Crime a Socially Constructed One's conduct or deeds turn into a crime or an offence via a progression of societal or communal conditioning. The same deed can be regarded as wrong in one community and act of valor in another or in the same community at a different point in time. The lawful status of a deed-whether it is an offense-does not depend on its substance, but on the communal reaction to that deed or to the individual who does it (Rosenfeld, 2009). Shifts in the lawful status of a particular deed can be due to communal changes or may be part of serious communal differences. The latest debates and confrontations over assisted suicide and abortion policy are two fine examples in the U.S. Lastly, the communal reaction to crime, social science theories on illegal behavior included, is founded on the significance of the deed and also the communal and ethical standing of the perpetrator and the offended (Rosenfeld, 2009).

Beliefs and values, and social conditioning assert that the definition of deeds, conducts and occurrences are not held as to their actual values but are regarded as to the standards given to them via communal interactions. Implying that, they are communally defined and structured thus under the influence of societal shifts (Rosenfeld, 2009). With regards to the communal conditioning viewpoint, a given deed (racism, domestic violence, DUIs) turns into a communal concern via the course of effective assertions by communal organizations that front a certain meaning of an issue or concern and then gather all kinds of communal reactions (medical therapy, incarceration, or mental evaluation)

Criminological School of Thought

Variants and social management assertion is that the meaning of crime or an offense is a one-sided opinion. Incarceration in correctional facilities, separation from family, punishment, confinement, and disgrace are the outcomes of crime. Particular deeds become criminal when legislations are formulated and enforced against those acts (O'Connor, 2010). The societal danger perception is usually more applied to financial crime. This perception brings into focus the biasness and unjust nature of the crimes that penalize the perpetrators and the crimes that penalize firms but not the individuals behind them. For example, British Petroleum (BP) is compensating the affected parties at an enormous cost for its destructive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, although it is not probable that staffs will be held personally liable. On the other hand a petty drug peddling charge can attract couple of years in confinement (O'Connor, 2010).

Legal sociology experts may perceive this as a dangerous societal act. In terms of human rights, the infringement part has a deeper definition to an offense. In this case the crime is not restricted to singular acts of individual injury but it also views the bigger picture that fights the widely communally accepted offenses that affect an individual's right to have an honorable way of life. This extends to many areas of existence such as sexual inequality, right to labor and basic education and racial or ethnic bias. It is anchored on the ideals of the Declaration of Independence to defend life, freedom and the pursuit of happiness for every individual. The sin perception shows the parallels between religion and criminology (O'Connor, 2010). It connects the similarities between a sinful mind and delinquency. Although several social scientists have highlighted the pointlessness of acknowledging that sin causes sin, they all accept that legislations demand that the perpetrators accept blame, and by extension admit that they are offenders.

The Surfacing of the Injured Party

The branches of criminal law and criminology have concentrated, over the years, on the unlawfulness of the offender than the criminally offended or victimized. Still, a variety of changes in the way of thinking, technological feats and communal and political influences have since the late sixties issued a basis whereby the models of victimization did surface. The perception that crime was more than simply the conduct of the perpetrator was already widely accepted among academics in the late 20th century (Wilcox, 2010).

It was then perceived as a scheme or system with the perpetrator and victim as components and the location and time viewed as instruments that aided in the victimization of the victim by the criminal. Apart...

The formation of the National Crime Survey in the seventies, was particularly helpful in collecting huge amounts of data on crime occurrences in the victims opinion and analysis of this data every year (Wilcox, 2010). This countrywide exercise created a platform for numerous other crime occurrence/victimization surveys in local societies and different settings such as high schools and colleges. These surveys were judged against official police reports; this allowed analysts to approximate more precisely the occurrence and frequency of crime in the community due to the fact that they summed up crime events whether they were reported to the authorities or not (Wilcox, 2010).
Lastly, in the early sixties, politically correct social organizations were willing to deliver more support to the offended and to entrench their rights in the justice system. The reaction to this movement was that more activities and functions were provided to the system to assist the victims towards recovery, and channels were opened to allow victim participation in the course of justice through witness statements. The merge between these social changes and the technological advancements provided a perfect environment for the surfacing of the different models on the views on victimization (Wilcox, 2010).

These attribution viewpoints concentrated on broad causative sways, including different lifestyles, day-to-day routines, social dynamics and inequality. The models of victimization are different. They include; those that think of victimization as part of the societal relations dynamics between the offended and the perpetrator, those that hold victimization as a part of the societal gap in terms of domination (Wilcox, 2010).

These different opinions are backed by practical studies recorded in different literature. This then presents victimization as a multifaceted occurrence, which is the outcome of many wide communal and circumstantial influences (Wilcox, 2010). Even though these models can be viewed as contending and perhaps studied separately there is no contention that they all have advantages and they help in giving a complete picture of what victimization is.

What is Crime?

From a societal conditioning viewpoint, an offense or a crime is a categorization of a particular conduct by people in power and with the influence to form legislations that identify some deeds as unlawful and penalize the culprits (Henry, 2009). In the first world countries, lawmakers and courts have the jurisdiction to determine and specify what is criminal and penalize the perpetrators. The deeds they categorize as offensive shows their own beliefs and interest, and the societal cultures and moral standing, especially that of the most vocal part of the community (Henry, 2009).

But, what is regarded as lawful or unlawful conduct in these categorizations changes not only in the whole community but in different segments of it, this also changes as time goes by (Henry, 2009). For example in industrialized countries, even with the huge losses incurred by the victims, offenders in financial crimes were up to the close of the twentieth century, mostly unpunished, the reasoning was that since these were offenses in business, the crimes were not regarded as substantial or real despite affecting many victims who incurred losses many times more than that of the average street crime (an ordinary robbery in the U.S. results in about $1,200, a bank robbery nets about $4,300, an embezzlement in a bank takes about $17,000, while a typical white collar crime ranges from $5-300 million dollars)

The irony is that the bank embezzler is usually punished leniently getting perhaps just 5 years in probation, while the ordinary bank robber can be incarcerated for about 20 to 30 years. How the jury leans whether to acquit or convict a suspect for an offense will sometimes show local and not countrywide values, for example, when the grand jury did not indict for a homicide a Texan, who shot and killed burglars in his neighbors' house (Henry, 2009).

Determination of a Crime and Victimization

Determination or measurement of a crime is part of criminal justice, which is critical but often assumed by criminologist (Addington). This is not good, because precise information is required to ascertain models of crime perpetration and victimization and to check how successful public policies are in dealing with crime. Crime data originates mainly from police reports, victim surveys and self reports by perpetrators (Addington).

The bulk of activity in determining how crime is ascertained concentrates on the information gathered in the U.S. The determination and analysis of United States Crime data possibly has a wider applicability, due to the fact that U.S. programs including the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) have been used as structures for information gathering in other nations.

The Justice Department employs the use of NCVS and UCR to determine how big, how expansive and how different and the effect of crime…