CRI 010: Introduction to Criminology

Module 5:
Identifying the Different Characteristics
of Criminal Law

Law – it is the rule of conduct, just and made obligatory by the legitimate authority for the common observance
and benefit. It is symbolically represented by a blindfolded woman carrying with one hand a sword
and the other a balance.
Criminal Law – It is a branch or division of law which defines crimes, treats of their nature and provides for
punishment.
Act No. 3815 – The primary source of criminal law in the Philippines. It is otherwise known as the Revised Penal
Code and it took effect on January 1, 1932. The Code Committee was chaired by Anacleto Diaz, with its
members, namely: Quintin Paredes, Alex Reyes, Mariano de Joya and Guillermo Guevara.

General
The Law is binding to all persons who live or sojourn in the Philippines.
Exceptions:
Head of the State or Country
Foreign diplomats
Ambassadors who are duly accredited to a country
Foreign troops permitted to in arch within a territory.

Territorial
The Law is binding to all crimes committed within the National Territory of the Philippines.

Terrestrial – jurisdiction exercised over land

Fluvial – over maritime and interior water
Aerial – over the atmosphere
Exceptions:
Head of the State or Country
Foreign diplomats
Ambassadors who are duly accredited to a country
Foreign troops permitted to in arch within a territory.
 Prospective
Criminal Law cannot make an act punishable in a manner in which it was not punishable when com-
mitted; it has no retroactive effect.
Exception:
1. When a new statue dealing with the crime establishes conditions more favorable to the accused, it can be
given a retroactive affect.
- Exemption to the Exception: If the accused is a habitual delinquent.
 CRI 010: Introduction to Criminology
Module 6:
Describing the Different Approaches in
the Explanation of Crime

Main Approaches in the Explanation of Crime

1. Objective Approach: Criminal behavior is explained in terms of factors extraneous to the offender which
are social, sociological, cultural and economic.
2. Subjective Approach: Criminal Behavior is explained in terms of factors within criminal, i.e. physical,
biological and mental traits.

Different Approaches in the Explanation of Crime

1. Biological Approach: It proposes that human beings commit crime because of internal factors over
which they have little or no control.
2. Causal Approach: This is a study of the causal link that exit between the defendant's action and the
plaintiff’s injury. It is observation of facts in relation to phenomenon of crime interpreting them in relation to
the possible causes of criminal behavior. A cause may be necessary or sufficient. If result B invariability fol-
lows cause A without any other factors being required, and cause A cannot be replaced b any other alterna-
tive, then cause A is both sufficient and necessary cause.
3. Deficient in Probity Approach: The criminals deficient in probity, says Dr. Maurice Parmellee, commit
crimes against property.
4. Descriptive Approach: It describes the phenomenon of crime and those who commit it. It covers aall
aspects such as personal traits of criminals and the various forms or criminal behavior.
5. Organically Inferior Human Traits Approach: This study was carried by Eavert A. Hootan and Wil-
liam H. Sheldon. Hootan stated that criminals are organically inferior. Hootan had studied 13,873 male crimi-
nals and 3303 persons of control group. The study was conducted in various American States. To Hootan the
criminal is an inadequately developed runty fellow, while to Sheldon the criminals is husky and athletic type
fellow.
6. Economic Approach: It studies external economic factors.
7. Endemic Approach: it studies those factors that arise from local conditions or being to a particular peri-
od of the year, or the specified area that make an man criminal.
8. Environmental Approach: It seeks to explain the phenomenon of criminal behavior with reference to
factors outside the personality of the delinquent.
9. Functional Psychosis Approach: As to mental quality an offender is either normal or abnormal. The
Psychosis are of two types, having psychosis of organic origin and having psychosis of non-psychosis origin
or functional Psychosis.
10. Organic Psychosis Approach: General paralysis of the insane (Patients of this abnormality commit
offenses with astonishing opened and silliness);
• Traumatic Psychosis (Patients of this abnormality commit crimes of violence);
• Encephalitis Lethargic (Patients of this abnormality commit crimes of explosive and sexual
nature);
• Senile Dementia (Patient of this abnormality are of old age and commit varying crimes);
• Epilepsy (Patients of such abnormality commit crimes of sudden violence).
• Schizophrenia (Patients of this abnormality suffer split-mindedness.
11. Heredity and Criminal Families Approach: Studies was conducted by Arthur Dugdale in the United
States of America on the Jukes (1877) and by Henry Herbert Goddard on the Kallikaks (1912).
12. Individualistic Approach: It focuses its attention on the biological, mental and other characteristics of
the offender to explain the cause of his delinquent behavior.
13. Physiological Approach: It is an approach to criminology made by endocrinologists who found that
glandular malfunctioning caused the delinquent behavior.
14. Social Approach: Man may live in isolation but generally he lives in society.
15. Therapeutic Approach: This approach is of recent origin. It considers the criminal as a victim of cir-
cumstances and a product of various factors within the criminal and the society.
16. Twin Research Approach: Violent due to environmental influences as prejudices of honor, politics and
religion, approach.

