犯罪作为社会控制

Crime as Social Control

对于犯罪,人们通常关注的是它本身的违法性和社会危害性,但是在更广阔的历史和空间的角度上,犯罪其实是对先前侵犯行为的报复。众多的社会学调查的结果表明,不管在过去还是当下,刑法学中认为的犯罪行为人很多情况下都是受害人,而犯罪行为是他们对先前不满采取的自助行为,是对不轨行为的反应,因而犯罪成为一种社会控制。从理论上分析这一自助方式,可以预测和解释犯罪。

Although it is the illegitimacy and social harmfulness of crime that we are usually concerned with, crime is actually retaliation to previous violation in a broader historical context. Results of many sociological studies show that criminals, according to criminal law, are victims in many cases, whether in the past or at present time. Criminal behavior is self-belp to previous complaint and response to deviant behavior, therefore it becomes a kind of social control. Crime could be forecasted and interpreted by ana- lyzing this kind of self-help according to a given theory.