#history of criminology

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"There can be no systematic intellectual progress in the study of organized crime assuming contentious governing structures beforehand.

Feuds and vendettas are endemic within underworld societies though one cannot assume there are never any effective restraints. It makes perfectly good sense for mobsters of any ethnic or racial background in any era to realize that killing other mobsters is dangerous and for them to seek allies or determine the range of opponents when contemplating such action. Sometimes those they wish to kill are frightening enough to restrain violence; sometimes not. Reasonable fear aside, there are other factors which either impede or stimulate organized crime's internal violence. Among the most important is whether or not there is a serious law enforcement investigation focusing on particular syndicates. For when organized criminals face potentially decisive prosecutions, they turn to killing one another with abandon knowing that their closest allies pose an unacceptable risk.

Informing is often good for business particularly when it eliminates competition in various illicit activities. Giving up other criminals thus helps to keep the police away from one's own door. Informing is also demanded by law enforcement for its own organizational needs, both for continuing general intelligence and to maintain a record of arrests and prosecutions. All this without mentioning corruption in the classic sense, where police figures are more deeply embedded members of criminal syndicates, or those variants where police units are in effect criminal syndicates. In these variations, intelligence-gathering through a flow of coerced underworld informants is constant. In the complex web of relations between organized crime and law enforcement, informing on others is a crucially important activity. That organized criminals "grass" to police is more the rule than is the romantic notion of "omerta." This naturally sets off a murderous Cycle - those with critical information know they may well be killed by their closest confederates so they in turn either kill them, flee, turn to law enforcement as informants. It is always a very precarious business, with treachery at every step.

Patron-client networks which can be thought of as complex grids of constantly changing social power holding precariously together professional criminals, their clients and victims, criminal lawyers, police and politicians, are the predominant form of association characteristic of underworlds. Obviously crime bosses and others in these networks seek to achieve a situation in which they will be protected-bosses from ambitious underlings and rival bosses, underlings and associates from bosses either somewhat psychopathic or under pressure from law enforcement. But there are no methods for controlling violence once these networks begin to change as they invariably do, except the traditional one of murdering actual and more importantly potential informers.

In the social world of organized crime who can ever know with certainty what criminal with important knowledge will inform? The fluid structure of criminal syndicates and the turbulent world within which organized criminals operate always undermine loyalty and restraint despite what crime bosses anxious about their safety may wish. The most important variables of instability are the waxing and waning of law enforcement's needs, the pressures of political reform movements, and simple ambition. They all have a corrosive effect on the connective tissue of patron-clientage.

Nonetheless, the notion of contained violence still persists, as Buscetta's testimony makes clear, indicating it probably serves other purposes or represents an "idealization" of organized crime. In fact, an "idealized" version of organized crime's development may well aid the bureaucratic needs of state agencies. It also appears to fit with popular though mistaken social science paradigms; in this case that of criminal modernization. In the latter case this theme-- sanctioned murder leading to a more complex criminal organization or the other way round-gained a foothold among criminologists because it seemed so logical. Hence, it was not noticed that it reversed the link between data and interpretation. Underworld tattlers filled in the appropriate empirical slots in an already extant theoretical structure.

The most cogent criminological statement that reveals this backward development was given by Robert T. Anderson several decades ago, In his quite famous article, "From Mafia to Cosa Nostra," published in the American Journal of Sociology, argued that the Sicilian Mafia was changing as Sicily itself underwent the process of modernization. Part of that process can be observed, Anderson noted, in the Mafia's adaptation and expansion of its "techniques of exploitation." Quoting from a 1960 article by reporter Claire Sterling, Anderson found that the Mafia had become urbanized:

Today there is not only a Mafia of the feudo (agriculture) but also Mafias of truck gardens, wholesale fruit and vegetable markets, water supply, meat, fishing fleets, flowers, funerals, beer, carrozze (hacks), garages, and construction. Indeed, there is hardly a businessman in western Sicily who doesn't pay for the Mafia's 'protection' in the form of 'u pizzu.

It is not certain what is urban about all these activities (fishing fleets, for instance), but it is plain that Mafia enterprises had widened from what earlier accounts had suggested.

When all was said and done, the dramatic point was that the Mafia "has bureaucratized," or almost bureaucratized, or was on the road to bureaucratization. Anderson wrote that the old or traditional Mafia was "family-like," lacking at least three of the four necessary "characteristics of a bureaucracy." However, that was all changing as Sicily "poised for industrialization with its concomitant changes." But because Sicily was on the brink of modernization, the Sicilian Mafia was momentarily, at least, a mix of the old and the new. There was no doubt, however, where it was heading.

