1

A Strong Partner for Sustainable Development

Module
In
CRIMINOLOGY 2
Course Code

THEORIES OF CRIME CAUSATION

College of Criminal Justice Education

Bachelor of Science in Criminology
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MODULE 2

EARLY GENERAL THEORIES ON THE CAUSES OF CRIME

1st Semester AY 2022-2023

RUBEN M. NARRAZID JR.

Instructor 1

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INSTRUCTION TO THE USER

This module would provide you an educational experience while

independently accomplishing the task at your own pace or time. It aims as well to
ensure that learning is unhampered by health and other challenges. It covers the
topic about early general theories of the causes of crime.

Reminders in using this module:

1. Keep this material neat and intact.
2. Answer the pre-test first to measure what you know and what to be learned
about the topic discussed in this module.
3. Accomplish the activities and exercises as aids and reinforcement for better
understanding of the lessons.
4. Answer the post-test to evaluate your learning.
5. Do not take pictures in any parts of this module nor post it to social media
platforms.
6. Value this module for your own learning by heartily and honestly answering
and doing the exercises and activities. Time and effort were spent in the
preparation in order that learning will still continue amidst this Covid-19
pandemic.
7. Observe health protocols: wear mask, sanitize and maintain physical
distancing.

STAY SAFE AND HEALTHY!

INTRODUCTION

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Anyone who attempts to delineate the work of a scholar is always confronted with the
query-how much of the man’s work been original and how much was merely the
replication of other men’s efforts? This question is especially important when dealing
with pioneers (Lunden, 1958). If we understand the pioneers, then we can better
understand the current issues in criminology. Tracing the major strands of thought
running throughout the pioneer series in terms of theoretical issues, we find at the
same time indications of the ways in which these issues have influenced the modern
criminologist (Jeffrey, 1959).

A. LEARNING OUTCOMES:
At the end of the lesson, you can:
1. Define the concept of demonology
2. Compare the three schools of thought
3. Discuss the explanation of crime in each of the pioneers of the school of thought

B. TIME ALLOTMENT: 3 Hours

C. DISCUSSION

1. Demonological theory

Theories in Criminology: From Demonology to Biological Theories of Crime

Demonology
Demonology is the study of demons or beliefs about demons, especially the
methods used to summon and control them. 'lhe original sense of «demon», from the
time of Homer onward, was a benevolent being, but in English the name now holds
connotations of malevolence. (In order to keeps the distinction, when referring to the
word in its original Greek meaning English may use the spelling “Daemon” or
“Daimon”.)

Demons, when regarded as spirits, may belong to either of the classes of

spirits recognized by primitive animism. That is to say, they may be human, or non-
human, separable souls, or discarnate spirits which have never inhabited a body. A
sharp distinction is often drawn between these two classes, notably by the
Melanesians, several African groups, and others. The Arab jinn, for example, are not
reducible to modified human souls. At the same time these classes are frequently
conceived as producing identical results, e.g. diseases.

The word demonology is from Greek daimon means “divinity, divine power,
god”; and logia.

Crime does not evolve from any single source. There can be several reasons for
a person’s criminal behavior. The theorists in criminology have tried to explain these
reasons through several theories. From Demonology to the Born Criminal theory,
several theories have been advanced in an attempt to explain criminal behavior.
However, to grow a better understanding of crime and deviant behavior, it is
important to know these theories. They provide different perspectives on crime.
These theories are important for understanding the sources of motivation or
circumstances which may lead to criminal behavior.

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Demonology is one of the earliest theories in criminology. In ancient times,

people believed that evil spirits or demons entered the human body to commit sins.
This was the earliest explanation given regarding crime and criminal behavior.
Terms like demons, witches, and windigo were used for people who had turned
criminals. Society thought that it happened due to evil influence. Supernatural
powers were considered the best explanation behind crime and sin. It was believed
that a person did not commit crimes of his own free will but under evil influence.

