This essay is based on Cary Federman's Review of Erich Fromm and Critical Criminology: Beyond the Punitive Society in the Candian Journal of Sociology.

Cary Federman's Bio

Remember that you need to balance by consideration of the perspective your author brings, of the audience he/she is writing to. Cary Federman's reference to the practical aspects of law enforcement alerted me to a perspective.

" In the final essay, Fromm asks: “Can psychoanalytical insight into the causes and motives of crime be of any practical use”? (147). Fromm recognized that, in the battle to explain crime, psychology always loses to the forces of law and order. Rather than arguing that psychiatry will provide further insights into criminal behavior (though he holds out the hope), Fromm argues for its utility. He wants to return psychology to its forensic roots, as an adjunct to chemistry and medicine, in an effort to buttress criminal factfinding (148). In a book laden with abstract and utopian observations about the psychology of crime, this is a practical solution that deserved deeper discussion."

Having some knowledge of who Cary Federman is affiliated with helps me place this critique in perspective. I agree with much that he suggests, that we need to beware of the Pollyannaish, icky-poo sweet, jejune approach, into which we all slip occasionally. But I am equally distressed by the forensic approach which ignores the humane aspect of making a good faith effort to understand alternative validity claims. The forensic approach, in the interest of practical advice on how to "prevent crime" often gives short shrift to the interdependence recognized by constitutive theory.

More to come . . .

Notes: judgment, believing that we know just from keywords for which we have preconceived definitions, prevents us from hearing. Learning, and in these leading edge issues we are all learning still, comes from listening for what there is in the oppositional argument that can give us a clue to examine more closely our own unstated assumptions. Reference to the story on religion from theory class.

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