Remarkably enough, it was the American Mafia that provided the example and model. It had achieved bureaucratization, remarked Anderson, "beyond that even of bureaucratized Sicilian groups." One of the key elements in this process involved a striking change in Mafia custom: "Modern mafiosi avoid the use of force as much as possible, and thus differ strikingly from old Sicilian practice." Here, Anderson intimates that the contemporary Sicilian Mafia is also moving in the same direction--away from violence toward other methods of dispute settlement. His discussion of the American Cosa Nostra holds that this overarching structure which is both a proof and attribute of Mafia bureaucratization serves to "adjudicate disputes…to minimize internecine strife, rather than to administer co-operative undertakings."

- Alan A. Block, "Organized Crime: History and Historiography,” in Space, Time & Organized Crime. Second Edition. New York: Routledge, 2020 (originally 1994). p. 33-35.

[iva333can]

Eugène-François Vidocq: From Criminal to Master Criminologist

The latest Vidocq’s reincarnation in the movie The Emperor of Paris starring Vincent Cassel (2018) . In the heart of Paris lies a tale as complex as the city itself: the story of Paris Sûreté and its legendary founder, Eugène-François Vidocq, the criminal who became the first modern criminologist. An investigation bureau composed of undercover officers was established in 1812 under the name…

[anxietyfrappuccino]

i'm the kind of nerd that enjoys all the different kinds of nerd stuff but i could not tell you a single thing about any of it, i am a black hole of "oh, that's cool" and then it's gone

[deadpoetsfall]

listening to classical music while losing my mind over my assignment i feel half like richard papen (losing my mind) & half like henry winter (listening to classical music)

[ing3nues]

born to be a renowned scholar, with infinite knowledge about ancient civilizations, history and literature in general, polyglot in a plethora of dead languages, whose main source of income is translating ancient text into other languages with terrifying precision and detail while still preserving the sentiment and emotion intended by the original writer, forced to become a psychologist because i live in a country that revolves around stem, where academia is beneficial only if you’re born wealthy or work your life away

[canon-toaster]

Audrey Klein and Leonard college AU because i love them and i wanted to draw different interactions between them

bonus colored Audrey below

[deadstrangeblog]

After almost a year of exorcisms, sometimes lasting 4 hours at a time, Michel worsened physically and mentally. She was aggressive, would mutilate herself, and hunted and ate insects like a starved animal. In November 1973, she started taking her antipsychotic drugs regularly again. Despite taking these medications, Michel’s psychosis worsened and she began speaking only in gutteral growls and claiming she saw demons. On July 1st 1976, Michel died at home.

She weighed just 67lbs due to severe starvation and her death was caused by extreme malnutrition and dehydration. A post-mortem revealed her knees were broken due to only crawling around on all fours for months, and she had contracted pneumonia. Her parents, along with two Catholic priests, were charged with negligent homicide as investigators agreed her death was preventable. Sadly, a lack of mental health awareness at the time and an obsession with demons meant that it was too late for Anneliese Michel, and this once happy girl had her life cruelly cut short.

[make-death-proud-to-takeus]

Fellow writers, where can I find some knowledge about poisons, drugs, alcohol with descriptions of overdose and what happens with the body leading to death?

[ohchrischris]

French anarchist of the day. Via the Met's collection of Alphonse Bertillon's early mugshots for the Paris police.

[graciesmind]

So erm...im new here

Hello, this is my first tumblr blog and tbh...a lil scured...but heres an intro

My name is Grace and I use they/them pronouns. I am a freshman in college and am double majoring in History and Psych, as well as a minor in Korean and Criminology. I love to learn (obviously), but I also have a lot of mental stuff going on, which I will mostly post about here, while my academic stuff is on my other blog. I like kpop, dancing, activism, reading, crocheting, and hanging out with my boyfriend and our pets.

Nice to meet you <3

[thestarwarslesbian]

I got my criminology results!!!

I got a C I was 2 grades away from the top grade.

I've got 2 more exams before I get my Diploma!!!!

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"Whether an understanding of cultural rivalries tells us more about violence within Italian-American organized crime, and something about relations between American criminals and those from abroad, is naturally not settled. But it seems a more fruitful line of inquiry than the one chosen which is to see all events, in some cases since 1890, in others 1900, or 1930, or 1931, or 1936 through [Mafia] Commission-colored glasses. Let me suggest that American organized crime would have been more or less the same had Sicilians, Neapolitans, and Calabrians never migrated to the U.S. Though much of American organized crime is ethnically oriented, it never depended on the migration of criminally-inclined Southern Italians to prosper. In fact, as far as drug racketeering is concerned, the important entry of Italian American gangsters came after World War II, and their presence signalled a mostly disastrous reorientation of the American market according to users.

