Harriet Pollack

Deviance as a Method of Coping

A deviant person is one who does something we would not do. Thus defined, deviance is subjective. But not all deviant conduct is culturally relative. Acts malum in se such as rape, murder, and assault are almost universally considered to be crimes. Noncriminal deviance, however, frequently exists more in the eye of the beholder than in the real world. Deviant conduct may be divided into three categories: crime, sin, and poor taste. Crime refers to those acts which are objectively and measurably harmful to the community and which cannot be tolerated by any society that wishes to continue as a stable organism. Violent crimes against the person and serious property crimes fall into this category. Sin refers to those actions which were originally prohibited by the dominant religion or religions of the community and which at various times may have been incorporated into secular law. Prostitution, gambling, drug use, alcohol consumption, and obscenity are examples of conduct that does no measurable damage to an unwilling victim; when such conduct breaks the law, it is frequently referred to as victimless crime. Poor taste refers to a whole host of social practices which are unpleasant and abrasive and which may or may not be symbolic of conduct that society may wish to prohibit. Overt public sexual practices, peculiar methods of dress, and the wearing of unpopular political symbols all fall into this category. Most deviants recognize that their conduct is personally destructive and may be socially harmful as well. Yet they continue to deviate from the socially prescribed norms because this conduct enables them to cope with the stresses that a highly organized society imposes on their personalities. Many forms of deviant conduct are tension relievers. Some create a short-lived euphoria, and some are acts of rebellion against socially pre scribed norms impossible to reach. In coping with deviance society must first look at what the deviant is attempting to tell us through his conduct. If other ways of relieving stress can be provided for him, he can be persuaded to conform. If he cannot conform and his conduct is violent, we must physically restrain him; if he is nonconforming and nonviolent, we should let him alone.

Book Reviews : The Conscience of the Courts, by Graham Hughes. Pp. 324. Garden City, N.Y., Anchor Press/Doubleday, 1975.

critical area of such decision making was that which permitted the CTP period of intensive supervision to be extended from eight months to an average of two and one-half years, ultimately making the CTP program almost three times more costly than institutionalization and possibly contributing to the lack of reduction in recidivism by overenforcement of rules and statutes during an extended period of close surveillance. Another area was that which estab-

8.95:

Starting with the late 1960s, for thirty years the U.S. Supreme Court was the darling of liberals. School desegregation, the vast expansion of defendants’ rights in cases like Mapp (1961) Miranda (1966) and Gideon (1963) the wide ranging defense of First Amendment rights in the Pentagon Papers (New York Times v. United States) (1971) and Flag Burning Cases (Texas v. Johnson) (1989), not to mention the Courts hostility to prayer in the schools—all these decisions gladdened the hearts of those on the left wing of the political spectrum.

Conservative pressure groups and the supreme court

The authors are mainly academics and foundation people, with a few lawyers thrown in for good measure. The editors have written excellent introductions to each section, analyzing and describing the issues described in each essay. Fogel and Hudson are, of course, ardent advocates of the &dquo;justice&dquo; model of correction. The justice model represents a rebellion against the earlier &dquo;medical&dquo; model of criminality so widely accepted up to ten or fifteen years ago. The medical model saw the offender as &dquo;sick,&dquo; and sent him to prison for &dquo;treatment,&dquo; which continued until he was &dquo;well.&dquo; The appropriate sentence, therefore, was one day to life: If he was &dquo;cured&dquo;

Book Reviews : Justice as Fairness: Perspectives on the Justice Model, David Fogel and Joe Hudson, eds. Pp. 297. Cincinnati, Anderson, 1981

As a nonsociologist, I was somewhat wary of the book, having in the past been impaled too often on a prickly, impenetrable thicket of sociological jargon; but to my relief and pleasure, I found Newman’s writing not only literate, but lucid and very interesting as well. He is also a fine scholar, and I would think that his footnotes could be used as the basis for a comprehensive bibliography on the subject of violence. Newman proceeds from the premise that violence is not only ubiquitous, but is also a tremendously important factor in contemporary culture; and therefore it is essential for social scientists to comprehend its nature. His modus operandi is to examine violence and theories about violence from every conceivable point of view. If violence were an orange, he would have sliced it across its equator, from top to bottom, and sectioned it as well. He starts by defining the general concept of violence, distinguishing between political and criminal violence, and examining it in a historical context. (The discussion of political violence and the analysis of the radical historians’ claims that violence is as American as apple pie is fascinating, and was, for me, the best part of the book.) He then goes on to discuss criminal violence in relation to demographic factors (age, sex, place of residence, ethnicity, etc.), cultures and subcultures, the family, institutions (schools, prisons), occupations, and, of course, individual personality factors. I would guess that there is not a single theory of violence of any merit that Newman does not mention and analyze. Despite the fact that the text is only 266 pages long, it is remarkably comprehensive; though dense with information, it is eminently readable. Having said all this, I must confess that although I consider Understanding Violence a good book, I did not find it a satisfying one. If I were teaching a course in social deviance or social control, I would happily assign it to my students so that I could use Newman’s innumerable analyses of the factors relating to violence as the jumping-off point for brilliant lectures, but I am not teaching such a course and I came away feeling that I had just read the encyclopedia. There are simply too many theories presented and too few conclu-

Book Reviews : Understanding Violence, Graeme Newman. Pp. 310. New York, J. B. Lippincott, 1979.

in courts derived from traditional Anglo-Saxon common-law precedents. Yet we are not told that the French juge d’instruction is a civil service appointee, or that there are grave historical and cultural differences between the judge on the Continent and his counterpart here. Nor are we reminded of the overriding influence of politics in every step of our criminal justice system. This last factor is especially crucial. The state of Massachusetts, to cite one example, recently emerged from a year-long battle over a key legislative proposal for basic court reform. The legislation was aimed at unifying all courts of the state into a single system; enabling freer transfer of judges among them; establishing appointment, rather than election, of court clerks; and transferring certain court functions from the counties to the state. In the battle, lobbyists from all divisions of the criminal justice system entered the lists, leading to the abandonment of many valuable features of the original plan as sacrifices to the rawest of political motives. The final compromise plan was badly scarred by bitter controversy over patronage and pay. If we struggle so over such reforms as these, which affect the very interests discussed by Weinreb, it is staggering to consider the outcry against any suggestion of massive court change. Before we attempt any such drastic innovation, we might first seek to improve the police function, 70 percent of which is devoted to other than peace-keeping or patrolling activities; to reform our ineffective bail system; to make better use of our courts, with more judges, longer court hours, and greater use of night and weekend sessions; and, finally, to rely more upon such community programs as mediation, restitution, arbitration, and advisory disposition panels. It would be unfair to both the book and its author to end on this note. Whether or not one agrees with Weinreb’s proposal and whether or not one regards it as feasible, the clarity with which the proposal is presented, and the author’s dissection of the ills of our current system commend the book to any reader concerned with our system of criminal justice. Until we have attained the best of all possible worlds, I fear we must settle for-and settle down to-the cultivation of our present court garden, which stands sorely in need of drastic weeding.