Social Institutions and Organized Crime
Paul Blakey
University of Phoenix
CJA 384
30 January 2013

Social Institutions and Organized Crime Social Institutions are groups of people who have come together for a common purpose. These institutions have formed a common bond. They have done research and have concluded by joining they can achieve more. Some of the social institutions in the local community are the Boys and Girls Clubs, the Cub Scouts, the Girl Scouts. There are generally five different types of social institutions. They are political, educational, religious, economic, and family. Each is filled with members of a common goal. Organized crime organizations have adopted the philosophy of social institutions. They
Rational choice theory suggests that people who commit crimes do so after considering the punishment and the rewards. When they believe the rewards are greater than the punishment, they commit the crimes. Everyone has a choice in what they do in America. This rational choice to commit crimes is just one of the bad ones. To combat the rational choice theory, law makers have devised the deterrence theory.
The belief of law makers is crime can be lessened by the threat of punishment. There is a general deterrence theory and a special deterrence theory. An example of general deterrence theory is capital punishment. Capital punishment is to discourage people from committing crime because they fear they will be put to death. The special deterrence theory is designed to keep offenders from ever committing a crime again. Its consequences may be to send a first time marijuana user to a six-month boot camp to deter him from using again. Each theory is used when studying how to combat organized crime in social institutions. Because most organized crime families are run like businesses it is hard to detect. The secrecy and loyalty are unmatched in legitimate businesses. The president of the local golf club may be the same man running the city’s racketeering business. He is using the same structure and methods. The difference is