“III. When the social transformation or revolution which the socialists desire has taken place, the social atmosphere will be most favorable.
“IV. In the socialistic order the individual also will be much superior to the man corrupted or demoralized by present conditions.
“V. And then crime, like poverty, ignorance, prostitution, and immorality in general, will have ended its unhappy tyranny over the human race.”
—It is not certain that an adherent of scientific socialism would agree that these theses are entirely accurate; for example, the second, that the bad economic condition of the population is the cause of crime—for the expression “economic condition” has here too limited a meaning, namely that of poverty, misery, etc. In place of this he [[101]]would rather make use of the expression, “mode of production.” It is this which, in the last analysis, rules the whole social life, according to the Marxists.—
The first chapter of Professor Ferri’s work, bearing the title of “la genesi sociale e individuale del delitto”, begins by remarking that the socialists blame society as the cause of all evils, including poverty and crime. On the one hand, they do this because of their “strategy of propaganda”, on the other hand it is a reaction against the extreme individualism which sprang from the French Revolution. They generally pay no attention to individual factors, or perhaps recognize them in part, but attribute their origin to society also. Between these two extremes is to be found criminal sociology, which says that the causes of crime are manifold.
According to the author there are three groups of the factors of crime: the anthropological or individual factors, the cosmic or physical factors, and the social factors. Since many authors, wholly or partially, share this view, which constitutes an attack against the very foundation of the idea of the social origin of crime, we will examine it here fully.
We take from “Sociologie criminelle”, where this doctrine is best set forth, the following statement of it. “Every crime is the resultant of individual, physical, and social conditions.”[18] The individual factor is, according to the author, the most important, the primordial factor, so to speak, for he says: “The social environment gives form to the crime; but this has its origin in an anti-social biological constitution (organic or psychic).”[19] The factors pointed out are the following:
“The anthropological factors, inherent in the person of the criminal, are the first condition of crime, and divide themselves into three subclasses, according as the person of the criminal is looked at from an organic, psychic, or social point of view.
“The organic constitution of the criminal constitutes the first subclass of anthropological factors and includes all the anomalies of the skull, brain, viscera, sensibility, reflex activity, and all bodily characteristics in general, such as physiognomy, tattooing, etc.