This is an extract from dissertation on Capital Punishment:
Crime is a many and varied phenomenon. The search for answers to the problem of crime is not new nor an easy one. What is it that makes some individuals resort to criminal behaviour while others do not? It is intended in this essay to discuss and compare three criminological theories: Classicism – Positivism and Sutherland’s differential association theory, and how they have aided today’s understanding of crime.
Prior to classical criminology’s evolution in European society, the explanation of human behaviour was approached in one of two different ways. One was spiritualistic and the other was naturalistic. The spiritualistic explanation was one of other world powers or spirits controlling objects or persons and effecting their behaviour. Therefore criminal behaviour was caused by the individual being possessed by demons. On the other hand the naturalistic theory postulated that the explanation must be found within the world of physical and material fact (Vold, 1979). Continue reading