Frequently Asked Questions

1) What is Criminal Etiology?
- Criminal Etiology is a division of criminology which attempts to provide scientific analysis of thee
causes of the crime.
2) What are the other approaches in the study of crime?
APPROACHES IN THE STUDY OF THE EXISTENCE OF CRIME
1. Biological—it believes that criminal behavior is inherited or identified through physical characteristics
of criminals.
Ex. : Kallikak Family—All descendants—20 paupers, 60 thieves, 7 murderers, 40 other criminals, 40 with ve-
nereal diseases and 50 prostitutes.
2. Psychiatric—it believes that crime is caused by mental diseases and mental disorders.
Ex. : The profile noted that Hitler was robust and viewed himself as a standards-bearer and trendsetter, he
also liked the circus acts that endangered people. He showed strong streaks of narcissism and sadism.
3. Psychological-it believes that crime is caused by behavioral disorders.
It has been well-known social Psychological principle that situations that diminish self-consciousness and
self-awareness lead individuals to being less restricted, less self-regulated, a nd more likely to act without
considering the consequences of their actions (e.g., Diener, 1979).
4. Sociological—It believes that crime is a result of social factors. Criminality results by the failure to
properly socialize individuals and by unequal opportunities between groups.
5. Geographical—it believes that location of a person triggers criminal behavior.
6. Demographical—it believes that population’s composition has a relationship in the existence of crimi-
nality.
The more people living in a particular community, the more possibilities of crime exist.
7. Epidemiological—It believes that crime is transmitted within the population. That people may also
commit crimes that are perpetrated by people among the population.
8. Ecology—studies criminality in relation to competition, social discrimination, division of labor, social
conflicts and interaction of people in their environment.
9. Economic—explains about the relationship of criminality based on the distribution of wealth or re-
sources in the community.
10. Victimology—Studies the role of the victim in the crime; it explains how people are being victimized.
Ex. A house was robbed because of the absence of somebody who will look it.
 CRI 010: Introduction to Criminology
Module 7:
Comparing the Different Schools of
Thought in Criminology

Schools of Thought in Criminology

Posted by: Brian
1. Classical School of Criminology—Recorded
- Classical Criminology grew out of a reaction against the barbaric system of law, punishment, and justice
that existed before the French Revolution in 1789.
- It was pioneered by an Italian nobleman and professor of law, Cesare Beccaria.
- He published an essay titled “On Crimes and Punishment” in 1764 that made a major reform on the judicial
and penal system throughout Europe.
- It governs the principle of “Let the punishment fit the crime.”