An early explanation of crime is theological or religious. Crime has been

viewed as a violation of religious doctrine. It is called a sin a violation of sacred
obligation. An individual who commits a crime has been viewed as possessed by evil
spirits or under divine wrath. Criminal acts were considered as indicia of basically
evil human nature suggesting adherence to Satan or under the spell of the prince of
darkness. The causes of crime have been based on a superstitious belief in which
criminals were allegedly perceived as controlled by otherworldly forces- the devil.

There are many myths, stories, and legends that we know about. They may be
the product of our imagination or be well crafted by our creative mind. Or maybe
not? Demonology is a very old discipline that developed itself out of theology. The
existence of demons (evil beings) only confirms a fact that God exists.

Demonology is unfortunately a borderline science. This essentially means that

modern science will never accept any explanation that involves non-material or
spiritual forms of evidence. Officially, any crime that involves demonic possessions
may be qualified as insanity. Psychiatrists are those who at a request of the Court
make a diagnosis and prognosis about a person’s sanity or insanity. Modern science
tends to rationally and materially explains connections of crime and demonic
possessions. The main reasons are lawmaker requests for a legal form of evidence.
Evidence can be statements of witnesses, victims, or perpetrators. Those statements
get their form of evidence in court records and usually are backed by consistencies
with material and circumstantial evidence or facts as well as with high credibility of
persons who gave those statements.

The demonological explanation of crime was based on a mixture of common

logic and religious beliefs. Similar attempts to explain human behavior were made by
astrologists. The development of astrology starts around 3500 BC. The positions of
heavenly bodies such as constellations and planets affect human behavior. In the
13th century, theology attempted to explain crime in a similar fashion as demonology
did before the theology. The introduction of the inquisition enabled clerics to be
investigators, prosecutors, and judges at the same time

Criminology as science looks out on these matters from a cultural and a legal
perspective. The legal perspective includes forensic psychiatry and psychology, while
the cultural perspective includes systems of values of some ethnic group or nation.
For example, there are still some ritual practices among the tribes on the African
continent that allow throwing of the firstborn male children to the pigs. Looking at it
from our perspective, this is naturally a crime but among those tribes, this is a
tradition. Systems of values are also different in organizations like Cosa Nostra,
narcotic cartels, or other criminal organizations. While some behaviors are desirable
in that kind of organization, they are banned or marked red by a «normal society.»

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Criminology as science was established in the second half of the 19th century.
However, interest to research crime existed in earlier times of history. Until
criminology became an autonomous science, crime was researched from the
theological, metaphysical, legal (nontechnical), sociological, psychological,
anthropological, psychiatric (medical), or biological standpoint. Development of
criminology theory starts with demonology around 5500 BC According to some
theorists; the first school of criminology was the demonological school of
criminology.

Criminology as science was established in the second half of the 19th century.
“People commit crimes under demonic or evil influences.”

2. Positivist Theory
The Italian or Positive School developed in the nineteenth century as an
attempt to apply scientific methods to the study of the criminal while rejecting the
legal definition of crime. This was basically made possible because of the
contributions of the three (3) respective experts in the persons of Cesare Lombroso,
and his two students Raffaele Garofalo and Enrico Ferri. This school based the study
of criminal behavior on scientific determinism-which explained that every act had a
cause.

Cesare Lombroso (1835-1909), an Italian criminologist who founded the

said school once explained that criminals commit crimes because they are mentally-
ill, sick and disturbed individuals; that is why they need to be treated instead of being
punished. But this was commented by Sheldon Glueck, a Polish-American
criminologist, when he said, “A sick person has a right not to be treated; it is only
when he becomes contagious that he may be quarantined." Known as the Father 0f
Criminology, Lombroso put his many years of medical research to use in his theory
of criminal atavism the idea that criminals manifest physical anomalies that make
them biologically and physiologically similar to our primitive ancestors, savage
throwbacks to an earlier stage of human evolution. He's also the “Founder of
Criminal Anthropology.” He studied the remains of executed individuals who
had been convicted of crimes and came up with the theory of born criminal, which
stated that criminals are a lower form of life, nearer to their apelike ancestors than
non-criminals in traits and disposition.