As many addicts attested, Jewish-American racketeers were disproportionately represented in smuggling and distributing opium and opiates. Moreover, their dope was purer and cheaper than what came after they apparently left the scene. The accounts indicate that they were replaced particularly after World War II by Italian-American racketeers who sold terrible heroin (cut far too many times with far too much toxic junk) for exorbitant prices. This ethnic change thus represented an era of increasing pain and desperation for users.

The transformation of notable drug racketeers from Jewish- Americans to Italian-Americans was at least partially the result of the Nazi interregnum which destroyed everything Jewish in Europe including overseas traders who supplied American drug distributors. In addition, the effects of chaos in Asia particularly after Pearl Harbor finished other American-Jewish connections with European-born traders living in Chinese coastal cities such as Shanghai and Tientsin. The comparatively stable connections of the pre-Nazi prewar decades which had produced purer narcotics at affordable prices were terminated. Italian-American racketeers responded to the temporary shortage of narcotics and their new position on the line of production and supply in predictably capitalist ways-prices soared and quality plummeted. It was only the postwar U.S. drug world that was crafted on the distribution of bad heroin by Italian-American racketeers to users who were overwhelmingly African-American. It must also be added that for at least the two decades following the war the overseas suppliers for the Italian-American drug distributors were typically French, Greek, Lebanese, and Syrian traders.

The historical reasons for these factor are not difficult to ascertain. The vast majority of Italian-American migrants to the U.S. came from impoverished rural agricultural backgrounds. The history of the Mezzogiorno from the Risorgimento (1860) through World War 2 maintained that backward exploited agriculture zone deliberately that by northern Italian industrialists their political cronies. Historian Jack Reece notes that Sicilians did not participate in post World War I protest movements characteristic of Northern Italy because social, political and economic structures there were "retarded" - "There were no factory occupations in Sicily because there were virtually no factories."

The typical Mafia crimes of this period were "cattle rustling, robbery and extortion." Politically astute Sicilians complained quite rightly that Sicily was far more like a colonial outpost than a "constituent part of the Italian Kingdom." Ceasare Mori, the Prefecture of Police under the Fascist regime, argued that the Mafia was a consequence of illiteracy and pauperism, malaria and chronic economic exploitation brought about by an antediluvian "Latifundia" system, and the personal politics of "clientelism." As so many historians and social scientists have found, the Mafia phenomenon emanated in the post-Risorgimento movement of estate guards to rural power brokers largely caused by the landlords' endemic absenteeism. Southern Italians who migrated to the U.S. in the latter decades of the nineteenth and the early ones of the twentieth centuries unquestionably lacked entrepreneurial skills honed from a commercial environment. They were a world apart from any phase of international commerce including the commerce of drugs. They were far different in this respect from many of the Eastern European migrants to the U.S. who had these skills and contacts with European, Middle East, and Far East contraband traders.

As common sense suggests, Americans who either shared a communal heritage with overseas criminals or otherwise were prepared to develop overseas contacts were far more successful than those without the heritage or contacts. The latter's primary recourse if they wished to enter the narcotics trade was to align themselves with key U.S. importers and wholesalers which is precisely what was done. Italian-American underworld figures who aligned with Jewish-American ones were thus enabled to work in the more profitable spheres of drug trafficking."

- Alan A. Block, "Organized Crime: History and Historiography," in Space, Time & Organized Crime. Second Edition. New York: Routledge, 2020 (originally 1994). p. 40-42.

[birdiebats]

The difficulty with sociology essays is there’s so much crossover into other disciplines I am never sure if the final product is even considered a sociology essay

[ohwellwhateevernevermind]

okay I'm looking at degrees and about to literally close my eyes and point at the closest. help me

[millingroundireland]

RBM III and the study of criminology

RBM III was rarely mentioned in the ASC's Criminologist. In 1979 was an article (page 11) saying he was from the University of Cincinnati and ex-officio and that he was helping organize the Academy of Criminal Sciences Annual Conference which would be held in Cincinnati that year.

More than that, I found a few articles by him in the student-run Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology, a publication of Northwestern University School of Law "that prints four issues annually and rests upon a century of scholarship devoted to the scientific study of criminal law and criminology" as it currently describes itself.

