Born on May 16, 1934, at Elkhorn, Wisconsin, U.S, Richard Quinney is a well-known American philosopher and criminologist identified for his approach to criminal justice research which is critical and philosophical (Bernard,2018). He received his first degree from Carroll College in 1956 which saw him kick-start his career as a Sociology graduate trainee at North-western University. Once he completed his M.A degree Richard joined The University of Wisconsin at Madison in 1957, the main focus of his Ph.D. work included studies in criminology, sociological theory, and statistics. His dissertation which examined white collar crime has become a constantly reviewed paper in criminal studies. While completing his dissertation he took up a full time teaching position at St. Lawrence University in 1960 (Wozniak, 2010) . Quinney then moved to the University of Kentucky where he worked as an assistant professor. It was at this time that he ventured into further research on law and crime focusing on the local crime patterns. He went ahead and began to write and publish articles related to methodological and theoretical issues in crime and criminal law.
According to (Wozniak, Cullen, & Platt, 2011), Quinney has authored over 30 books and nearly 80 articles in his lifetime and is among the top ten most cited scholars in criminology. In one of his earliest works, Quinney examined white collar crime showing how white collar criminals are given different official treatment compared to street criminals. He generalized this concern by creating the conflict theory which states that coercion and power of people play a major part in their ability to exercise authority over the powerless so as to create social order. With this theory, Quinney helped describe the conflict between capitalism and socialism, showing how capitalist societies struggle to belong to the dominant class to be able to dictate how laws are made putting themselves in a superior position. As in most of his theories, Richard followed Marxism, with one of its contention stating that in a capitalist society, crime is always inevitable with the root cause being social inequality. In his theory of sociology, a politically categorized society creates laws to interpret the interest of the individuals at the highest classes in this societies. Richard wrote about this theory to illustrate how the powerful people in the society, who are the lawmakers create laws that are a reflection of their public policies.
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Among his famous books is ‘The Social reality of crime (1970)” where he concludes that the public conceptions of crime are created in political arenas and are meant to serve political purposes. In 1974, he took a neo-Marxist approach in his “ Critique of Legal Order” where he came up with a theory on legal order whose main intent was to explain the false consciousness that was created by official reality. In 1977, he continued to build his work in the book “Class, State and Crime” where he argues that crime is a part of a society’s structure claiming that those in power are the ones who create the laws, therefore, protecting their interests instead of the interests of the bigger public (Bernard, 2018). In this book, Richard touched on the criminal justice system labeling it an agent of oppression created to maintain the status quo.
Later in his care, Quinney seemed to focus on the creation of morally upright and peaceful societies, he illustrated this in his book “ Providence: The Reconstruction of Social and Moral Order (1980).” When he moved from his usual neo-Marxism to religious and spiritual approaches. Quinney’s decision to shift to peace-making was particularly influenced by the Buddhist views on suffering and the end of suffering. He aimed at advocating responses to crime that did not involve violence. Through his autobiographical reflections and photographic essays, Richard has been able to examine people’s culture, customs, and habits.
It is with no doubt that Richard Quinney contribution to criminal law has been massive. This has not gone unnoticed as he has been celebrated a number of times through awards, In 1984, The American Society of Criminology awarded him The Edwin H. Sutherland Award for his outstanding contribution to criminology. The society also recognized him in 1998 under the Critical Criminology Division by presenting him with the Major Achievement Award. In 1986, Quinney was awarded the Fulbright Lecture and Research Award at the University College in Galway under the Department of Political Science and Sociology. The Western Society of Criminology in 1992 awarded him with the President’s award. In 2009, he received yet another award, the Sullivan Tift Award from the Justice Studies Association for his “outstanding service to the academic discipline of criminology for the past 40 years” (Wozniak, 2010) .
Quinney’s legacy for criminal law and criminology is multiple and was based on people experiencing social injustices and personal ignominies. The work he has done over the course of four decades, addressing the study of crime in an engaging, uplifting and constantly evolving style cannot be compared to anyone else in the field of criminology. Taking a look into his works, it is clear that Richard is a man whose career’s main focus was the common people.
References
Bernard, T. J. (2018, May 12). Richard Quinney | American philosopher and criminologist. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/biography/Richard-Quinney
Wozniak, J. F. (2010). Quinney, Richard: Social Transformation and Peace-making Criminology. Encyclopaedia of Criminological Theory , 754-764. doi:10.4135/9781412959193.n208
Wozniak, J. F., Cullen, F. T., & Platt, T. (2011). Richard Quinney’s The Social Reality of Crime: A Marked Departure from and Reinterpretation of Traditional Criminology. Social Justice Journal , 41 (3), 197-213. Retrieved from http://www.socialjusticejournal.org/archive/137_41_3/137_11_Wozniak.pdf
