Molly Waitt 1

Agnew’s General

Strain Theory & The Mob

Molly Waitt

Crime Film: Final Paper

Due: April 19, 2015

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Introduction

From the God Father, to Goodfellas, all the way to Scarface, organized crime has been

a major part of crime films for many years, dating back all the way to the 1930’s. Also many

different historical events can be based of backgrounds of these movies. Some of them are

based of real stories and some are fabricated. The violence, loyalty, and fear are seen through

the 3 movies listed above. Along with the themes above, many different criminal justice

theories along with social strain theory are shown throughout crime films. According to

Robert Merton’s strain theory, there are 5 different types of people who make efforts for the

future (Applying Merton’s Theory.) While looking at crime movies, you can see the many

different sides of Merton’s theory, from the conformist to the rebels. These movies tend to

have a historical background and focus on many famous mobsters or gangsters such as

Henry Hill, an Irish gangster, along side his crime family and friends or Al Capone, an Italian

gangster.

Merton’s strain theory starts by discussing conformist. These are the people who

make efforts for their future. In many ways this is following social norms and having a legal

way to achieve these means (Applying Merton’s Theory.) The goals are essentially obtains

from working hard, going to school and getting a job. Although conformists are not the focus

of crime films, there are many instances where they are shown. This gives the viewer a

better understanding of the extent of some of the other roles and the path that some of the

characters in each plot take.

Next, Merton touches upon ritualist, who rejects the social norms goals, going with

the norm of studying or working but never wanting to extent, it to achieve goals. This is less

seen throughout movies because the comparison doesn’t show the part of the theory crime

really focuses on. The third are the innovators. They have big dreams and are very much

about living the American dream and succeeding in life. The difference is they have different
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ways of obtaining these goals. They tend to be very passionate about goals just find a

different way. Fourth are retreatists. These are people who may not go to school or stay

away from the rest of society. Last and most important to crime films is the rebels. The

rebels don’t just reject social goals but also ignore the way to achieve them. This is a change

in society by causing crime, whether its killing or dealing drugs. This is important because it

takes a look at a completely different lifestyle than conformist. Conformist can be seen as the

norm of society, following all of the right ways to achieve what is seen as a common goal.

Showing conformist shows the extreme that mobsters or rebels (Applying Merton’s Theory.)

Overall, many different theories are seen throughout crime films but articles such as

Assessing Determinacy and Indeterminacy across Life Domains by Stacy De Coster and Lisa

Kort-Butler can help explain the theory in more depth and in real life circumstances that can

be compared to films. The articles discuss the vagueness and overlapping of some of the

subcategories that are found in Merton’s theory (De, C. S., & Kort-Butler, L.) This sometimes

makes it hard to classify some of our movies characters. For example, in the movie

Goodfellas, Henry Hill grew up in a blue-collar neighborhood but saw a different life form

himself. In many ways he starts as a conformist and transform into a rebel, quitting school

joining Paulie in a life of crime and drugs.

Merton’s strain theory led me to Agnew’s 3 categories of strain. The first is the

inability to achieve positive valued goals. The second is the removal or the threat to remove

positive valued stimuli. And last to represent a threat to one with noxious or negatively

valued stimuli (Agnew & White.)

Methods

I started my research and analysis by logging into the Westfield State University

libraries’ database. I searched Agnew’s general strain theory. The first article that came up

was Assessing Determinacy and Indeterminacy across Life Domains, this prompted many ideas
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about the vagueness and overlap of Merton’s five subthemes and Agnew’s more solid focused

reasons behind criminals. . This led me to search the family values of gangsters or mob

families. My next article is titled Family Values and Feudal Codes: The Social Politics of

America's Twenty-First Century Gangster, looking at these values are important to Merton’s

theory because it shows the goals and means to achieve these goals through the eyes of the

gangsters. The last article I found on the libraries database was Eating with the Mafia:

Belonging and violence, this stood out to me because of its abstract and discussion of the

tension between the Mafia and the community surrounding it. After I found these solid

articles to discuss the lifestyles and means of achievement, I decided I wanted some articles

from the Internet that further explain Agnews’s strain theory in a deeper understanding. I

found an article called Applying Merton's Strain Theory to Young People by searching

Merton’s theory and it gave a stronger focus and background of the subthemes than the

other articles I had found. After finding these articles to help me gain understanding and

analyze Agnew’s theory while looking at gangsters, mobsters, and the Mafia. Next I looked on

Google for movies that related to organized crime because my focus is to discover or

elaborate on the strain theory of gangster or mobsters life.

