LABELING THEORIES

Labeling Theories

Labeling Theories

Labeling Theories

Labeling theorists believe that labeling and reacting to offenders as "criminals" has unanticipated negative consequences, deepening the criminal behavior and making the crime problem worse. They believe that the criminal justice system is dangerous in the sense that it is "casting the net" of social control too widely. Thus, net-widening, or any state intervention, is inherently criminogenic.

Furthermore, scholars in this tradition work with revisionist assumptions of what crime is. Broadly defined, revisionism in criminology refers to a rejection of legalistic conceptions of what crime is. Labeling theorists therefore are critical of conceptions that crime is ...