Rational Choice Theory - Term Paper Example

INTRODUCTION The theory of Rational Choice has significantly influenced the evolution of criminal law, crime prevention systems and law enforcement practice in many areas of the world. Answering the question why people commit crime, the theory, founded on Jeremy Bentham’s Principles of Utility, asserts that individuals who are involved in crime are rational actors, and their judgments to take part in a criminal behavior have economic basis. This idea, commonly referred to as ‘Rational Crime,’ was initially put forward by Gary Becker who contends that an individual commits an offense if the expected utility – meaning the benefits and the expected return an offender obtains – surpasses the utility he could acquire using a similar amount of time and effort utilized in other undertakings (169-217). As the influence of the Rational Choice Theory is massive, and one which helped transform the concept of justice, punishment and penal systems, it is significant to reevaluate - in the light of emerging alternative theories in criminal justice - the applications, feasibility as well as the benefits and limitations of the Rational Choice principles. APPLICATION AND INFLUENCE The application of the Rational Choice Theory on criminal justice system is massive as it is evident in our justice system. For instance, the severity of punishment or penalty for a criminal act, as apparent in our existing laws correlates to the severity of the crime committed. In the second half of the 20th century, many countries in the West including the US have turned to death penalty and capital punishment in order to deter crime. This clearly had its underpinning on the concept of Rational Choice which considers swiftness, severity and certainty of punishment as major components in the apprehending of the justice system’s ability to control human actions and behavior. As Rational Choice also places the burden of maintaining peace and order through the state’s criminal justice system or through legislations, states have codified laws which embodied the concept of the Rational Choice Theory. The record crime rates in the later part of the 20th century brought about by the failure of penal rehabilitation system to curb and prevent crime spurred the emergence of the thought. Hence, experts of criminal behavior with the aid of law enforcement and legislations shifted its focus on the ‘act’ or the criminal activity aiming mainly to make the deviant behavior or the crime ‘less attractive.’ Siegel wrote that “crime prevention… or crime reduction, maybe achieved through policies that convince criminals to desist from criminal activities” hinder their actions and evade a specific target (142). The concept of rationality further spawned and brought forth preventive strategies such as the increment in the number of law enforcers in a community, mandatory sentencing, the ‘three-strikes’ laws and other harsher penalties. As the theory is based on the concept that individuals will commit crimes if they do not fear punishments, laws and enforcement methods should be fashioned in such a way that the deviant activities are deemed negative and will be given appropriate punishment. CRITIQUE OF RATIONAL CHOICE The efficacy of the Rational Choice Theory, however, has been under question as various empirical studies point to the fact that the severity of the penalty has little effect on controlling criminal behavior. Capital punishments, for instance, do not have considerable consequence on the rates of homicide and murder. Although some studies show a correlation between perceived certainty of punishment and criminal behavior, these are weak correlations which do not offer empirical support. Other critics contend that the tendency of some criminals to be impulsive and risk-taking cause them to ignore the long-term corollaries of their behavior and focus more on the immediate benefits (Gottfredson and Hirschi, 131-142). The quest for this immediate fulfillment of a criminal desire causes individuals to feel unaffected by the possible pains of incarceration or punishment. The ‘emotional force’ of immediate desires is so strong that it overwhelms the probability of experiencing pain in the future (Fry 59). Nagin and Paternoster support this argument declaring that criminal offenders are more centered on the present rather than the future and as a result, “future consequences have only a de minimus on their decision calculus” (471). Parsons, in his work, The Structure of Social Action, believes that the calculation of the cost of a criminal act or behavior depends on an individual’s moral certainty or uncertainty. Amoral and anti-social individuals are more prone to the life of crime and the calculation of the crime’s benefits carry much weight while those whose “rule is accepted as moral obligation, the attitude of calculation is lacking” (403). The same position was put forth