Gale Encyclopedia of American Law Volume 3 P33 fully illuminates today's leading cases, major statutes, legal terms and concepts, notable persons involved with the law, important documents and more. Legal issues are fully discussed in easy-to-understand language, including such high-profile topics as the Americans with Disabilities Act, capital punishment, domestic violence, gay and lesbian rights, physician-assisted suicide and thousands more. | 308 CRIMINOLOGY contemporary social upheavals. Critical criminology relies on economic explanations of behavior and argues that economic and social inequalities cause criminal behavior. It focuses less on the study of individual criminals and advances the belief that existing crime cannot be eliminated within the capitalist system. It also asserts like the conflict school that law has an inherent bias in favor of the upper or ruling class and that the state and its legal system exist to advance the interests of the ruling class. Critical criminologists argue that corporate political and environmental crime are underreported and inadequately addressed in the current criminal justice system. Feminist criminology emphasizes the subordinate position of women in society. According to feminist criminologists women remain in a position of inferiority that has not been fully rectified by changes in the law during the late twentieth century. Feminist criminology also explores the ways in which women s criminal behavior is related to their objectification as commodities in the sex industry. Others using the social-structural approach have studied gangs juvenile delinquency and the relationship between family structure and criminal behavior. Social-Process Criminology Social-process criminology theories attempt to explain how people become criminals. These theories developed through recognition of the fact that not all people who are exposed to the same social-structural conditions become criminals. They focus on criminal behavior as learned behavior. Edwin H. Sutherland 1883-1950 a . sociologist and criminologist who first presented his ideas in the 1920s and 1930s advanced the theory of differential association to explain criminal behavior. He emphasized that criminal behavior is learned in interaction with others usually in small groups and that criminals learn to favor criminal behavior over noncriminal behavior through association with both forms of behavior in .
