Submitted To-

Submitted By-

Dr. Imrose Tiwana

Aditya Mehtani
Roll no. 187/13
Section B,
B.A. LL.B. Hons.
3rd Semester.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to record my thanks to all who helped
and supported me in preparation of this project.
My deepest thanks to my Professor , Dr. Anupam
Bahri, the guide of this project. I thank her for guiding
me and correcting my project with attention and care.
She has taken the pain to go through the project and
make necessary corrections as and where required.
I would also like to thank my institution and my
family without whom I couldnt have completed my
project.

Social Control

Social control theory began to be studied as a separate

field in the early 20th century. Social control is a concept
that refers to the ways in which peoples thoughts, feelings,
appearance, and behavior are regulated in social systems.
One way this is done is through coercion, from imprisoning
those who commit a crime to physicians administering drugs
that make difficult patients more manageable. Social control,
however, is mainly done through socialization in which
people come to identify with a social system and its values
and norms, thereby acquiring a stake in maintaining those
values and norms. Social control refers generally to societal
and political mechanisms or processes that regulate
individual and group behavior, leading to conformity and
compliance to the rules of a given society, state, or social
group.
According to Mannheim, social control is the sum of those

methods by which a society tries to influence human

behavior to maintain a given order.

Any society must have harmony and order. Where there is

no harmony or order the society actually does not exist
because society is a harmonious organization of human
relationships. Unless the individuals live up to the prescribed
norms of conduct and unless their self-seeking impulses are
subjugated to the welfare of the whole it would be quite
difficult to maintain effectively the social organization.
Society in order to exist and progress has to exercise a
certain control over its members since any marked deviation
from the established ways is considered a threat to its
welfare. Such control has been termed by sociologists as
social control.
Social control has been defined by Maclver as the way in
which entire social order coheres and maintains itself- how it
operates as a whole as a changing equilibrium. To Ogburn
and Nimkoff the patterns of pressure that a society exerts to
maintain order and established rules is social control.
According to Gillin and Gillin social control is that system of
measures, suggestions, persuasions, restraint and coercion
by whatever means including physical force by which a

society brings into conformity to the approved pattern of

behavior or subgroup or by which a group molds into
conformity its members.

Sociologists identify two basic forms of social controls.

The means to enforce social control can be either formal or
informal.

1. Formal Social Control

2. Informal Social Control

1. Formal Social Control

Control here is based around the idea of formal, legal,
norms (or laws) of behaviour. That is, rules of behaviour that
are written down and, in societies such as our own, that
apply equally to everyone (not all societies apply formal
rules equally). Where laws are involved, it is usual to find a
group of people, normally employed by the government,
whose job it is to enforce the law. In our society, for
example, the main agency of formal social control is the
police and the judiciary (courts), although the armed forces

can, on occasions, be used to perform this role.

Not all formal norms are laws, however. When you are
accepted into an organisation (such as a school or college
for example), you agree to abide by the formal rules
governing behaviour in this institution. In this example, if you
do not attend classes then you will be punished in some
way.
In general terms, formal rules and social controls exist to
tell everyone within a society or social group what is and is
not acceptable in terms of behaviour. Such formal controls
usually exist where a group is very large and its members
are not in day-to-day contact with each other.

2. Informal Social Control

Like their formal counterpart, informal controls exist to
reward or punish people for acceptable / unacceptable
behaviour

(what

sociologists

call

deviance).

Informal

controls cover a vast array of possible sanctions and tend to

differ from individual to individual, group to group and
society to society. Informal controls apply to informal norms
of behaviour and they include things like ridicule, sarcasm,
disapproving looks, punching people in the face and so

forth.
For example, at a Women's Institute gathering a
disapproving look may be enough to tell you that people
think it is not appropriate to flirt with the vicar. Amongst
members of a criminal gang, however, it is unlikely that a
disapproving look would be used as a means of informal
social control should you tell them you intend to inform on
their activities to the police.

Some of the differences of formal and informal

social control are:
Formal social control includes written, formalized and
codified statements in laws, rules, and regulations.
Whereas informal control does not contain any written
rules.

Formal control agencies are authorized ones created by

government and informal control agencies are created by
social networks and organizations but not by government.

Formal control is much effective and stronger than

informal social control. Any situations which cannot be
handled by informal control are subjected to formal one.

Formal control is effective for even large groups of

population but informal control is effective only for a small
group of people.

Need for Social Control

Social solidarity is essential for the existence of society.No

two persons is alike in their na-ture, ideas, attitudes and
interests. Every individual is a separate personality. There
are cultural differences among the individuals. As a matter
of fact society is a heterogeneous or-ganization. If every
individual is allowed unrestricted freedom to act and
behave, it may cre-ate social disorder. For an orderly
social life social control is necessary. The aims of social
control are to bring out conformity, solidarity and continuity
of a particular group or society.
Social control is necessary for maintaining order in the
society. It is necessary for every soci-ety or group to
maintain its social order and this is possible only when its
members behave in accordance with that social order.

