Labelling Case Study

2046 Words5 Pages

ESSAY – LABELLING PERSPECTIVES
1. Define what criminology and introduce theory 200
Criminology is a field of scientific study focused on crimes and criminals. Criminology has been studied for many years, and throughout these years several theories have been developed to understand and predict the numerous causes of crimes and to figure out possible ways to respond and attempt to fix these crimes and make any improvements to the criminal justice system to ensure a safe society. One specific approach within criminology is the labelling perspectives. This theory aims to understand the response of others, who identify and interpret activities and certain individuals as deviant. This essay will examine the labelling perspective …show more content…

Frequently police have been seen in certain areas to target these groups and provide a sense of prejudice, therefore, showing a level of discrimination towards specific groups. It can be argued that appearance or altering ones appearance can be linked with criminal or deviant behaviour. Factors such as tattoos from labelling were consistent amongst those who were found to commit crimes and in turn, helped with the development of diversion programs like the ‘tattoo removal scheme’. This scheme was presented to those who had committed a crime; in particular the youth of society in hope removing their tattoos would offer them a better chance to ‘fit in’, thus, opening up job opportunities for them. Another well-known example of labelling if found within racial profiling. Racial discrimination is seen very often within the Australian society as a part of labelling a whole culture or race for one individual or groups action. Racial discrimination is when a person is treated less favourable than another person due to their race, colour, descent, national or ethnic origin or immigrant status (Australian Human Rights Commission, 2014). One specific sort of group that is seen to be racially discriminated within the Australian society are Africa- Australians. One very well-known example is the case of Haile-Michael and Others v Commissioner of Police and Others. Within the case six young African Australian men filed a law suit against the Victorian police on the grounds of racial discrimination as the police officers were doing regular ‘random checks’ on the 6 men for several years whilst they were living around the Flemington and North Melbourne area (Windle, J 2008). The men were targets of assaults and racial taunts by the public, and frequent received unnecessary questioning by police that would generally not be asked

Open Document