by Etzioni who argued that firm moral certitudes with regard inappropriateness of particular behavior generates ‘non-market’ areas in which people act in firm accord with their moral principles. This clearly illustrates that costs and benefits, for some individuals, are insignificant in determining actions and behaviors (220). This contention has been supported by other scholars. Toby notes that only amoral individuals are hindered from realizing their impulses by first weighing pleasure and punishment (333). This clearly illustrates that deterrence perception may vary according to an individual’s level of criminal proclivity. It can only mean that those who are overly moral or social can be prevented from doing a crime through moral sanctions while the ones who are extremely amoral will not be deterred at all by sanction threats. Zimring identified possible offenders occupying the middle level which he referred to as ‘marginal offenders.’ He views these offenders as considerably responsive to threats of sanction and punishments (132). Hence, the application of the Rational Choice model of preventing crime may not be effective at all since it is based on a shaky foundation – one that lacks support through empirical evidence. WEAKNESSES AND LIMITS IN IMPLEMENTATION Not only is the foundation of the Rational Choice model criticized for its lack of empirical evidence, it is also questioned for its limitations. One of the criticisms hurled against Rational Choice is its weakness to forcefully apply punishments. Very often, criminals serve less time than their assigned sentences due to parole. Hence, the estimation of the actual sanction of imprisonment is insufficient. Moreover, the duration of sentencing may not even be proportional to the punishment as calculated by the offender and these estimates are vastly approximate which in turn distorts the estimation of the punishment in relation to the criminal offense (Erlich 551-567). Other weaknesses of this model point to the fact the crime rates and trend often acquire two varying measurements as law enforcers observe that many crimes are not reported to the police (Bureau of Justice Statistics 2003). The measurement of the crime rates is significant to the implementation of the Rational Choice based model of law enforcement as this seeks to quantify crime rate and the implementation of robust law enforcement system. Yet, even this does not prevent crime but only reduces the risk of crime (Block and Lind 241-247). Moreover, protection and law enforcement aiming to reduce crime come with a great cost. The three components of law enforcement system provide that the state must form policing body to observe law violations as well as identify and apprehend the suspected offenders. The assessment of guilt comes second, normally by an independent court system; and lastly to effect punishment, corrections system, more often in the form incarceration must be put in place. In the US alone, law enforcement expenditures incurred by the government reached 161.7 billion in 2001 with annual costs speedily rising. Police expenditures take up as much 40% of these expenditures while spending in correction facilities rapidly increased which came with the fourfold increase of inmates in US prisons within the last three decades (Bureau of Statistics 2004). In addition, private entities also utilize protection in the form of alarm systems or the employment of security guards. The Bureau of Labor Statistics in the US reports that approximately a million people work as private security guards around the country. Alarm technologies have also experienced rising demand and economic growth (Ayres and Levitt 43-77). However, law enforcement experts assert that self-protection may be inefficient in deterring crime as observable self-protection such as car alarms, for instance, do not discourage offenders but rather offenders merely switch focus to another possible victim who has no observable self-protection. The expenses incurred by individual in acquiring observable self-protection normally have little or no measurable effect at all on the rate of criminal offences. Hence, their benefits do not surpass their costs. Scholars also suggest that a theory on how criminals react to the increase and decrease in law enforcement must be put forth in order to measure optimal levels of law enforcement in relation to criminal offences (Wright et al 180-213). The application of certainty and severity, two main features of the Rational Choice model, also causes problems with regards conviction of a criminal offender. Andreoni cautions that a rational judge or a jury takes into account the inevitability of wrongful convictions. As a result, a rational jury or a judge is wary of imposing punishments of equal severity to a severe crime (387-395). In some cases, convictions are not even issued (385-395). This is confirmed by existing literature on jury psychology