The Positive School said that punishment should be replaced by a scientific

treatment of criminals calculated to protect society. This school finds supporters in
biology, psychiatry, psychology, social work, sociology, and anthropology, each of
whom applies the concepts of his science to the study of the criminal. It gained its
name from the positivist philosophy of the nineteenth century which applied
scientific methods to social problems. It attacked the legal definition of crime, and in
its place substituted a concept of natural crime. The positivist rejected the juridical
concept of crime in favor of the sociologic notion of crime. Lombroso is generally
credited with shifting the criminologist's attention from the crime to the criminal
(Jeffery, 1959).

Raffaele Garofalo (1851-1934), an Italian criminologist and a student of

Lombroso noted that the concept of a “criminal” presupposes the concept of “crime.”
He observed that although the naturalists speak. The positivist's rejection of the legal

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definition was based on the idea that for scientific purposes the concept of crime
cannot be accepted as a legal category, since the factors which produce the legal
definition are contingent and capricious. However, Garofalo, like many of his
contemporary criminologists, didn’t accept his teacher’s view regarding physical
traits (e.g. big forehead or large head); rather he linked criminal behavior to a defect
in their physiological makeup. He also traced the roots of criminal behavior not in
the individual's physical features but to their psychological equivalents, which he
called “moral anomalies.” Garofalo defined crime, not as a violation of a law, but
as a violation of nature. An act was a crime if it violated human nature in either of
two forms: probity, which is honesty and integrity, and pity, which is compassion for
others (Jeffery, 1959).

Enrico Ferri (1856-1929), a highly successful trial lawyer and perhaps

Italy‘s perhaps greatest contemporary forensic orator, stated that “crime must be
studied in the offender and said that “a person is legally or socially responsible for his
actions by the fact that he is a member of society, not because he is capable of willing
an illegal act." He went for a year to Turin to study with Lombroso and, as his
student, visited prisons, mental hospitals, and laboratories.” Ferri said that a man
was sentenced, not according to the seriousness of the offense, but according to the
factor or factors which motivated him to commit a crime. He argued that criminals
should not be held morally responsible for their crimes, because they did not choose
to commit crimes but were rather‘were driven to commit crimes due to economic,
social, and political factors (moral responsibility). The purpose of criminal
justice was to afford maximum protection or defense of society against the criminal.
The defense of society was placed above the rights of individuals and recommended
penal colonies, indeterminate sentences, hospitals, scientifically trained judges, and
the abolition of juries (Jeffery. 1959). The Italian or Positivist School’s main notion is
that “Let the punishment fit the criminal.”

Theories that existed before the positivist theory of crime were phrenology
and physiognomy theories. Johann Lavater, the physiognomist, thought that the
shape of the skull and some facial features had an impact on human behavior and
actions. Later, positivist theorists of crime Cesare Lombroso took Lavater’s ideas and
began exploring other physical traits of a body. Lombroso, the criminal
anthropologist, not only researched the facial features and the shape of the skull but
social conditions of individuals like unemployment and medical history of illnesses.
He compared a large number of criminals and non-criminals using human physical
traits like ear size, hair length, and others. Goring, the main critics of Lombroso,
conducted research on crime heredity but didn’t find any differences in facial
features or other human physical traits between prison inmates, asylum inhabitants,
and non-criminals. The only physical difference Goring found between an
experimental and control group was the significant dissimilarity in body weight and
stature.

The criminals in Goring’s research tend to have lower weight and small
stature. Positivist’s theorists of crime argued that human behavior is pre-disposed
and fully determined by individual differences and biological traits. In short, terms,
what drives people towards crime is not a matter of free-will. The positivist crime
theorist and criminal anthropologist Cesare Lombroso made attempts to
scientifically prove his thesis that criminal offenders were physically different from

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non-offenders. Lombroso stated that atavistic features are more akin to savages and
criminal offenders. This view was held by many biological positivists.