Pioneer in Classical School of Criminology

1. Cesare Beccaria (1738-1794)
- He is an Italian who was one of the scholar to develop a systematic understanding of why people commit
crime.
- He believes that all human beings are rational beings and that they possess free-will the capacity, to
choose between right or wrong.
- He thinks if a person commits a crime even if he knows that it is wrong then he/she should be punished.
- He believes that punishment must certain, swift and severe to outweigh the benefits that the offenders get
to deter future crimes.
2. Jeremy Bentham
- English jurist, philosopher and prolific writer “Greatest Happiness Principle” of the Utilitarian (Principle of
Utility).
- He claimed that the usefulness of the action is not important but rather whether the action promotes the
general happiness.
 Utilitarian—usefulness of the action is not important but rather whether the action promotes the
general happiness.
 Hedonism—It was introduced by Jeremy Bentham. A philosophy where people choose pleasure and
avoid pain.
1. Classical School of Criminology—Module
- the classical school developed during the Enlightenment in response to excessive and cruel punishments
to crime.
- Cesare Becarria argued for more humanitarian forms of punishment and against physical punishment and
death penalty.
- He believed that punishment should fit the crime and not to be excessive.
- A primary premise of the classical school was the fundamental equality of all people, which means that
every person should be treated equally under the law.
- Criminal behavior would be subject to similar punishment, and people had to know what categories of
conduct were punishable.
- Punishable conduct would only be that which encroached on someone else’s freedom in violation of the
social contract.
- No longer would status be a factor to receive treatment or more favorable punishment.
- Central to the classical school was the presence of Freewill.
- All people act within reason; conduct results from the conscious operation of a person’s will after reflec-
tion an choosing among alternatives of action.
- People played into how the classical school thought of punishment.
- Because crimes are chosen through free will, they should be punished swiftly and proportionally to the
crime.
- This is the most effective deterrent to crime.

Major Contributions of Classical School of Criminology

• Pioneered by Cesare Beccaria an Italian jurist and Jeremy Bentham a British Philosopher
Two Primary doctrines are:
• Freewill by Cesare Beccaria, which stated that man is entirely unrestricted in his ability to
choose between good and evil or man has the capacity to choose what is right and what is
wrong.
• Hedonism that was introduced by Jeremy Bentham. A philosophy where people choose
pleasure and avoid pain.

2. Neo-Classical School of Criminology—Recorded

- This school maintained that while classical doctrine was correct in general, some of its detail should be
modified.
-It contends that children and lunatics cannot calculate pleasure and pain and that they do not possess free
will, thus they should be exempted from criminal punishments.
 - This school emphasized that Children and Lunatics should be given exemption because they are not acting
on freewill due to immaturity and diseases of mind and introduces the application of mitigating circum-
stances in imposing penalties.

2. Neo-Classical School of Criminology—Module

- The neo-classicist school emerged, in large part, to remedy some of the problems created by the
classical. school.
- According to Taylor, Walton and Young, contradictions in classicism presented themselves in universal pe-
nal measures and in day-to-day practice.
- "It was impossible in practice to ignore the determinants of human action and proceed as if punishment
and incarceration could be easily measured on some kind of universal calculus: apart from throwing the
working of the law itself into doubt (e.g. in punishing property crime by deprivation of property) classicism
appeared to contradict widely-held commonsensical notions of human behavior."
- Classicism concentrated on the criminal act and ignored individual differences between criminals.
- Neoclassicism still held that freewill is important, but that it can be constrained by physical and environ-
mental factors.
- Thus, neo-classicists introduced revisions to account for problems presented in classicism:
• Allowing for mitigating circumstances by looking at the situation (physical and social environment) in
which the individual had been placed.
• Some allowance was given for an offender's past record. A court needs to take into account an offender's
criminal history and life circumstances when making a decision about someone's sentence.
• Consideration should be given for factors like incompetence, pathology, insanity and impulsive behavior.
Also, certain individuals, such as children and the mentally-ill, are generally less capable of exercising
their reason.

Major Contributions of Neo-Classical School of Criminology

• This school maintained that while classical doctrine was correct in general, some of its detail should be
modified to include:
• Children and lunatics should not be regarded as criminals; hence they are free from punishment.