which affirms that the severity of punishment considerably affect the possibility of conviction. However, this does not mean that crimes of higher severity do not reach conviction; in fact, research suggests that highly severe crimes have higher conviction rates. The problem is that, punishments do not usually correlate with the severity of the crime (Wright et al, 180-213). This leads us to question the efficiency of capital punishments and the death penalty in discouraging criminal offenses. Research suggests that in the application of capital punishment, the aspired rate of deterrence is normally not achieved. Decrement in crime rate is observable only when an execution occurs, yet increases again to very high levels after a period of time. It is clear, therefore, that capital punishments do not generate overall decrease in crime rate. Furthermore, comparative studies of crime rate in states that impose death penalty and states which do not, suggest an inversely proportional relationship: when a country eradicates death penalty, reduction in the rate of capital crimes is recorded (Pfohl Ch. 3). These problems are further compounded by the lack of data and statistics, crime reporting measurements and other factors that the Rational Choice model rely on for law enforcement policies. CONCLUSION It is therefore safe to assume, with the evident and current shortcomings of the Rational Choice Theory to provide a reliable and viable framework for the deterrence of criminal offenses, that its theoretical foundations - the legislative principles founded on the theory as well as the theoretical concepts which spawned from the model - be revisited and reassessed. Furthermore, ethical and moral issues also hound the principles of Rational Choice in its treatment of criminals and criminal offense. The quantification of crime, its benefits and its risks dehumanizes individuals and the enforcers of the law. It should be remembered that human beings are also involved in the deliberation of the severity of a crime as judges and jurors always consider the human factor in the issuance of punishment or convictions. The significance of the human factor in crime prevention is also lost when law enforcers are treated as commodities and when their quantity and numbers are delineated so much more than their willingness to serve their communities or their efforts to prevent harm from happening to another human being. The Rational Choice principles are useful only when factors and variables that affect enforcement and crime are perfunctory rather than entities that are mainly guided by emotions. The theory also poses the question with regards the goal of criminal justice system: Is it always to punish, or to reform? WORKS CITED Andreoni, James. “Reasonable Doubt and the Optimal Magnitude of Fines: Should the Penalty Fit the Crime?” RAND Journal of Economics, Autumn 1991, 385-95. Ayres, Ian and Steven D. Levitt. “Measuring Positive Externalities from Unobservable VictimPrecaution: An Empirical Analysis of Lojack.” Quarterly Journal of Economics, February1998, 43-77. Becker, Gary. "Crime and Punishment: an Economic Approach." Journal of Political Economy 76(1968): 169-217. Block, Michael K. and Robert C. Lind. “Crime and Punishment Reconsidered.” Journal of Legal Studies, January 1975, 241-247. Bureau of Justice Statistics. Reporting Crime to the Police, 1992-2000. Washington, D.C.:Department of Justice, March 2003. Ehrlich, Isaac. “Participation in Illegitimate Activities: A Theoretical and Empirical Investigation.” Journal of Political Economy, May-June 1973, 551-67. Etzioni, Amitai. “The Moral Dimension:Toward a NewEconomics.” NewYork: Free Press, 1988. Fry, Margery. “Arms of the Law.” London: Victor Gollancz Ltd. 1951. Gottfredson, Michael R. and Travis Hirschi. “A General Theory of Crime.” Stanford, CA:Stanford University Press, 1990. Hirschi, Travis and Michael R. Gottfredson “Control Theory and the Life-Course Perspective.” Studies on Crime and Crime-Prevention (Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention) 4(1995):131-42. Nagin, Daniel S. and Raymond Paternoster. “Enduring Individual Differences and RationalChoice Theories of Crime.” Law & Society Review 27(1993):467-96. Parsons, Talcott. “The Structure of Social Action.” New York: Free Press, 1937. Siegel, Larry. Criminology. 4th ed. New York: West Publishing, 1992. Stephan Pfohl, Images of Deviance and Social Control: A Sociological History, 2nd ed., McGraw-Hill, 1994. Toby, Jackson. “Is Punishment Necessary?” Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology, andPolice Science 55(1964):332-37. Wright et al. “Does the Perceived Risk of Punishment Deter Criminally Prone Individuals?” Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquenc, 41(2004): 180-213. Zimring, Franklin E. and Gordon J. Hawkins. “Deterrence and Marginal Groups.” Journalof Research in Crime and Delinquency 5(1968):100-14. Read More