The Positivist theory of crime presumed that the scientific study of criminal
behavior should find the “causes” of such behavior. They also believed that the causes
of crime are beyond the control of the individual. Explanations of the positivist
theory were deterministic. Lombroso was influenced by Darwinian principles of
evolution and used these ideas to support a thesis on the inferiority of criminals.
Positivist theory of crime implemented the idea of social Darwinism that individuals
or groups develop certain physical and psychological attributes, which allow them to
function more efficiently in the social and natural environment.

We can object to positivist theories of crime that the theories never accepted
the idea about the equality of gender roles. Lombroso thought that males were more
lenient to a crime because they were more masculine than females in general. Italian
historian Renzo Villa thought that Lombroso’s attempt to identify signs of criminality
using biological traits are an inevitable result and part of the contextual development
of nineteenth-century penal science and medicine. The positivist theory of crime
understanding was limited to the external appearance or phenotype properties as the
way to identify the physical characteristics, which were present in the criminal
approach of phrenology.

This theory acts on the proposition that one who commits a crime cannot
morally comprehend the wrongfulness of his actions in the same way individuals of
average intelligence or who are socially accepted, etc are able to do so. The mind of
these individuals has been affected in a particular way and therefore does not have
the capability to make a conscious, rational choice to obey the law. Unfortunately, a
case can be made based on this theory regarding shootings on school campuses
where students have murdered fellow students usually because of some type of
bullying involved.

In the early 1800s, public executions used to be commonplace. The idea was
that society would be afraid of the public punishment that came with wrongdoing
and adjusts their actions. This reasoning for punishment aligns with a view known as
utilitarianism. Utilitarianism is a theory that one is motivated by pleasure and the
fear of pain, so punishments can be used as a deterrent to commit crimes. In the
mid-18005, ideas about criminals and punishment started to evolve. Positivist
criminology began to emerge, which is the study of criminal behavior based on
external factors.

3. Neoclassical Crime Theory

Classical crime theory is represented by the theoretical study of Jeremy Bentham and
Cesare Beccaria. Jeremy Bentham was a founder of English utilitarianism. Bentham
thought that human beings are hedonistic and act only in their own self-interest.
Utilitarianism also considered rational courses of action when people pursue their
own interests. Utilitarian teachings are an important part of criminal-justice ethics
today. Neoclassical crime theory is a continuation of the classical crime theory
tradition. Development of neoclassical crime theory will continue in 1980 with a
forming of new sociological theories, i.e. differential association and identification.
Although sources that mention the neoclassical school and crime theory of
criminology are merely sparse, its main contribution to the field of criminology is

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reflected through the understanding of individual differences of the perpetrators.

While classical school was wholly concerned with an explanation of crime,
neoclassical crime theory saw some flaws in Beccaria’s theory of crime. Classical
crime theory completely concentrated on the criminal act and positivist crime theory
concentrated on the perpetrator. Positivist was obsessed with behavioral prediction
and classicist with a crime explanation.

Neoclassical crime theory sought to improve the stances towards perpetrators

who should have an impact on the level of guilt and severity of punishment. Not all
perpetrators should be treated in the same fashion, because the evident differences
exist among ' them. Crime is a result of many conditions that have ultimately
influenced the perpetrators to commit it. A representative of neoclassical criminology
theory, Gabriel Tarde published the book “Penal philosophy” in 1890. Gabriel Tarde
was a French sociologist and founder of neoclassical criminology school. In his book,
Tarde criticizes classical and positivist criminology and takes the best from both
criminologies. Neoclassical criminology theory considers the age, gender, and social
class of the perpetrators. The perpetrators are people who think, feel, act, and
criminal behavior is learned within groups by imitation and identification.

4. Classical Theory
The meaning of critical theory derives from the Greek word Kpitikoc, Kritikos
Meaning judgment or discernment, and in its present form goes back to the 18th
century.

