Summary Of Social Disorganization Theory

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Chapter four is about the topic of social structural causes of delinquency. Areas covered are theories such as disorganization theory, cultural deviance theories, and many more. It also includes information to structural explanations and the contribution they play in juvenile delinquency. Social Disorganization theory is a well-known approach created by Clifford Shaw and Henry McKay. It discusses the inability of a community structure to realize the common values of its residents and maintain effective social control. It is focusing on the macro level of practice compared to mezzo or micro. Communities play a big role in an individual’s life, especially when they are growing up and watching what is done around them. An insight into this is …show more content…

There are many various actions that have been taken to help with the prevention such as the Chicago Area Project. It was created by Clifford Shaw and Henry McKay with the hopes that it would problem solve in the local areas. They believed instead of sending troubled youth straight into the system, their community should deal with the problems in it and intervene for the sake of the youth. The three main focuses of this project was to provide a forum for locals to become aware of new perspectives with social thing such as child welfare and juvenile delinquency, to initiate new ways of communication between the locals and the representative of the larger community, and to bring adults into contact with the local youths. This prevention program worked well for many years with a decrease in drug use, until workers started have burn out. Overall though, community policing and efforts for prevention have been based off of this program to help better …show more content…

One of them is the reduced or lack of social capital which are resources that reside in the social structure itself such as norms, social networks, and interpersonal relationships. An insight with this is that these contributions to the growth of a child can either create a negative or positive reaction due to the strength of the social capitalism. Lower-class youth are the most common to lack the social capital needed to realize and reach the potential they have which can be connected to many things such as economic struggle, family problems, and many other things. The lack of success in life is what can be a main cause of delinquent acts because they may have a hard time coping with the issues going on. Poverty is one of the main issues social capital is referring to because the youth can lack the basic needs they should get, which means they also aren’t receiving the parts of life like social connection. Within the textbook, Steven F. Messner collected data and found that child poverty is related to the arrest rates in delinquency. Overall, reduction in social capital can take a toll on the developing youth and the life they have ahead of

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