In the last two decades, criminology in the United States has witnessed a transformation of its fundamental paradigms for understanding and interpreting the dynamic aspects of crime and delinquency. The founders and explorers of crime and delinquency formulated several theoretical approaches to understand the causes, remedies, and prevention of criminal activities. This essay firstly traces the contributions of Gabriel Tarde and Cesare Lombroso in the development of psychological-oriented theories and how the theories have changed. Secondly, the biblical justice system substitute to criminology theories is explored.
Firstly, Gabriel solely focused on the behavioral aspect of delinquency. He developed his theory by merging the elements of psychology and interaction (King, 2016) . He emphasized the role of the social environment in modeling criminal demeanor. Little has changed since the development of these theories, as current researches have supported Gabriel's theories by asserting that the social environment greatly contributes to modeling a criminal (McLeod, 2020) . However, various researchers have used his work as a foundation for other theories such as social control theory and social disorganization theory. Additionally, modern theorists have focused on the relationship between crime, delinquency, and the contributing factors.
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Besides, Lombroso successfully explored the biological, social, and psychological aspects contributing to crime and delinquency, applied in contemporary psychological-based theories. In his text, “ Criminal Man ," he refers to an individual as a habitual criminal given that he/she acquires the behavior from the societal environment (Lombroso, 2015, p. 24) . Many theorists have used his findings as a basis for their research. However, modern theorists have now focused on how psychology contributes to criminal behavior. For example, modern theorists have tried to determine the relationship between issues like self-control and aggressive behavior, and crime. Additionally, modern theories have focused on how an individual’s environment, such as parental supervision, gender, and other issues, models criminal behavior. More so, some modern criminal theories support Lombroso’s theories by concluding that social environment affects criminal behavior.
The western criminal justice system draws most of its concepts from the long American theological roots, and as such, it can be effectively be substituted with the biblical justice system. The biblical alternative is based on people as moral agents and God’s retributive justice. Based on God's attributes of justice and righteousness and the laws presented in the Bible, people are easily aware of what is wrong or right (Proverbs 89:14) . Just as how the criminology theories convict lawbreakers, sin is also punishable by just pain, as seen when God chases the disobedient Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:24) . Finally, the biblical system has restorative justice, which also exists in criminology as amnesty. For instance, through God’s restorative justice and love, He forgives the Israelites (Isaiah 40-55) . The great correlation between God's system and the modern-day criminology theories implies how effective the biblical system can substitute them.
References
Bible. (2019, April). Genesis 3:24 . Oremus Bible. https://bible.oremus.org/?passage=Genesis%203:24&version=nrsv
Bible, O. (2019, April 29). Isaiah 40-55 . Oremus Bible Browser. http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=274695517
Bible, O. (2019, April). Proverbs 89:14 . Oremus Bible. http://bible.oremus.org/?passage=psalm+89.14&vnum=no&version=nrsvae
King, A. (2016, April 7). Gabriel Tarde and Contemporary Social Theory. Sociological Theory, 34 (1), 45-61. https://doi.org/10.1177/0735275116632558
Lombroso, C. (2015). Criminal man. Sage Publications.
McLeod, S. (2020). The Psychodynamic Approach . Simply Psychology: https://www.simplypsychology.org/psychodynamic.html
