the Law (robbery, murder etc), thus the act is known as illegal, whereas Deviance is an act that is not against the Law but an act seen as ‘abnormal’ and going against the norms values o f Society, such as cross-dressing etc. Marx developed the idea of Marxism (a conflict theory between Upper and Lower social classes) in the 18th Century, when social classes were very clearly defined- the ‘Bourgeois’ and the ‘Proletariat’. For this very reason, what is known as ‘Traditional Marxism’ is now quite evidently outdated, mainly due to the emergence of the ‘Middle Class’ throughout the 20th Century and the ‘Digital Revolution’ also†¦show more content†¦will shape public opinion of a crime and as a result, how a victim sees that crime. Relative deprivation is a crucial concept to Left Realism, and is perhaps the most easily identifiable Marxist idea in Left Realism. Relative deprivation is not the deprivation of money etc. but being deprived of something to which one believes oneself to be entitled to have, and Left Realist’s believe it is relative, not material deprivation that causes crime, and following the Idea of Merton’s strain theory, people commit crime to gain what they think they are deprived of. Young began the idea of a ‘Bulimic Society’, where expensive products, obtainable easily only by the upper classes and presented daily and rigorously presented to the working class via the Media. Therefore, the Media is seen as the fuel to relative deprivation, and consequently the root of crime and deviance within Society. Like all theories, Left Realism has its share of criticisms, such as ignoring white-collar crime, overzealous in their predictions of the level of crime and over-reliance on Victim Survey’s, which are too subjective to b e taken as concrete data. Left Realist’s also has its criticizer’s, such as the Right Realist’s, who believe economic and social factors i.e. class conflict, don’t cause crime, but cultural factors are to blame (instant