LABELING THEORY
Labeling theory is one of the most important approaches
to understanding deviant and criminal behavior. It stems
from the work of W.I. Thomas who, in 1928, wrote, "If men
define

situations

as

real,

they

are

real

in

their

consequences."Labeling theory was created by Howard

Becker in 1963. Labeling theory stresses the idea that
deviance is a relative term. Labeling theory takes the view
that people become criminals when labeled as such and
when they accept the label as a personal identity and
people become deviant not because of the act itself, but
how people react to that act..

Labeling theory is a vibrant area of research and theoretical

development within the field of criminology. Originating in the
mid- to late-1960s in the United States at a moment of
tremendous political and cultural conflict, labeling theorists
brought to center stage the role of government agencies,
and social processes in general, in the creation of deviance
and crime. The theory represented both a theoretical and
methodological break from the past, and it could reasonably

be argued that it was one of the dominant theoretical

perspectives in the study of crime and deviance from the late
1960s until the early 1980s. It was also responsible for
spurring countless empirical studies over this time period.
Although there were periods when interest in labeling
process was in decline, particularly after 1985, labeling
theory has had a bit of a resurgence in recent years.
Labeling theory has become part of a more general
criminological theory of sanctions that includes deterrence
theorys focus on the crime reduction possibilities of
sanctions,

procedural

justice

theorys

focus

on

the

importance of the manner in which sanctions are imposed,

and defiance/reintegrative theorys emphasis on individual
differences in the social bond and persons emotional
reaction to the label. Labeling theories of crime are often
referred to as social reaction theories, because they focus
primarily on the consequences of responses or reactions to
crime. These responses or reactions typically focus on three
sets of actors:
(1) informal social others, such as the friends, parents, or
partners of persons committing crimes, and who disapprove
of the offenders behavior.
(2) organizations or institutions such as the criminal justice
system, whose function it is to do something about crime.

(3) those who perceive a threat by some behavior and want

to see legislation passed to outlaw it.
All of these very diverse actions have one thing in common:
they are all reactions to crime. As such, they are said to be
labels because they have the quality of attaching a name or
a signature to someone or some behaviorhence the name
labeling theory. From this, labeling theory can be
understood as involving two main hypotheses. First is the
status characteristics hypothesis, which states that labels are
imposed in part because of the status of those doing the
labeling and those being labeled. The second is the
secondary deviance hypothesis, which essentially argues
that deviant labels create problems that the one being
labeled must adjust to and deal with, and that under certain
conditions labels can lead to greater involvement in crime
and deviance.
Edwin Lemert made a distinction between primary deviance
and secondary deviance.
1) primary deviance
primary deviance behavior that does not conform to the
social norms, but the behavior might be temporary,
fleeting, exploratory, trivial, or especially, concealed from
most others. The person who commits the deviant act

does not see him/herself as deviant; put differently, it is

not internalized as a part of the person's self concept
2) secondary deviance
The behavior that does not conform to the social norms, but
the behavior tends to be more sustained over time. The
person continues to do the deviant behavior even after being
caught and labeled by a social institution. The person
accepts the deviant label, incorporating it into the person's
self concept.
3) deviant career
deviant career
becomes

one's

continued secondary deviance, that

"job"

and

becomes

one's

primary

economic activity. Person accepts the deviant label.

4) radical non-intervention
radical non-intervention labeling theory's solution, at least to
juvenile deviance. Has two parts:
1) preferably do not label anyone, but especially not a
juvenile. Sociology knows that many adolescents reduce or
stop their deviance as they become adults and accept adult
statuses and roles. So labeling them might in fact prevent
that "becoming good" transition as they become adults.

2) if anyone has to be labeled, label fairly don't "peak" and

notice social class, race, sex, etc., and therefore label some
individuals differently than others.

Beginning in the 1950s with the work of people like Becker

and Lemert the symbolic interactionist approach to
deviance began to focus on the way in which negative
labels get applied and on the consequences of the
labeling process. Edwin Lemert, for example, made a
distinction between primary deviance and secondary
deviance. Primary deviance is rule-breaking behavior that
is carried out by people who see themselves and are seen
by others as basically conformist. People break rules in all
kinds of circumstances and for all kinds of reasons, such
that Lemert thought sociology can't possibly develop any
general theories about primary deviance. But when a
negative label gets applied so publicly and so powerfully
that it becomes part of that individual's identity, this is what
Lemert
negative

calls

secondary

labelings

deviance.

become

turning

These
points

dramatic
in

that

individual's identity; henceforth s/he is apt "to employ his

or her deviant behavior or a role based upon it as a means
of defense, attack, or adjustment to the problems created
the subsequent societal reaction." (Lemert) Having been
processed by the juvenile justice system and labeled a

delinquent, or harassed by the police as a gang member,

the individual takes on that label as a key aspect of his/her
identity. The theory explains deviance as a social process
whereby some people are able to define others as
deviant. It emphasizes that the deviance is relative -- it is
not until a label is given to someone by someone else in a
position of social power that the person actually
"becomes" a deviant.The theory has both strengths and
weaknesses. Think about what they might be.