3. Italian or Positivist School of Criminology—Record

- Positivist school of criminology emerged from the positive philosophy of the nineteenth century, which ap-
plied scientific methods to explain criminal behavior.
- It was anchored in the doctrine of determinism, where it is believed that criminals are like sick people that
need to be treated rather than punished.
- Criminals commit crimes because of factors that are beyond their control, such as poverty.
- It governs the principle "Let the punishment fits the criminal."
 - This school promoted the Doctrine of Determinism which stated that man's choices, decisions and actions
are decided by antecedent causes, inherited or environmental, acting upon his character.
- "Positivism - the branch of social science that uses the scientific method of the natural sciences and sug-
gests that human behavior is a product of social, biological, psychological, or economic forces that can be
empirically measured.
- the group of thinkers considered from this school were Cesare Lombroso, Raffaele Garofalo, and Enrico
Ferri.

Pioneer in Italian or Positivist School of Criminology

1. Cesare Lombroso (bom Ezechia Marco Lombroso November 6, 1836-October 19, 1909)
- Regarded as the "Father" of Criminology and has the largest contributions to biological positivism.
-An Italian physician and anthropologist who wrote the book titled Criminal Man in 1876, which he posited the theory
of the born criminal, where it involved the concept of atavism in explaining the causes of criminality.
- “Atavism” is an idea that criminals are evolutionary throwback to an earlier form of life and that they have identified
physical stigmata.
Types of Criminals according to Lombroso:
1. Bom Criminals - homo delinquents or atavism, with subhuman and savage behavior.
2. Criminal by Passion - characterized by a romantic sensitivity and capacity for altruistic motives in the commission
of crime.
3. Insane Criminals - suffering from abnormalities and disease of the mind
4. Criminaloid- less savage and predatory than born criminals but more occasional
5. Pseudo-criminals self-defense. those who kill in self-defense.
2. Enrico Ferri
- Best known as Lombroso's associate, attacked the classical doctrine of free-will
- He believed that social as well as biological factors played a role, and held the view that criminals should not be
held responsible for the factors causing their criminality were beyond their control. (Moral Responsibility)
Scientific classification of criminals according to Enrico Ferri:
1. Born or instinctive criminal - who carries from birth, through unfortunate heredity from his progenitors, they are
characterized by a reduced resistance to criminal stimuli and also an evident and precocious propensity to crime.
2. Insane criminal affected by a clinically identified mental disease or by a neuropsychiatric condition which groups
him with the mentally diseased.
3. Passional (passionate) criminal who, in two varieties, the criminal through passion (a prolonged and chronic mental
state), or through emotion (explosive and unexpected mental state), represents a type at the opposite pole from the
criminal due to congenital tendencies.
4. Occasional criminal - who constitutes the majority of lawbreakers and is the product of family and social milieu
more than of abnormal personal physiomentar conditions.
 5. Habitual criminal - or rather, the criminal by acquired habit, who is mostly a product of the social envi-
ronment in which, due to abandonment by his family, lack of education, poverty, and bad companions.... al-
ready in his childhood begins as an occasional offender.

3. Raffaele Garofalo (1851-1934)

- An Italian nobleman, magistrate, senator, and professor of law who rejected the classical principle that
punishment should fit the crime, arguing instead that it should fit the criminal.
- Traced the roots of criminal behavior to psychological features which he called “moral anomalies”.
- These constituted “Natural Crime” and were considered offenses violating the tow basic altruistic senti-
ments common to all people, namely; probity (respect for the property of others) and Pity (revulsion against
the infliction of suffering on others).

Four Classes of Criminals according to Raffaele Garofalo:

1. Murderers—Those who are satisfied from vengeance.
2. Violent Criminals—Those who commit very serious crimes.
3. Thieves/Deficient Criminals—Those who commit crimes against property.
4. Lascivious Criminals—Those who commit crimes against chastity.
CRI 010: Introduction to Criminology
Module 7:
Comparing the Different Schools of
Thought in Criminology

Schools of Thought in Criminology