Classical theory in criminology has its roots in the theories of the 18th-century
Italian nobleman and economist, Cesare Beccaria, and the English philosopher,
Jeremy Bentham (Hollin, 2004, 2). This was a time in history when the punishment
for the crime was severe in the extreme, and both men proffered the theory of utility.
New theorists like Beccaria and Bentham looked at the causes of criminal and
delinquent behavior and began to scientifically explain such deviance (Juvenile,
2005, 71). They rejected theories of naturalism and demonology which characterized
the European Enlightenment as explanations for these types of behavior. The new
theories reflected the rationalism and humanitarianism of the philosophy of the Age
of Enlightenment

Beccaria did not develop a completely new theory of criminology, but rather
sought a way to make the punishment for committing a crime more rational (Classic,
2001). He believed that there should be a hierarchy of punishments for more and
more serious crimes and the number of times a criminal had been charged
previously, the circumstances under which the death penalty was imposed would
depend entirely on the severity of the crime and not the actual act committed or the
degree of involvement in the act. He was against judges having the broad discretion
they possessed and favored definite punishments fitting each crime.

He published an historic piece, An Essay on Crimes and Punishment, in 1764,

discussing why crime occurs and what society should do about it (Juvenile, 2005,
72). He advocated a proposition that punishment should be swift, certain, and
proportional to the crime. He also advocated the abolition of both corporal and
capital punishment, a revolutionary idea in his time. His work was promoted by
Bentham, particularly in his book An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and
Legislation. Beccaria and Bentham believed that people committed crimes when they

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believed that the chance of rewards to them would be greater than the likelihood of
punishment (Hollin, 2004, 2).

It was the pain/pleasure view of human behavior: that human sought to gain
pleasure and avoid pain. These men believed that people acted on the principle of
free will: they made a choice of what behaviors to indulge in and therefore should
suffer the consequences if caught in criminal acts. The emphasis on human-centered
rationality led these theorists to the position that perpetrators of crimes should be
held personally responsible for their actions and punished according to the severity
of the crime (Juvenile, 2005, 71). Under these circumstances, criminal law must
match the needs of the individual to the needs of society as a whole, with neither
wishing a crime to be committed (Hollin, 2004, 2).

Classical theory of crime explains that crime is‘a product of believes that
benefits of committing crimes are far greater. People opt in decisions making
between two scenarios A and B. A scenario IS: a “crime isn‘t profitable because you
will get caught” and B scenario presents certainty in decision making “that you will
never get caught”. Most of the criminals think they’ll never get caught.

Main principles of classical school of criminology were:

1. Crime is a rational choice, and most people are capable to commit crimes.
2. People will commit a crime after they have compared potential costs and
benefits of such actions.
3. Most of the people fear punishment, and the certainty, severity and speed of
punishment will have at impact on the level of crime.
4. Punishment needs to fit a crime and individual differences of perpetrators
shouldn’t have an influence on the punishment.
5. The criminal justice system needs to be predictable, while laws and
punishments must be known to public.

Proportionality in criminology means that crime must fit a crime. The first
model of proportionality in applying punishments was lex talionis or law of
retaliation. Crime is a behavioral human characteristic and a choice.

Similar to the choice theory, this theory suggests that people think before they
proceed with criminal actions; that when one commits a crime, it is because the
individual decided that it was advantageous to commit the crime. The individual
commits the crime from his own free will being well aware of the punishment. This
theory, along with choice theory, derived its basis from what John Locke penned
“The Social Contract.” Locke proposed that all citizens are equal, and that there is an
unwritten but voluntary contract between the state and its citizens, giving power to
those in government and defining a framework of mutual rights and duties. In
Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes wrote, “the right of all sovereigns is derived from the
consent of every one of those who are to be governed.” This way of thinking enforces
the idea that we, as citizens, agree to follow the laws of the government in return for
our protection and sustenance which is very different from early European
authoritarianism.
D. Activities/Exercises
Name:________________________ Subject: Crim 2:Theories of Crime Causation
Section:_____________________ Date: ____________

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MODULE 2-LESSON 1: EVALUATION

1. Define the concept of demonology

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2. Discuss the similarities and differences of the three fundamental schools of

thought in crime causation.

School of thought Classical School Neo-Classical Positivist School

School
Similarities

Differences

3. Discuss the explanation of crime in each of the pioneers of the school of thought
1. Cesare Beccaria

2. Jeremy Bentham

3.Cesare Lombroso

4.Raffaele Garofalo

5.Enrico Ferri

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