The first of these was in 1966, with RBM III as a co-author with Robert J. McDevitt and Sandra Tonkin. It was titled "Situational Tests in Metropolitan Police Recruit Selection." The nine-page article described the authors as following:

Robert B. Mills, Ph.D., is an assistant professor in Department of Psychology and Psychiatry, University of Cincinnati, and the chief psychologist, Division of Mental Health, Health Department, City of Cincinnati. Dr. Mills received his Ph.D. from Columbia University. His present paper is based upon work done with the Cincinnati Police Department. Robert J. McDevitt is a practicing psychiatrist in Cincinnati, Ohio. He serves as a consulting psychiatrist, Division of Mental Health, Department of Health, City of Cincinnati, and an instructor in psychiatry at the University of Cincinnati. He received his medical degree from St. Louis University and performed his psychiatric residency at Ohio State University. Sandra Tonkin is a graduate assistant in the Department of Psychology at the University of Cincinnati.

I guess it is no surprise that all these people are based in Cincinnati, two of which at the University of Cincinnati. Sandra Tonkin may have been RBM III's GA. The article has been uploaded here for your reading pleasure. At the end of the article, one of the articles cited is a talk RBM III gave, with two others (the same ones who co-authored this article with him), at the American Psychological Association (APA)'s gathering in 1964:

This post was originally published on WordPress in January 2019.

One compilation (original link here) summarizes, on page 43, the above mentioned 1966 article, adding that RBM III should be contacted for further information:

The authors describe three situational tests that have been used experimentally to assess the performance of Cincinnati police recruits receiving Police Academy training. The situational tests, modeled after the tests used by the Office of Strategic Services during World War II, were designed to simulate natural field problems that officers might typically encounter. During the five to six hour psychological evaluation, the candidates worked on the tasks while observers rated the candidates' performance under simulated stress conditions. The tasks were designed so that their completion did not depend on skills developed through specialized training or experience. Group activities were included so that the candidates leadership qualities and capacity for teamwork could be assessed. One task was called The Foot Patrol Observation Test and in this test the candidates were instructed to walk to a specified building through a busy, predominantly Negro business neighborhood, making observations along the route. Afterwards, they were asked to complete multiple-choice questions and open-ended essays that were getting at attitudes about law enforcement and at the same time providing a writing sample. The second test was the Clues Test which involved candidates investigation of a hypothetical city employee. Observations occurred in a roped off area of a simulated office that had clues such as race-track sheets, Scotch bottles, a passport application and a memo from the City Manager requiring audit of certain accounts. The candidates completed a questionnaire that cw led for factual data as well as hypotheses regarding such matters as the employee's whereabouts and possible basis for prosecution. The third task called the Bull Session is a group diagnostic procedure in which an evaluation team observes candidates interacting with their peers, after being briefed on the strengths and weaknesses of candidates. The group leaders began the discussion of topics relating to police work including such subjects as the use of force, the handling of fear, and the use of narcotics. The questions were usually presented as personal experiences or as hypothetical situations. At the end, a "debriefing" session was held to restore emotional equilibrium. The Bull Session was considered by the staff to be a Most valuable selection technique used at the time. The authors note that situational testing could be used as a supplement to both written tests and personality inventories once adequate reliability can be established and the test scores arc evaluated in relation to measures of effective police field performance. For further information, contact: Robert H. Mills, Ph.D. Professor & Head Department of Criminal Justice University of Cincinnati Cincinnati, Ohio

Then there are two articles by RBM III alone in 1969: "Commentary on the Symposium" and  "Use of Diagnostic Small Groups in Police Recruit Selection and Training." Let's start with the first one. This two-page article focuses on stereotypes people have on police and his worries about police professionalization. It can be read here. [2] The second article, which was presented at the APA's 1968 convention, focused on police training and recruiting. In the paper, which can be read online, if you wish, here, cites his 1966 paper noted earlier:

One article in 1972 cites the 1966 paper of which RBM III was a co-author, writing that

Mills, McDevitt, and Tonkin (6) found that in 55 U.S. cities having populations greater than 150,000 some sort of psychological testing was used in the selection of police recruits. In addition, 16% of these same cities used some type of psychiatric interview, 85% used some measure of aptitude.

