
Module SXY-3015:
Crime & Power
Module Facts
Run by School of History, Philosophy and Social Sciences
20.000 Credits or 10.000 ECTS Credits
Semester 2
Organiser: Prof Martina Feilzer
Overall aims and purpose
Power relations play a critical role in crime, crime control and criminalisation, three areas that form the core concerns of criminological enquiry. The aim of this module is to enable students to gain a deeper understanding of this critical role. This will be achieved by focusing on discrete areas of inquiry that illustrate the power relations that underpin the certain crimes such as domestic violence and state crime and how crime is managed and punished. This module aims to explore key theoretical ideas and texts on power as it affects individual relationships, organisations and organisational structures, and the State. It analyses a range of phenomena from State uses and abuses of power including extreme violence – genocide – to institutional and individual uses and abuses of power.
While the scale at which these various crimes take place ranges from the transnational to the interpersonal, we will consider the extent to which the dynamics of power may have similar elements. For example, processes of demonisation of the ‘other’ may apply both to racist and sexist crimes at an individual level and to crimes of ethnic or gender hatred on a larger scale – in wars and in genocide. We will examine discourses of power: the ways in which crime and justice, victims and offenders are represented, and the ways in which our understanding of these phenomena are socially constructed.
Course content
Part One: State crimes From ghettos to genocide: how does criminology and criminal justice respond when it is the State who offends? How do we define crime, justice and victimisation in this context?
Part Two: Institutional power Prisons represent institutional power at both physical and symbolic levels. Power may take many forms and examples include: prisons and the construction of masculinities and femininities; political power in prisons, using the example of Northern Ireland during the ‘Troubles’.
Part Three: Interpersonal crimes Many crimes of power take place at an interpersonal level: examples may include ‘honour’- based violence and coercion; homophobic hate crimes; and gender violence in intimate relationships. How do social and criminal justice systems respond to these forms of crime?
Assessment Criteria
threshold
Threshold students should be able to:- Explain what is meant by power relations within the context of crime, deviance and criminal justice; identify and explain some of the models of justice; appreciate some of the ways in which the application of power is legitimised or criminalised; locate crime and power within a broader explanatory framework.
good
Good students should be able to:- Examine and critically reflect on what is meant by power relations within the context of crime, devaince and criminal justice; explain with accuracy the various models of justice; evaluate and diverse ways in which the application of power is legitimised or criminalised; apply an understanding of crime and power within a broader conceptual framework.
excellent
Excellent students should be able to:- Examine and critically analyse power relations within the context of crime, devaince and criminal justice; critically analyse the various models of justice; demonstrate an insight into the diverse ways in which the application of power is legitimised or criminalised; locate critiques or crime and power within a broader conceptual framework.
Learning outcomes
-
Apply an understanding of crime and power to broader frameworks, e.g. political and economic.
-
Understand what is meant by power relations between and amongst individuals, organisations and the State in the context of crime, deviance and criminal justice
-
Understand the different ways in which power can be used and abused.
-
Acquire a knowledge of the mechanisms that help to protect individuals and organisations from these abuses.
-
Appreciate the diverse ways in which the application of power is legitimised or criminalised.
Assessment Methods
Type | Name | Description | Weight |
---|---|---|---|
Powerpoint presentation | 30.00 | ||
3,000 word essay s2 | 70.00 |
Teaching and Learning Strategy
Hours | ||
---|---|---|
Workshop | There will be 12 x 2 hour workshops on a weekly basis. This will incorporate both lecture format and will also provide opportunites for collaborative learning and incorporate group work. |
24 |
Private study | 176 |
Transferable skills
- Literacy - Proficiency in reading and writing through a variety of media
- Self-Management - Able to work unsupervised in an efficient, punctual and structured manner. To examine the outcomes of tasks and events, and judge levels of quality and importance
- Exploring - Able to investigate, research and consider alternatives
- Information retrieval - Able to access different and multiple sources of information
- Inter-personal - Able to question, actively listen, examine given answers and interact sensitevely with others
- Critical analysis & Problem Solving - Able to deconstruct and analyse problems or complex situations. To find solutions to problems through analyses and exploration of all possibilities using appropriate methods, rescources and creativity.
- Presentation - Able to clearly present information and explanations to an audience. Through the written or oral mode of communication accurately and concisely.
- Teamwork - Able to constructively cooperate with others on a common task, and/or be part of a day-to-day working team
- Argument - Able to put forward, debate and justify an opinion or a course of action, with an individual or in a wider group setting
Subject specific skills
- Capacity to identify and describe the causes and consequences of social order and change in specific contexts.
- Ability to formulate and investigate sociologically informed questions.
- Appreciate a range of research designs and strategies and how they may be applied to sociological investigations.
- Competence to carry out a piece of sociological research using either primary or secondary data, or both.
- Undertake either on their own, or in collaboration with others, investigations of social questions, issues and problems, using statistical and other data derived from research publications.
- The ability to identify criminological problems, formulate questions and investigate them
- Competence in using criminological theory and concepts to understand crime, victimisation, responses to crime and deviance; and representations of crime, victimisation, and responses to these, as presented in the traditional and new media and official reports
- The capacity to analyse, assess and communicate empirical information about crime, victimisation, responses to crime and deviance, and representations of crime
Resources
Resource implications for students
Students are not required to purchase any resources.
