Cohen Status Frustration: Criminality and Unemployment Research Paper

Criminality and Unemployment
Student’s Name
Institution
Criminality and Unemployment
Introduction
Social classes are often associated with social values that we are expected to live up to them in society. American criminologist Albert Cohen puts forward that people tend to acquire different social values depending on who they associate with frequently. His theory further argues that this segregation among social classes gives rise to the formation of social groups among the youth with unacceptable social statuses, especially among the working-class young male. These groups are evident to have unconventional social behavior and often associated with indecent acts like vandalism or violence (O’Donnell & Blankenship, 2018). Unemployment seems to play a major role in the rise of crime rate in the society. One may lack employment for whatever reason and the repercussion that comes along with having a major impact on one's well-being. This paper aims to reiterate the same but rather in a different perspective on the relationship between criminality and unemployment. Opinions of previous scholars have been emphasized in order to appreciate the varied opinions in the unending debate of the relationships.
Literature Review
Different scholars have had varied opinions regarding the relationships between poverty, crime, and unemployment. (Dollar, Cindy Brooks et al., 2019) acknowledges the discrepant relation of poverty-stricken communities with crimes. They argue that some communities exhibit a notable peaceful coexistent despite being highly disadvantaged by poverty. However, their detailed study on joblessness under different poverty levels provides a clear indication that joblessness has a major impact on crimes and violence-related homicides. This is due to the shifting of positive social norms to negative due to isolation after a long period of joblessness.
There exist ambiguity in the correlation of crime and unemployment as evident by the theoretical and statistical findings (Lee, 2016). Lee (2016) demonstrated using facts that crime rates may increase or lower with the rise in the unemployment rate. Take for instance, when most people are unemployed then there is no one earning and therefore criminals have no one to steal from. On the contrary, when most people are unemployed, they tend to practice criminal activities on the few that are employed. In order to eliminate this ambiguous behavior, (Lee, Kangoh, 2016) proposes the introduction of apprehension as it not only limits crime rates but also determines the unemployment impact on crime. Nordin & Almén (2017) also suggest that there exists a non-linear relationship between crime and unemployment. Stigmatization as a result of long-term joblessness may positively impact on the crime rates.
On the contrary, most scholars are of the opinion that unemployment, especially long term, have a clear association with violent crimes. According to Nordin & Almén (2017) in their detailed research on the relationship between long term unemployment and crimes, they concluded that there is a significant positive association between long term joblessness and violent crimes. Furthermore, they argue that there exists a correlation between t...