The Movies

The Godfather is a classic crime movie that focuses on the Italian mobster who rules a

society within a society by being a rebel. The Godfather has been said to be one of the

greatest films of all time. Based off a novel, the movie focuses on the Italian American crime

family. Starting off at the Don’s daughters wedding, we see Michael the son who seems to

have no interest in the family ‘business.’ At first he seems to be a conformist of the society

outside his family, waiting to live a normal life achieving means in a normal manner, rather

than become a rebel and join the crime life. Coming home from the army, Michael gets

thrown into his father lifestyle. The father would fall under the rebel category due to the fact
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of his manner to “reject and ignore the goals, but try to change the society itself through

deviant behaviors such as smoking, drinking, drugging, and so forth instead of going to

school” (Applying Merton’s Theory.) In the article by De Coster and Kort-Butler, it talks

about life discussions can be affected and triggered by aggression displacement causing

people to take a different path in life (2006.) The stress of family troubles on Michael’s family

led him and the family into a lifestyle that takes after Agnew’s forms of achievements.

Goodfellas

The next movie that was a good fit for Agnew’s strain theory was Goodfellas.

Goodfellas not only was a different culture than the Godfather but also showed the

background of how the character got into the culture and lifestyle and off the social norms

beaten path. Goodfellas is an amazing example Agnew’s general strain theory because it is a

movie a young man who is growing up in the mob. Agnew’s strain theory talks about the

inability to achieve goals in a proper manner. In the movie Goodfellas, Henry Hill advances

his ranks through society and the mob by means that are not considered of social norm. The

last movie I decided to look at was Scarface. I thought this was an amazing example because

it showed a powerhouse in the crime world. The means of achievement are so dramatic there

is lack of overlapping. All three movies covered drugs, killing, and some form of a gangster.

Conclusion

Overall, Agnew’s theory focuses on the goals of our society and the ways to achieve

such goals. All three movies take a culture, much different than most peoples every day life’s,

and gives a learning tool to understand the theory. The inability to achieve goals is seen

through the films in many different forms from children to adults and shows that the mobs

are ways to achieve these goals. It is seen almost every other scene the strain of removing

the possible threats such as police or different ‘royal’ families.

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The movie itself has many different forms of showing threat. Each movie took a led

character and gave a threat to one of the other characters. Guns and verbal violence really

show the means to achieve goals within this life style.

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Bibliography

AGNEW, R. and WHITE, H. R. (1992), AN EMPIRICAL TEST OF GENERAL STRAIN THEORY.

Criminology, 30: 475–500. doi: 10.1111/j.1745-9125.1992.tb01113.x

Applying Merton's Strain Theory to Young People. (2012, January 18). Retrieved March 24,
2015, from http://japansociology.com/2012/01/18/applying-mertons-strain-theory-to-
young-people/

De, C. S., & Kort-Butler, L. (January 01, 2006). How General Is General Strain Theory?
Assessing Determinacy and Indeterminacy across Life Domains. Journal of Research in Crime
and Delinquency, 43, 4, 297-325.

Fields, I. W. (May 01, 2004). Family Values and Feudal Codes: The Social Politics of America's
Twenty-First Century Gangster. The Journal of Popular Culture, 37, 4, 611-633.

The Godfather. Dir. Francis Ford Coppola. Perf. Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James 
Caan and
Diane Keaton. 1972. VHS. Paramount Home Video, 1999.

Goodfellas. Dir. Martin Scorsese. Screenplay by Nicholas Pileggi. Prod. Irwin Winkler. Perf.
Ray Liotta, Lorraine Bracco, Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, and Paul Sorvino. Goodfellas. Warner
Bros., n.d. Web. 24 Mar. 2015.

Parker, M. (January 01, 2008). Eating with the Mafia: Belonging and violence. Human
Relations, 61, 7, 989-1006.

Scarface. Bregman, M., De, P. B., Stone, O., Pacino, A., Bauer, S., Pfeiffer, M., Universal Pictures
(Firm), ... Universal Studios Home Entertainment (Firm). (2006). Universal City, CA:
Universal Studios Home Entertainment.