I.
F. Turati.
In the first chapter of his “Il delitto e la questione sociale”, the author shows that among the numerous misfortunes from which the proletariat suffers, this must be reckoned, that it is almost exclusively from its ranks that criminals are recruited. “The criminal tribute is the almost exclusive privilege of one social class. And as the bourgeoisie has so far thought out no better plan than to oppose the degradation of crime with another degradation called punishment, it has come about that to the monopoly of the criminal tribute is added, for the poor, the monopoly of the penal tribute.”[2] [[211]]
After having spoken, in the following chapter, of “free will”, Dr. Turati gives his attention to an opinion of Dr. Lelorrain, who says that we must modify man if we wish to make criminality disappear or decrease. Dr. Turati objects that it is exceedingly difficult to change man, and that there is an easier and more effective way, namely to change society. In a society where everything is bad, where the exploitation of one by the other is the rule, where the enjoyment of some goes on at the detriment of others, and this under the protection of the law—in such a society there is a perpetual incitement to crime. It is the ideal of socialism to create a society in which crime shall be neither necessary nor advantageous. However short its duration, the colony of New Lanark founded by Owen, is one of the best proofs of the correctness of this idea. In a society formed in accordance with this socialistic ideal, crime would appear only exceptionally, by atavism, for example, and would cease to be a general and always threatening danger.
“The social penal question is a question above all of social transformation.” Many objections have been made to this statement. The school of Lombroso and Ferri sets up in opposition its theory of the triplex character of the factors of crime; cosmic, individual, and social. When society is so modified that the interests of the individual are identical with those of the community, it would be only one part of crime that would disappear; one could not, for example, prevent an extraordinary heat from causing crimes against morals.
According to Dr. Turati it is not impossible to refute this objection, though it may be difficult to do so. In the first place Ferri recognizes the social causes as more important than the other two put together. He estimates that the number of persons driven to crime by social reasons (passion and occasion) is more than 60%; the others (insane or half-insane criminals, born-incorrigibles, and habituals) form a minority, then. But among these there are many criminals by habit, who were not born as such, but have become such from force of circumstances. Dr. Turati estimates that from 70% to 75% of criminals have come to commit their crimes from social causes. When we take account further of the fact that about 18% of the prisoners are insane, the number of real criminals who have become such from other than social causes is reduced to 10% at the most.
According to Dr. Turati the physical and anthropological factors exert an influence upon the form, but not upon the nature, of the crime. Further, these three causes are present in every crime, but [[212]]almost no crime would be committed without the social cause. It is this last that is always the predominant factor. When it is removed, then, the other two are reduced to zero. The facts have proved this. Owen’s colony was not made up of peculiar material, and the physical surroundings were neither better nor “more honest” than any other. Nevertheless, crime was unknown there. But the author furnishes still further proofs in support of his thesis that physical and anthropological causes amount to nothing in comparison with social causes, which in turn are dependent upon economic conditions. With the exception of crimes committed by the propertied class, which are in general the result of excessive cupidity, or a commercial uneasiness, and which will “ipso facto” disappear without any doubt when once society is otherwise organized, the greatest contingent of criminals is furnished by the class of non-possessors. Now all the physical influences, such as climate, act upon the two classes in the same way, nor are there anthropological differences between the two classes, yet the difference between them as regards criminal tendencies is great. It is the social factors, then, that explain the difference.
However, another observation must be made here. Ferri cites in a mass, as social factors, the increase of population, emigration, public opinion, customs, etc. But when we examine and classify these factors minutely, it becomes clear that in reality they are based upon economic conditions alone.
However, this observation is not applicable to “criminals by passion”, since in their case the influence of the environment appears to be but weak. Lombroso estimates that they form 5% of all criminals, and Ferri is of the opinion that it is only 5% of those who commit crimes against persons who are criminals by passion.