Clifford Robe Shaw

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Clifford Robe Shaw (* 1895 in Luray , Indiana ; † 1957 ) was an American sociologist and criminologist . As a student of Ernest W. Burgess, he is a member of the Chicago School of Sociology . Together with Henry D. McKay , he built the urban ecological Concentric Zone Theory by Robert E. Park into a theory of social disorganization . In the version of Shaw and McKay it belongs to the criminal sociology textbook knowledge. He is also considered a pioneer of the biographical process in sociology.

Life

Shaw grew up as the son of a farmer in a small farming community in Indiana. At first he studied to become a clergyman, but then, after completing his military service in 1918, turned to sociology and studied at the University of Chicago . He never earned a PhD and worked part-time with parolees at the Illinois State Training School from 1921 to 1923 and as a probation officer from 1924 to 1926. In 1926 he was appointed Research Director of the Illinois Department of Public Welfare's Institute for Juvenile Research on the recommendation of Burgess .

Social Disorganization Theory

The Concentric Zone Theory is based on a model in which the city center is surrounded by other areas in the form of concentric circles. The business center tends to expand outwards. This creates a region surrounding the center, the transition zone , in which a heterogeneous population with a low social status lives. These people often live in unstable families and poor quality housing, according to Shaw and McKay. According to the theory, they carry out criminal acts far more frequently than residents of other parts of the city, whereby their ethnicity does not play a significant role. In the zones surrounding the transition zone , the crime rate is falling again noticeably.

Shaw and McKay explained the phenomenon they observed by saying that the structural change emanating from the business center was causing social disorganization in the neighboring transition zone . Traditional institutions such as neighborhoods, schools and families no longer played a stabilizing role there, which means that there is no consensus on values ​​and norms. Furthermore, delinquent behavior in such a disorganized social environment would be learned from those who have already acquired these attitudes.

Fonts (selection)

  • Delinquency Areas. A Study of the Geographic Distribution of School Truants, Juvenile Delinquents, and Adult Offenders in Chicago , University of Chicago Press, 1929
  • The natural history of a delinquent career . The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1931 (new edition: Greenwood Press, New York 1968).
  • Brothers in Crime , University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1941.
  • Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas , University of Chicago Press; New edition edition 1972 (first edition 1942), with Henry D. McKay
  • The Jack Roller. A Delinquent Boy's Own Story , University of Chicago Press, Chicago 2013, with a foreword by Howard S. Becker (first edition 1930).

literature

  • Jon Snodgrass: Clifford R. Shaw and Henry D. McKay. Chicago Criminologists . The British Journal of Criminology, Volume 16, Issue 1, January 1976, pages 1-19.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Stefanie Eifler : Kriminalsoziologie , Bielefeld 2002, p. 21 f.
  2. ^ Rolf Lindner : The discovery of urban culture. Sociology from the experience of reporting. New edition with a current epilogue, Campus, Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 183.
  3. ↑ Biographical information is based on: Rolf Lindner, The discovery of urban culture. Sociology from the experience of reporting. New edition with a current epilogue, Campus, Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 183 f.
  4. ↑ Stefanie Eifler: Kriminalsoziologie , Bielefeld 2002, p. 22.
personal data
SURNAME Shaw, Clifford Robe
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Shaw, Clifford R.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American sociologist and criminologist
DATE OF BIRTH 1895
PLACE OF BIRTH Indiana , United States
DATE OF DEATH 1957