A-Level Sociology: global, green and state crime

One of the content areas of Crime and Deviance in A-level Sociology (for example, AQA A-level Sociology 7192, Paper 3) is 'globalisation and crime in contemporary society; the media and crime; green crime; human rights and state crimes'. These topics move the study of crime away from individual offenders towards transnational networks, corporations and states, and they are a common source of extended questions. This material covers all four.

The quiz starts with globalisation: Castells's global criminal economy, traced through an invented drug supply chain, Taylor's Marxist argument that neoliberal globalisation creates crime at both ends of the class structure, and Hobbs and Dunnighan's 'glocal' networks. Green crime follows, with Beck's risk society, White's contrast between anthropocentric and ecocentric views, the transgressive approach that defines green crime by harm rather than law, and South's distinction between primary and secondary green crimes.

State crime is next. You classify an invented case of torture using McLaughlin's four categories, explain an atrocity with Kelman and Hamilton's idea of crimes of obedience (authorisation, routinisation and dehumanisation) and recognise Stanley Cohen's spiral of state denial. The last questions deal with the media: the news values that make some crimes front-page news and leave others unreported, and Wall's four types of cybercrime.

Each quiz question describes an invented company, government, network or newspaper and has one defensible answer; each explanation adds the context or criticism you would need to use the idea in an essay.

The material offers four formats. The 12-question quiz explains each answer. The 16-card flashcard deck covers the key concepts, from the global criminal economy to Gerbner's research on fear of crime. The printable written work sets eight open questions, from outlining two categories of state crime to assessing whether the media cause crime and fear of crime, with ruled space for handwritten answers that are then checked. The oral exam puts you in front of an examiner who asks one question at a time, follows up on your reasoning and gives brief feedback at the end.

Use it once you know the main theories of crime, to extend them to crimes that cross borders and to crimes committed by powerful organisations and states.

• Explain how globalisation has changed crime, using Castells, Taylor and Hobbs and Dunnighan
• Explain green crime using Beck's risk society, White's anthropocentric and ecocentric views and South's typology
• Evaluate legal and transgressive definitions of green and state crime
• Classify state crimes and explain them using Kelman and Hamilton and Cohen's techniques of denial
• Explain how news values shape the media's picture of crime and assess the link between the media, crime and fear of crime
• Classify cybercrime using Wall's four categories

Practice material written by Zestly, based on the Crime and Deviance topic of A-level Sociology specifications (for example AQA A-level Sociology 7192, specification version 1.2, section 4.3.1: globalisation and crime in contemporary society; the media and crime; green crime; human rights and state crimes).