There are two articles in 1970 which are seemingly by RBM III. [1] In 1964, he reviewed Michael Harrington's The Other America for Crime & Delinquency and in 1965, he reviewed Thomas F. Pettigrew's A Profile of the Negro American. [3] He also wrote to Howard Belding Gill, described as a published criminologist by a finding aid. He also seems to have helped a criminal justice program started at Texas A&M University in Corpus Christi in 1980. At some point or another, he wrote an article titled "Qualities of a Successful Police Officer" which was summarized by one site (and another) as

(1) Motivation for a police career, (2) normal self-assertiveness, (3) emotional stability under stress, (4) sensitivity towards minority groups and social deviates, (5) collaborative leadership skills, (6) mature relationship with social authority, (7) flexibility, (8) integrity and honesty, (9) active and outgoing nature

This connects to his talk to the APA in Honolulu in 1972 (on page 45 of this document), in which he talked about a "new breed" of police officers:

After RBM III's death in 1981, varied people have won his graduate award:

Andrew J. Meyer of the Department of Criminal Justice and Political Science at North Dakota State University

Colleen Kadleck of the School of Criminology & Criminal Justice at University of Nebraska at Omaha

Jennifer Webster of the Criminal Justice Program at McKendree University

Kevin M. Beaver of Florida State University, College of Criminology

Hannah McManus, ‎Research Assistant, ‎International Association of Chiefs of Police & University of Cincinnati

Ashley L. Bauman, Division of Criminal Justice University of Cincinnati

Melissa Burek, Bowling Green State University

Kelsey Mattick, Data Technician, Multnomah County Department

Kristan Ott, Underwriting Manager, The Business Backer

Michael John, Cincinnati Police Department

Additionally, his works, especially his book Offender assessment: A casebook in corrections (reviewed in the Journal of Criminal Justice in 1980), were cited in John J. Miletich's Police, Firefighter, and Paramedic Stress: An Annotated Bibliography, Perspectives in Law & Psychology (reprinting his Clues Test), Chapter 2 of an analysis of the Police's labor market, Correctional Ethics (2017 book), the Handbook of Scales for Research in Crime and Delinquency (1983 book), and the Police Executive Research Forum's 2004 report.

© 2018-2023 Burkely Hermann. All rights reserved.

Notes

[1] "Practicum Placement in a Counseling‐Employment Agency for Disadvantaged Youth" and "Situational group counseling with disadvantaged youth." Other artcles include "Introducing Foster Mother Training Groups in a Voluntary Child Welfare Agency";

[2] Page 44 of this document summarizes this article as follows: "Mills describes a police selection exercise called the "Prisoner's Dilemma." It takes up the first half of a two-hour "Bull Session." Eight to twelve candidates participate after they have completed all other selection procedures. The four-person evaluation team includes two group leaders and two participant-observers who instruct the candidates to make their views known, and caution them not to "hide" themselves within the group. The candidates are divided into two teams, with four to six candidates in each group. They are told that the purpose of the exercise is to maximize the number of points their team obtains. But as it turns out, the only strategy that wins points is one in which there is a collaboration on the part of both teams. During the exercise, there are specified opportunities in which the "negotiators" for each, team can meet to discuss their strategy, thus providing the evaluation team with opportunities to observe leadership behavior, personal persuasiveness and ability to function under pressure. Police recruits react differently to this exercise than do college students or members of the clergy.The police candidates more aggressive in getting points for their time. The evaluation team uses a combination of objective and projective types of personality tests as well as situational tasks such as the small group technique described in this paper. The team presents to the Civil Service Commission a recommendation on each candidate, describing each as either "acceptable" or as a "high risk" candidate."

[3] He also Samuel Yochelson and  Stanton E. Samenow's The Criminal Personality: A Profile for Change as reported online, saying "The Criminal Personality is a seminal work that provides challenge to mental health professionals to alter their preconceptions in dealing with criminals, and gives correctional counselors a blueprint to begin the serious work of criminal rehabilitation. One by one the cherished myths of sociology and psychology regarding the origins of criminality are discarded, since the authors find that rationalizations of broken family, racial oppression, bad companions, and lack opportunity' are utilized by criminals to justify continued nonresponsibility for their own behavior." Also mentioned here and here, along with here.

[lookb4uleap]

Confronting Indian Residential School Confabulation and Media Irresponsibility

Responding to Gerbrandt and Carleton’s “Debunking the Mass Grave Hoax” by Michelle Stirling ©2023 Canada is in the grip of a ‘mass grave/missing children’ psychosis related to Indian Residential Schools.  The ‘shock and awe’ media campaign that accompanied the statements by the Kamloops First Nation in May of 2021 claiming that clandestinely buried children’s bodies or remains had been found in…