Seductions of Criminology: Katz on Magical Meanness and Other Distractions

Abstract

Seductions of Crime is an important book, not because it resolves the problems of theoretical criminology (it does not) but because it pressures criminologists to reconsider their assumptions and methods-and their politics. Katz identifies conceptual and methodological shortcomings in much criminological research, but his own work exemplifies some of the distractions that limit the scope and power of our inquiries. The major premise is that traditional criminology has failed to explain criminal behavior because social variables (class, ethnicity, etc.) have been treated as if they directly caused individual behavior. (Merton's anomie theory is especially criticized as the prototype of such theorizing.) Katz argues that research stemming from traditional theories has consequently been off target, characterized by a background to foreground approach unable to get at the motivational dynamics of actual individuals electing to commit deviant acts. The meaning of deviance for