Talis Reading list
http://readinglists.bangor.ac.uk/modules/sxy-3015.htmlReading list
Key texts are available via Talis reading list. This has been created and approved. Other resources such as websites are available online.
Pre- and Co-requisite Modules
Pre-requisites:
Courses including this module
Compulsory in courses:
- M93B: BA Criminology & Criminal Just (4yr with Incorp Foundation) year 3 (BA/CCJ1)
- M931: BA Criminology & Criminal Justice with International Exp year 4 (BA/CJIE)
- M930: BA Criminology & Criminal Justice year 3 (BA/CRIM)
- M932: MSocSci Criminology & Criminal Justice year 3 (MSOCSCI/CCJ)
Optional in courses:
- LM3Y: BA Cymdeithaseg&CriminologyCrimJ year 3 (BA/CCCJ)
- MR95: BA Criminology&Criml Just/Italian year 2 (BA/CRIT)
- MR95: BA Criminology&Criml Just/Italian year 4 (BA/CRIT)
- MC98: BA Criminology/Psychology year 2 (BA/CRP)
- MC98: BA Criminology/Psychology year 3 (BA/CRP)
- MR94: BA Criminology/Spanish year 2 (BA/CRSP)
- MR94: BA Criminology/Spanish year 4 (BA/CRSP)
- X317: BA Childhood and Youth Studies and Social Policy year 3 (BA/CYSP)
- X315: BA Childhood and Youth Studies and Sociology year 3 (BA/CYSS)
- LL13: BA Sociology/Economics year 3 (BA/ECS)
- LL2B: BA Sociology & Economics (4 yr with Incorporated Foundation) year 3 (BA/ECS1)
- LQ3J: BA English Lang. & Sociology year 3 (BA/ELSOC)
- M3Q9: BA English Literature and Criminology and Criminal Justice year 2 (BA/ENC)
- M3Q9: BA English Literature and Criminology and Criminal Justice year 3 (BA/ENC)
- MR91: BA French/Criminology&Crim'l Just year 2 (BA/FRCR)
- MR91: BA French/Criminology&Crim'l Just year 4 (BA/FRCR)
- MR92: BA Criminology&CrimJustice/German year 2 (BA/GCR)
- MR92: BA Criminology&CrimJustice/German year 4 (BA/GCR)
- MVX1: BA History/Criminology year 2 (BA/HCR)
- MVX1: BA History/Criminology year 3 (BA/HCR)
- LM52: BA Health & Social Care / Criminology & Criminal Justice year 2 (BA/HSCCCJ)
- LM52: BA Health & Social Care / Criminology & Criminal Justice year 3 (BA/HSCCCJ)
- LL53: BA Health & Social Care/Sociology year 3 (BA/HSCS)
- LL54: BA Hlth & Scl Care/Social Policy year 3 (BA/HSCSP)
- LP33: BA Media Studies and Sociology year 3 (BA/MSSOC)
- LM4X: BA Polisi Cymdeithasol & Criminology and Criminal Justice year 3 (BA/PCCCJ)
- CL83: BA Sociology/Psychology year 3 (BA/PS)
- L300: BA Sociology year 3 (BA/S)
- L31B: BA Sociology (4 year with Incorporated Foundation) year 3 (BA/S1)
- LM40: BA Sociology & Criminology & Crim Just with International Ex year 4 (BA/SCJIE)
- LM39: BA Sociology and Criminology & Criminal Justice year 3 (BA/SCR)
- 3L3Q: BA Sociology and English Literature year 3 (BA/SEL)
- LV31: BA Sociology/History year 3 (BA/SH)
- 8Y70: BA Sociology (with International Experience) year 4 (BA/SIE)
- LQ31: BA Sociology/Linguistics year 3 (BA/SL)
- L41B: BA Social Policy (4 year with Incorporated Foundation) year 3 (BA/SOCP1)
- L402: BA Social Policy year 3 (BA/SOCPOL)
- LL34: BA Sociology and Social Policy year 3 (BA/SOCSP)
- LM50: BA Social Policy and Criminology and Criminal Justice (IE) year 4 (BA/SPCIE)
- LM49: BA Social Policy/Criminology year 3 (BA/SPCR)
- LL14: BA Social Policy/Economics year 3 (BA/SPEC)
- LL1B: BA Social Policy & Economics (4yr with Incorp Foundation) year 3 (BA/SPEC1)
- LV41: BA Social Policy/History year 3 (BA/SPH)
- CL84: BA Social Policy/Psychology year 3 (BA/SPP)
- LVH2: BA Welsh History/Sociology year 3 (BA/WHS)
- LQ35: BA Cymraeg and Sociology year 3 (BA/WS)
- M108: LLB Law with Social Policy (International Experience) year 4 (LLB/LIF)
- M113: LLB Law with Criminology (Intl Exp) year 4 (LLB/LIK)
- M1L4: LLB Law with Social Policy year 3 (LLB/LSP)
- M1LB: LLB Law with Social Policy (4 yr with Incorp Foundation) year 3 (LLB/LSP1)
- M1M9: LLB Law with Criminology year 3 (LLB/LWCR)
- M1MB: LLB Law with Criminology (4 yr with Incorporated Foundation) year 3 (LLB/LWCR1)
- L302: MSocSci Sociology year 3 (MSOCSCI/S)
- L403: MSocSci Social Policy year 3 (MSOCSCI/SP)