Criminality and economic conditions

by Willem Adriaan Bonger

Some authors are of the opinion that crimes against persons are equally caused in large measure by bad economic conditions, since bad education, lack of discretion, etc. are consequences of these conditions. In Garofalo’s opinion this idea is inaccurate, since the bad conditions in which the proletariat live lead indeed to roughness, i.e. make them insensible to the suffering of others, but it does not follow that the proletarians are totally deprived of moral sentiments. The criminal statistics of Italy show that 16% of the correctional criminality was committed by property-owners, though they form but 10% to 11% of the population. Garofalo attempts to prove the truth of his thesis also by a classification of criminals by trades. The agricultural class in Italy, the poorest and most ignorant, form 25.39% of those brought before the correctional tribunals, while those engaged in manufacturing, commerce, the army, etc., those with some education, therefore, who are much less numerous in the population, form 13.58%. In 1881 the Italian population included 67.25% of illiterates, and in 1880 68.09% of those correctionally convicted were illiterate. Further it has been proved many times that an improvement in economic conditions is accompanied by an increase of crime. In France, for example, wages have risen, the consumption of cereals, like that of meat, has increased, and the number of children enjoying the advantages of a primary education is more extensive and yet criminality has grown greatly in the same period. To the possible objection “that many authors, like Mayr, have proved that the rise in the price of grain is accompanied by an increase of crimes against property, and vice versa, and that economic conditions are consequently an important cause of crime”, Garofalo responds that crimes against persons increase with the fall in the price of grain, and that consequently, by the changes in the economic life there has been [[98]]brought about a change in the kind, but not in the extent, of criminality. Exceptional occurrences, such as famines, commercial crises, etc., increase crime only in appearance. If the question is probed to the bottom (the author appears not to have done so himself, at least he does not record any results) it is probable that it will be discovered that what happens is only that the form of crime becomes more serious, that the vagrant, for example, becomes a highway-man, etc.

The conclusions that the author draws are the following:

“First. The present economic order, that is to say, the distribution of wealth as it exists today, is not a cause of criminality in general.

“Second. The fluctuations which are wont to occur in the economic order may bring about an increase in one form of criminality, but this increase is compensated for by the diminution of another form. These fluctuations are, therefore, possible causes of specific criminality.”[15]

—My criticism of what has gone before will be limited to some principal points only.

First. The author dodges the question when he includes under economic conditions poverty only, and this in the very limited sense of the lack of the absolute necessities. He who writes upon the connection between crime and economic conditions must analyze the whole present economic system, and not stop with one of the consequences of that system, the poverty in which the proletarians find themselves. Consequently Garofalo’s whole argument, tending to show that the bourgeoisie have a great part in the crimes against property, is beside the mark, for capitalism results in great uncertainty of existence for the bourgeoisie also. It is then quite comprehensible that this class should be guilty of crimes of this kind. According to Fornasari di Verce, however, the Italian statistics show that the well-to-do class take less part in crime than the poor. According to him 13% of all those convicted in 1887 were well-to-do, a class which, roughly speaking, forms 40% of the whole population. (See also Colajanni, “La Sociologia Criminale”, II, pp. 536 ff.)

In consequence of this arbitrary restriction of the subject the author’s remarks are of little value. But aside from this there are still serious charges to be made against his manner of treating the subject.

Second. The assertion of Garofalo that in general in our present society he who wishes to work can find work, is not worth combating in a serious book. To say that machinery does not every day make [[99]]some workers unnecessary, that there are no industrial crises causing an enormous amount of involuntary unemployment, is conclusive proof that one does not know the present mode of production. The existence of a group of the population, the so-called lower proletariat (“bas-prolétariat”, “Lumpen-proletariat”) cannot be a natural phenomenon, since it has not been always and everywhere present; it is strictly bound up with certain modes of production.

Third. As I have had occasion to show already in more than one place, the increase of crimes against persons during periods of prosperity has a very great, though indirect, connection with economic conditions.

Fourth. That poverty in the strict sense of the word is not the sole cause of economic criminality, that cupidity plays also an important rôle, I do not wish to deny. Only, this cupidity is not an innate quality of man, present everywhere and always, but is awakened only under certain economic conditions. This is especially the case in our present society.