Radical victimology views criminal conduct as a by-product of the structural organization of the society, the state’s input, and the legal system that play a role in defining a victim or offender. This perspective does not entail a self-evidenced definition of a victim as it includes those who undergo oppression in the hands of the powerful and those who undertake state duties, such as the police (Victims, victimization and victimology, n.d.). This theory perceives offenders as the primary victims of an oppressive governance system but tends to overlook others who are affected by the actions of the offenders. Poor members of the society have often fallen prey of victimization and this has left the guilty among the bourgeois members leading their lives at the expense of the innocent poor who take responsibility of their misdeeds (Victims, Victimization and Victimology, n.d.).
Victim blaming places the responsibility of the crime on the offended individuals rather than offenders. Sexual assault cases, for instance, tend to associate the traits of the victim with the occurrence of the crime against him or her. The behavior of victim blaming is mostly founded on distinctive attitudes toward the male and female genders. Other characteristics of victim blaming is that it may be founded on the society’s expectations of how the various genders should behave (Crippen, 2015). Some communities, for instance, allow men to be explorative in sexual issues, a factor that leads to the blame of women in rape cases. The way of dressing of the woman has particularly attracted great attention in justifying men’s engagement in a rape crime (Beiner, 2007).
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The major similarity between radical victimization and victim blaming is that both are founded on the society’s predetermined attributes of a crime or the offender. In radical victimization, the powerful utilize their influence to have others face the legal system without necessarily committing a crime. In victim blaming, the society allows some attributes of the subordinate groups to be used in justifying some crimes committed against them by the superior ones. As such, women are at times blamed for sex assault against them and this sees the offender freed from a trial or receiving a relatively less severe punishment (Crippen, 2015). Another similarity is that both theories involve the oppression of the victim rather than the offender. In radical victimization, the victim against whom a crime is committed tends to be ignored. The offender becomes the victim as he is arrested and molested by those who undertake state duties on behalf of the government. In victim blaming, the person against whom the crime is committed is exposed to shame by having him or her take the responsibility of the crime(s).
A major difference between the two theories is that radical victimization is founded on the structural framework of the society while victim blaming tends toward the social and cultural aspects of the society. In radical victimization, it is the legal system or the state’s functions that oppress the victim while in victim blaming, the society’s expectations of the individuals’ way of life play a critical role in determining the outcomes of a crime. Again, the offender tends to be the victim in radical victimization and the self-evident victim is overlooked. This implies that a thief who is arrested by police becomes the victim while the victim of the theft is ignored. The thief’s victimization arises from the oppression he or she undergoes in the hands of the police and other authorities. In victim blaming, the offended person carries the responsibility of the crime leading to leniency in the way the offender is punished.
References
Beiner, T. M. (2007). Sexy dressing revisited: Does target dress play a part in sexual harassment cases? Duke Journal of Gender Law & Policy, 14 (1), 125-152.
Crippen, M. (2015). Theories of victim blame. Senior Honors Project, 66. Retrieved from http://collected.jcu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1065&context=honorspapers on 16/5/2016
Victims, victimization and victimology (n.d.) In Understanding victims and restorative justice, pp.13-40. Retrieved from https://www.mheducation.co.uk/openup/chapters/0335209807.pdf 16/5/2016
